Alex Morales Motorsports

[flatlander_48]

Admirable that you want to write a page on Alex Morales, but Wikipedia is about as accurate at times as a $3 watch.

There is actually quite a bit out there about Alex. He raced in the late 20's, 30's and 40's. Ran a sprint car built by Roger McCluskey for Chuck Hulse, his cars were the Tamale Wagons after the family business. Had a hall of fame list of drivers. Ran championship cars until he passed away, won two CART races with Pancho Carter at Michigan in 1981 and Johnny Rutherford at Sanair in 1985.

Google Alex Morales sprint car, click on the link to his profile at the Sprint Car Hall of Fame and Museum, it has very good information.

I was at Michigan for Pancho’s win. That was the 1st Michigan 500. It took 2 weekends to run as the first was rained out. They also tried to burn the joint down with a pit fire. I believe that started in Herm Johnson’s pit. There was also a big crash in Turn 4, but I don’t remember who it was. With Tony Bettenhausen in 2nd, this represented their highest finishes...

[Rails]

Well, I wish I had done that, that was actually straightup. I did know Capels was the team manager, I got to know him a bit when he was head at USAC. I don't think he's gotten the recognition he deserves for his contributions to the sport. Guy was pretty good whether it was dirt (Vel's won a lot of dirt car races with him there) or pavement, front or rear engine.

Had a good friend who crewed for Alex Foods cars. Always said Johnny Capels was a great guy.

[rrrr]

I may be wrong because I'm working from memory at the time of this post but the legendary chief mechanic Johnny Caples was the guy in charge after his years with Vel's Parnelli.

When I was a teenager, I watched Caples running super modifieds at Albuquerque's Speedway Park. While he was the USAC Chairman in the early 2000's, I bumped into him as we gridded our car at the Hoosier 100 and mentioned that to him. He laughed and self-deprecatingly replied "You don't look that old".

He has an incredible racing resume.