TV, Poison, or Tubular Tommy Ivo
retired after a 19-year career in acting, dancing, and singing, followed by a equally long career owning building, and driving 36 cars that competed in 12 different classes. Ivo was the first to run in the 8s on gas, the first to run over 170 then 180 on gas, and first to dip into both the 7s and 5s on fuel. When Don Garlits made the switch to a back-motor car after losing a portion of his foot to a drivetrain failure, Ivo followed suit but became involved in one of the most spectacular crashes in drag racing history. We now pick up the third and last portion of Tomfoolery--the fast life and fun times of irrepressible Tommy Ivo.
 

on Garlits' foot injury and his subsequent and successful switch--initiated by an article written by Ed von Delden entitled "New Concept For Fuelers" (Aug. '70)--from a slingshot to a mid-engine design had a revolutionary effect on Top Fuel. Within a year after Garlits made his winning introduction at the '71 NHRA Winternationals, drivers no longer sat behind and peeked around the blower of a nitro-burning engine. "I switched to a rear-motor Woody [Gilmore] car in '72 and was the first to break into the 5s, at a track in Pennsylvania during the latter part of that year. Even though I knew it was safer ride--the trouble was always behind you--it was the ground rush not the wall of flames with smoke at the top, which got my attention. I was attaining the same ground speed--around 245 to 250 mph--but it felt like 100 mph faster." After Garlits lost his foot and sat out the 1970 season, Ivo began match racing Shirley Muldowney. "I got along well with Muldowney, but she was like Prudhomme--very determined." Ivo's match-race program with Shirley worked until Garlits came back, then the strip promoters saw the "King vs. Queen" possibilities, and Ivo lost this gig as well. But it was at the '74 Winternationals that Ivo came within a hair of losing his life. "I had just taken a new Don Long car and was on my fourth pass against my former helper John 'Tarzan' Austin. I had her pretty hopped up, because I didn't want to lose to him, when the engine blew in the lights. All I can guess is that I had leaned it too much and caught a piston. Engine parts 'zeroed' out the wing, and when I lifted, the torque rolled the car. All I could think of as I went over was 'I'm going way too fast to be doing this.' Luckily I didn't get a scratch, but I missed my big chance. The first safety official that reached me was riding one of those little mopeds. If only I had borrowed his motor bike and ridden down the track waving and bowing to the fans, it would have been the crowing moment of my career. Instead I gimped around the pits--strictly for show--the next day after Bernie Partridge (NHRA's announcer) announced that I was at the> track."  

Organized drag racing had become big business by the middle of the '70s, and Ivo saw more match race possibilities driving a Funny Car than a Fueler. So for the first time since he raced his '55 Buick, he was in a closed car--kind of. "Jaime Sarte built my first Funny in '77, the same one that I ran under the Rod Shop banner. After 19 years driving either a roadster or a dragster, it felt like a security blanket, a much slower ride that cut down the speed effect. But its short wheelbase caused it to dart from side to side. It made me keep on top of my driving. And when a blower would bang, I would lose a body and go back to driving a roadster in the blink of an eye. The real fun part was the long burnouts and my ability to do them without losing control."  

< But Ivo, much to his chagrin, was losing control. "I had led a happy-go-lucky life surrounded by young crewmen, but I was now pushing 45 and still not organized. All I wanted was to be a bopping, footloose fool, but when I joined the Rod Shop I had to deal with the corporate structure that came with it. It was as if I was back at the studios, but it took three years before I realized I was not having fun."  

After nearly 50 years of Tomfooling around, Ivo married, and that changed his life. "My career had been one of traveling and working on my cars. Now I was working on our house. The problem was that I had to hire people to do what I did for 19 years, and I tended to hire good guys, not good mechanics. The result was that I began to tear up a lot of stuff because I didn't have time to work on the cars." After three years of driving floppers, Ivo returned to his past.  

Ivo's recall ability remains phenomenal--a talent he acquired during his show biz career. Whether it was his marshmallow-toasting race against Bob Smith's Untouchable jet or his green weenie, 280-plus pass with Art Arfons, Ivo remained intrigued by cars that blew and flew. "In 1979, I asked Ron Attebury to build a jet for me. I also got my engines from a guy who owned an aircraft salvage yard in Phoenix, Arizona. The J-34 engines cost $25 each, and their fit was so precise that I loved working on them. Jets were the most awesome things I ever drove. Their top-end charge was unreal. They would go from 200 to 300 like a Fueler goes from 0 to 200. They just wouldn't lie down. What I loved the most was to close the hand throttle, hit the chute release, and then go limp so I could feel the weightlessness for 2 or 3 seconds. In fact, I played games in the car when the chute hit. But that only lasted two years. I woke up to the reality after I reached 45. I was eating alone at Denny's on my birthday, and I began to realize that I needed to get a real life."  

Even though it seems like yesterday when I shot Ivo's restored four-motor car at Palmdale, it was 20 years ago when he got out of racing in 1981. "I realized after my 36-year drag racing career that none of those 36 cars I drove ever got me, and that I had more mileage on a dragstrip than anyone else at the time I retired." But Ivo had one last hurrah in him.  

TV Tommy, the hands-on drag racer, had become Ivo the hands-on house remodeler. He was on his way to pick up some bricks at one of the local building supply yards when, for one of the few times in his life, his memory failed him. "While on my way to the yard, I made a wrong turn and found myself going up an alley. I looked to my right, and I couldn't believe my eyes. Sitting behind an unnamed speed shop was my old trailer with my four-motor dragster in it. The speed shop's owner had bought the car from Jim Harwood. Its right front engine was broken, but I had to have the car, and I made its owner a offer he couldn't afford to refuse." Ivo's promotional instincts were still going 300 in the eyes.