Spend a few minutes watching the countless insults, accusations and conspiracy theories leveled between Red Bull team principal Christian Horner and Mercedes-AMG boss Toto Wolff and you might get the impression that people In charge of the big open wheel racing teams are smug, self-righteous clowns.
As recently Formula one As the season culminates, the incessant bickering between the two billionaires during and after each weekend becomes exhausting. In the midst of their toxic wits — verbal battles — I find myself thanking Michael Shank, owner of the IndyCar team, who has never been in F1, for being everything. they are not.
Say hello to the most real team owner in motor racing.
Shank’s arm is full of tattoos. His ears are made to listen to Van Halen – he’s actually more of a Van Hagar guy – and has a tendency to gulp down the bottle with that very man, Sammy Hagar. Sipping wine and picking up barbecue plates didn’t suit his Midwestern sensibilities; knocking out tequilas with the Red Rocker in Cabo San Lucas is more of Shank’s style.
Along with his status as a party legend, Shank’s racing record is equally impressive. Splitting his efforts between IndyCar and the IMSA Sports Car Championship, the Meyer Shank Racing team he co-owns with former SiriusXM CEO Jim Meyer has enjoyed an epic run over the years. recently.
Contracted as a factory team by the American division of Honda and the luxury/performance brand Acura, MSR quickly won the 2019 IMSA GTD class championship with a racing version of the Acura NSX supercar. Consecutive return as GTD title winners with Acura in 2020 is the premise for MSR to enter the stratosphere. Debut with the team, living legend Helio Castroneves goes on to win the Indianapolis 500 for a fourth time with MSR in 2021. What a way and a place to deliver Meyer and Shank’s first win as IndyCar team owners.
Crowned as the winner of IndyCar’s biggest race, MSR matched the achievement eight months later at IMSA by winning January’s overall at the Rolex 24 At Daytona. Their success in Daytona was limited to October when MSR won their third IMSA title in four years, this time in the top DPi category. Well, good people sometimes finish first.
“I’m totally biased towards Mike Shank,” NASCAR star AJ Allmendinger, who was part of MSR’s first claimed victory at the 2012 edition of the Rolex 24, told ESPN. “You want to get over the wall for him, and that’s because he puts his heart and soul into everything he does and because he really cares about you too. Now he’s got it all. what he deserves, and he deserves it before he understands.”
Shank’s story is one of the best in the sport. Born in the small Ohio town of Gahanna, he grew up in the rich amateur racing culture fostered by the Sports Car Club of America. His dream of driving in the Indy 500 shaped his life. Figuring out how to pay for such high runs was the first problem to solve, and that’s when a local heating and ventilation business owner inspired Michael Shank Racing in 1989.
Shank will use his talented hands to prepare the HVAC businessman-owned racing car and pour those profits into racing any club race car he can. found to discover his inner Mario Andretti. As his reputation as a mechanic grew, more and more amateur racers dropped their cars at MSR. As his work on race preparation and track support began to grow, he ran on his own in larger and faster cars, bringing MSR to the open wheel training chain that has spawned the IndyCar champions as well as Indy 500 winners.
Shank’s team quality has attracted major talent and key sponsors; Future three Indy Racing League champion and 2007 Indy 500 winner Sam Hornish was MSR’s most famous graduate of the late 1990s. And around the same time, Shank was close to doing it. was the dream of establishing MSR. The car was slow and the Nielhouse Motorsports team he drove was a mess, but the record books confirm that Michael Shank competed in an IndyCar race.
The 1997 Las Vegas 500K, the venue for the IRL’s season finale, saw Shank drive under the checkered flag in a respectable 16th place in a 31-man starter. It wasn’t joining his beloved Indy 500, but it was enough for Shank to make peace with ending that chapter of his life. While he doesn’t plan on driving on the Freeway, bringing MSR to the Brickyard as an IndyCar team should become a new target to kick off the action. Two leaps of faith will follow.
Looking back to 2021, Shank and his wife Mary Beth were able to stand on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway start/finish line, kneel and kiss the bricks, pose with Castroneves and the Borg-Warner trophy thanks to a gamble between husband and wife. -parallel wives performed 17 years before their biggest day in the sport. With MSR’s junior open-wheel team losing momentum in the early 2000s, any thought of switching to IndyCar was dismissed.
