Big Al, remembered

 They're all going now, one by one by one. Mortality is undefeated in these matters, surprise, surprise. Not even speed junkies who spend the greater chunk of their lives dancing every dance with it get away forever.

And so there awhile back went Dan Gurney, racer and car builder, who built his own legendary  American Eagle brand and took it to Europe to do battle with Ferrari and Lotus-Ford and the rest.

And a little later went Bobby Unser, who won the Indianapolis 500 three times and used to talk as fast as he drove, but no one minded because he was Bobby Unser and he'd seen so much worth talking about.

And now it is a December morning a few months later, and his little brother Al is gone.

Al Unser Sr. died Thursday in his beloved New Mexico, after a 17-year fight with cancer. And once again the memory vault opens, and the years roll away.

Remember when he was 31, 32 years old, and his ride was that gorgeous, iconic Johnny Lightning Special, deep blue framed by jagged yellow lightning bolts? 

Won Indy back-to-back in that seat, Al did, in 1970 and '71. Fifty years on, only Helio Castroneves has done it since.

Or how about 1987?

Al was 48 years old and a three-time Indy winner by then, but that May he was strolling around Gasoline Alley without a sponsor and, consequently, without a ride. Roger Penske found him, stuck him in a year-old show car and sent him out to replace the injured Danny Ongais.

You know what happened next. Al started in the middle of Row 7, patiently picked his way to the front the way Al always did, and won the damn thing. Biggest upset in Indy history, some people say. 

Thirty-four years have erased what Al said about that, but that's not surprising. As stingy with words as his brother was generous, he was never one for the succulent quote. He held your attention with the shrewd, meticulous way he drove, and with this still-waters demeanor -- call it New Mexico Zen -- with which he carried himself.

There was a time, for instance, one May when Al was coming to the end of his racing life, when he was sitting at a table in a tent back by the motorhomes somewhere. A few reporters were sitting there with him, asking him questions. The subject of his age came up.

Al answered the question with a question.

"Well," he said, or words to that effect. "If you took all ages away, and nobody knew how old anybody was, how old would you be?"

Pure New Mexico Zen, that one. And likely the best quote those of us who were there ever got from Al Sr.

Now he's gone, at the age of 82. 

Or however old you want him to be.