After part-time roles for Ferrari and Parnelli in 1972 and 1974, respectively, Andretti joined the latter full-time for 1975 after finishing runner-up in the SCCA Continental Championship.

He won the Pocono 500 in 1986 and remained with Newman/Haas until 1994; his victory at Phoenix in 1993 made him the oldest winner in IndyCar history, aged 53, as well as the first driver to win a race in four different decades.

Mario Gabriele Andretti was born on February 28, 1940,[c] to an Istrian Italian family in Montona, Istria, Kingdom of Italy (present-day Motovun, Croatia).

[10] Andretti's family owned a 2,100-acre farm in Montona,[11] but after World War II, the Treaty of Paris (1947) transferred the territory to communist-controlled Yugoslavia.

[14] In his autobiography, Andretti wrote, "The first time I fired up a car, felt the engine shudder and the wheel come to life in my hands, I was hooked.

"[15]: 6 The garage owners noticed the brothers' passion for racing and brought them to watch the 1954 Mille Miglia, which was won by two-time Formula One champion Alberto Ascari.

[11] His father felt that moving to America would give his children the best opportunity to succeed in life,[20] but did not want his sons to become motor racers, as the sport was extremely dangerous at the time.

[3] The first car Andretti regularly drove was his father's 1957 Chevrolet, which the twins did not race, but nonetheless upgraded with features like a glasspack muffler and fuel injection.

[27]: 26 From 1956 to 1978, the top open-wheel racing series in North America was the USAC National Championship, alternatively referred to as IndyCar or Champ Car.

An opening appeared to materialize when one of the big three IndyCar teams,[33] Dean Van Lines Racing Division (DVL), lost Chuck Hulse to injury.

[42] At age 25, Andretti became the youngest IndyCar champion in history,[25] a record he held for thirty years until Jacques Villeneuve won the 1995 title.

[26] To his irritation, however, when he appeared on Johnny Carson at the end of the season, he was introduced as the Indy 500 Rookie of the Year, which he felt downplayed his title win.

[50] However, Foyt's tire sponsor Goodyear arranged for him to commandeer Roger McCluskey's car to prevent Andretti, a Firestone man, from winning.

[46] Unhappy about being an owner-driver,[54] and concerned that Firestone was cutting back its sponsorship budget,[48] Andretti sold the team to Andy Granatelli's STP Corporation before the 1969 season.

[78] In the NASCAR Grand National Series, Andretti was less successful on average, with one win, one top-five finish, and three top tens in fourteen races from 1966 to 1969.

[79] He generally did not get the first pick of equipment and pit crews,[80] and said that a lack of technical support forced him to ask a rookie, Donnie Allison, for help setting up his car.

Reviewing the race, Motor Sport wrote that Andretti displayed "that same assurance of absolute control [in the corners] one saw in [Jim] Clark's driving.

In his Ferrari debut, he won his maiden Grand Prix at Kyalami after race leader Denny Hulme's engine failed with four laps to go.

[66] In addition to Maurice Philippe, the team hired more Lotus veterans, including Jim Clark's old crew chief Dick Scammell and administrator Andrew Ferguson.

"[87] The day after Andretti learned Parnelli was shutting down, he met Lotus' Colin Chapman, who told him, "I wish I had a decent car for you.

"[14] Wind tunnel technology was still primitive at the time, but Lotus devised a way to model air flow on track by hiring a photographer to take pictures of wind-sensitive bristles that were mounted on the chassis in tests.

[112][113] Engineer Nigel Bennett recalled that Andretti would request seemingly imperceptible adjustments before the race, such as "Lower the front springs by an eighth of a turn.

[109] With plenty of downforce in hand, Lotus ran a small rear wing that increased the car's top speed,[132] fixing what Andretti felt was the 78's biggest weakness.

[102]: 164  In 1979, the team rolled out the Lotus 80, whose downforce overwhelmed the car's suspension, generating porpoising issues, and whose weak chassis popped out rivets while driving.

[30] CART was formed because the larger and more institutional IndyCar teams, like Andretti's Penske Racing, wanted the sport to emphasize technical innovation (the costs of which deterred new entrants) and a more structured commercial strategy.

Andretti won the season opener at Long Beach, but his Indianapolis 500 race was compromised by electrical issues, and his wheel fell off at the Milwaukee Mile.

[189] Finally, in his last serious chance at a win in 1993, he led the most laps, but his race was derailed after the team incorrectly changed the tire stagger on his car during a late pit stop.

They qualified in ninth place, but although their car passed initial inspection several days earlier,[197] it was disqualified shortly before the race started due to an improper oil cooler.

[194] Porsche withdrew active support from Courage in 1996,[194] and the team finished 16th after losing 90 minutes in the pits fixing an electronic issue and a broken axle.

[257] He cameoed in Bobby Deerfield (1977);[258] Pixar's Cars (2006) (an animated film where he was represented by a sentient version of the Ford Fairlane in which he won the 1967 Daytona 500);[259] and DreamWorks' Turbo (2013) (where he voiced the traffic director at Indianapolis Motor Speedway).