Hamilton leaves Foyt’s team to become top dog

Wed, Dec 17, 1997 (5:03 a.m.)

Tired of spinning his wheels for A.J. Foyt, Davey Hamilton has ended his two-year relationship with the four-time Indy 500 winner and is joining another notable car owner for the 1998 Indy Racing League season.

Hamilton said Tuesday that he has left A.J. Foyt Enterprises and will drive for a new team headed by Rick Galles of Albuquerque, N.M., and Chicago businessman Bob Nienhouse. Nienhouse recently purchased a majority of Galles Racing International, which won the 1990 CART series championship and the 1992 Indy 500 -- both with Al Unser Jr. as driver.

Hamilton, a Las Vegas resident who finished second in the IRL championship points battle this season, said he felt it was time to break away from Foyt.

"It was just time to move on," the 35-year-old Hamilton said. "There's no hard feelings or anything, it was just a situation where I didn't feel I was going to get any farther with that team and (Foyt) had to have all his people happy.

"I want to go to the next level and A.J. wasn't willing to take me there."

There had been speculation that Hamilton's and Foyt's relationship became strained after the Las Vegas 500K in October at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Hamilton, battling Tony Stewart for the series championship, had qualified on the pole until his teammate, Billy Boat, bumped him with a faster run.

Many observers said Foyt should have held Boat back and let Hamilton take the valuable points for winning the pole. But Hamilton said that incident had no bearing on his decision to part ways with Foyt.

"No, that really didn't play into it," Hamilton said. "I'm definitely a team player and the bottom line is I wasn't upset that A.J. sent Billy out, who was my teammate, and bumped me off the pole. If I'm the second-fastest guy, I don't want anybody to go slower for me."

Hamilton did say, however, that he felt Foyt hampered his attempt to win the championship by providing Boat with better equipment.

"I did feel that I didn't have the same equipment that Billy had and that was where I was real disappointed," Hamilton said.

"All I want is the same equipment and A.J.'s strategy or theory was to put me in some conservative stuff to finish the race. But my theory was that going into the last race, we had to let it all hang out and go for the win.

"I didn't have the fastest combination at that race -- he gave it to my teammate and that's what I was upset about."

Hamilton said he was "big-time surprised" that Foyt refused to make a commitment to giving him better equipment in 1998 after making a bid for the series championship this year. So Hamilton began looking at other teams shortly after the season-ending race in Las Vegas.

He actually had talked separately to both Nienhouse and Galles about joining their teams before they announced their merger.

"I was going to make a change and I had some teams I was considering, but when this program came to me and told me what they had to offer me, it was pretty much a no-brainer for me," he said. "Rick Galles is experienced, winning the (Indy) 500 and CART championship and pretty much every race that IndyCar has run, and Bob Nienhouse is a very successful businessman.

"It's the best of both worlds to have a great businessman to run the team and a great racing guy in Rick Galles to put everything together."

Hamilton said his decision to leave Foyt was made easier by the commitment Nienhouse and Galles made to him.

"It's a one-car team and that was another big factor for me to go to that team," Hamilton said. "I'm the one and only driver; their focus is on me and their program is based around me and I like that. It's more pressure, maybe, for myself, but that's what I want -- I feel that's what it's going to take to win.

"Our goal, first and foremost, is to finish races but we also want to win races. We were real close this year to winning a championship and we want to try to do that again."

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