Jim France, part of NASCARhis founding family, has started a new endurance motorsport championship, the GRAND-AM Rolex Series, and with its creation, a new low-tech model called the Daytona Prototypes will lead the way. head. Struggling for money, Mike and Mary Beth had only one drastic move left to make: they mortgaged their house to raise funds and bought a Daytona Prototype.
The young open-wheel team participates in races lasting 45 minutes or less knowing nothing about sports cars or racing 24 hours straight without sleep. Joining GRAND-AM as a registrant in 2004, the vision for entering the IndyCar paddock was outlined when MSR first forayed into high-level professional racing with the Daytona Prototype. It’s a bold move that doesn’t guarantee the MSR will survive its motorsport test, let alone get back on track and make its way to IndyCar.
The first few years at GRAND-AM were difficult for Shanks; With hardship mortgage payments coming due every month, living austere life is imperative as any remaining income goes back into the pool. This is where we find out why Allmendinger is Shank’s #1 fan.
“I love him because what always stands out the most, especially when he is struggling to keep the team going, is that all the people on the MSR crew are always there,” he said. “The same people. I’ll show up to race for Mike at Rolex [24] every year, and I know each person’s name because they’re always the same person, because even when he and Mary Beth were struggling to pay the electricity for their house, he didn’t want the families The family he recruited was in trouble.
“So he always kept them, whether he could really afford it or not in the most difficult times financially for the team. He made sure they were there. at any cost, whatever sacrifices he and Mary Beth had to make, they made it and put his men first, giving the little money they were making, so that his crew I’m not losing my job. He’s that kind of guy. I’m a grown man, and I’m getting fuzzy just thinking about it.”
The GRAND-AM rerouting will pay off as MSR continues to grow and become the factory Daytona Prototype team for Ford before receiving a switch hiring call from Honda. MSR will represent the American branch of the Japanese manufacturer at IMSA, first under the Honda name, and later as Acura. Thanks to Honda’s active involvement in IndyCar, Shank also found his way into the Indy 500, where the MSR made its debut in 2017 with a Honda engine.
In the process, Shanks met Jim Meyer and by 2018 Michael Shank Racing had become Meyer Shank Racing. Thankfully, the same initials. And through Meyer’s network of connections, Liberty Media, the company that owns F1, was introduced to Shanks.
Soon, Liberty was impressed enough with what they found in MSR to buy a 30% stake in the team based in Pataskala, Ohio. Not bad for an old racing club mechanic.
Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of Shank’s personality is his humble approach to life. He’s the only IndyCar or IMSA team owner I know whose fans plan to have a beer with him. A very specific beer. Busch Light.
There he was, just climbing the fence with Castroneves at the Indy 500, and in his back pocket, Shank’s favorite beer was poking out, waiting to be drunk. With a camera capturing the moment for millions of viewers, Shank cracked it and crushed it. Our guy. Everyone’s man. But the story doesn’t end there.
Renowned for his devotion to Busch’s low-calorie product line, the local Ohio distributor ensured that the Indy 500 festivities would continue long after he and Mary Beth returned home. . Neighbors started sending pictures of Shank as boxes of Busch Lights began to pile up on his doorstep. And then those neighbors and friends of that family started the routine and kept adding and adding to the beer wall. Shank stopped counting when the number of cans neared 500.
“He finally had a big break with [Meyer] and Liberty and Honda, he and Mary Beth put in a lot of effort and a lot of trouble along the way,” Allmendinger said. “So he’s going to win the Indy 500, win the biggest race of his life. , and should be out partying for the rest of the year. And most people don’t know this, but he decided to appear in Mid-Ohio in a [NASCAR] Xfinity races just to hang out and watch me. That was unbelievable.
“I even just reluctantly threw it out there like, ‘Yeah, you should go to Mid-Ohio,’ but I never thought I’d meet him. I really forgot to invite him. He was. should be out there, going crazy on top of the world, celebrating the greatest win he’s ever had But no he’s there, just hanging out with me at an Xfinity race I’ll always love him that.”
In a world of petty Horners and Wolffs, be a Mike Shank. Find him at the next IMSA or IndyCar race and ask if he has any Cold Busch Lights to share. Trust me, he’ll be — and then you’ll have a freaky story to tell about the most real team owner in the race.
