Remembering Pete Biro: 1933–2018
Editor's Note: Motorsports photographer Pete Biro, one of the legends of the game from the 1960s into the '90s, died on December 26, 2018, at age 85. He was also an accomplished magician of no small reputation. Recently, he'd been engaged in publishing books combining images from his archives with freshly researched text by author George Levy, including Can-Am 50th Anniversary and the upcoming F1 Mavericks: The Men and Machines that Revolutionized Formula 1 Racing, due out in June. In his memory we are republishing this "What I'd Do Differently" interview conducted by author Peter Manso, from the August 2015 print edition of Car and Driver. Biro had posted the image above on his personal Facebook page with the comment, "We used to have great access," which seems relevant to his answer to Manso's first question.
C/D: How has the racing scene-F1, Indy, whatever-changed?
Pete Biro: For photographers, mainly it comes down to access. One of the things that made me quit was when I went to Laguna Seca and wanted to do some headshots of Nigel Mansell, and his PR guy jumped in: "No, you gotta wait. You gotta make an appointment." I put my cameras back in my car. It was just, "Screw it." Also at Indy. I'd done 33 Indy 500s when I returned one year to find there's a fence where I usually shot from at Turn One-NASCAR made them put the fence up, it was chain-link, maybe 12 to 15 feet high, and you couldn't shoot through it. But the biggest change was that you used to be able to hang out with drivers, go to dinner with them, and travel with them.
C/D: Who were you closest to?
PB: Dan Gurney, Denny Hulme, Bruce McLaren, Jerry Grant, Phil Hill, Shelby, Richard Petty, Benny Parsons, Bobby Unser, Roger Penske. When I started shooting, there were no corporate decals. Drivers, photographers, the writers, everybody knew each other, and there was a level of cooperation, of interaction, that simply doesn't exist anymore. The whole sport has become overregulated. It used to be a contest among the best drivers, now it's a contest between the best engineers. Look at the front wings on today's F1 cars-there must be 40 or 50 pieces to them. Compare that to Jim Hurtubise or George Bignotti, who used to chalk Indy-car designs on the garage floor.
C/D: Your new book, Racer's Faces, shows the intensity in the drivers' eyes.
PB: Well, these guys were always busy, intensely thinking about getting another tenth of a second. They weren't just standing around between holes in a golf tournament, say. Even so, the only guy who ever got pissed off at me and my camera was Paul Newman, who was sitting on the wall at Indy with Carl Haas one year and snapped, "Hey, don't take my picture!"
C/D: Weren't pranks part of the routine, too?
PB: You mean like when Foyt and Unser tried to beat each other through an infield tunnel at Indy in rental cars? Or the time McLaren and Hulme wanted me to drive up and down the ski slopes at Saint-Jovite with them in rental cars? The most famous of these pranks was when, on a bet, Augie Pabst ran his rental into a motel swimming pool at Laguna Seca.
C/D: Who was the most flagrant cut-up?
PB: It could be Andretti, but more likely Jerry Grant. One time Grant was stark naked at this motel, outside on the balcony, when he grabbed a fire hose that he poked through somebody's window and started spraying.
C/D: Wasn't there an episode in France involving you, David E. Davis Jr., then editor of Car and Driver, and Dan Gurney?
PB: Evi Gurney, Dan's wife, says it never happened-but it did. I was following Dan with Bill Dunne, Dan's team manager, in Bill's hopped-up Mini Cooper estate wagon. David E. was with Dan in a BMW. We were approaching the French border, and there were eight or 10 cars waiting to go through passport control at this gate that was down across the road. Gurney just drove off the road, down the side on the berm, and never stopped. We followed him even though I figured we were going to get our asses shot off. An hour later we're on the outskirts of Paris, eating at a very, very good restaurant. David E. always knew the good restaurants.
C/D: You took a number of rides, camera in hand.
PB: I did, yes. Jackie Oliver took me around Laguna Seca for five laps in a Shadow Can-Am car once, and when I got out I threw up. Another time Richie Ginther gave me a ride in a Ford Le Mans racer at Riverside. We're going down the back straight at more than 200 mph, I see the big corner coming up, and my foot starts to put the brake on, but Ginther's shifting up into a higher gear. I thought I was dead. Later Richie asked: "What did you think of the brakes? We don't believe it ourselves, how good they are."
C/D: Experiences like that made you respect these guys anew?
PB: Oh, yeah. Once Gurney was driving me in a Cougar, probably going 100 mph in the neighborhood near his shop, and there's a dead end ahead. He does a handbrake turn and all of sudden we're going the other way. Right then I told myself that these guys know how to do things we're not even aware of.
C/D: So what would you have done differently?
PB: Keep my photos filed better! Also, the only driver I never got friendly with, 'cause he was so shy, was Jimmy Clark. I kick myself for that. Otherwise I wouldn't change a thing.
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