Chavik Indy Roadster

Chavik read about Phil Shafer, who was born half a world away and more than a century earlier in Des Moines, Iowa. Shafer’s friends called him ‘Red’ because of his auburn hair, and he was 21 when he drove in his first automobile race in Iowa City. By 1929, Red Shafer ran a thriving Pontiac dealership in Des Moines and had competed on every board track and dirt patch between Indianapolis and Altoona. Doctors advised him to give up racing or risk heart failure. Instead, Shafer took two years off – a hiatus that may have had more to do with the stock market crash than his heart – and returned in 1931, tanned, rested, and ready with a fresh car for the new stock-block rules at Indianapolis. Built in Indy by Herman Rigling, one of that town’s first speed geniuses and himself a German immigrant, the Shafer 8 featured Buick’s newest 272ci overhead-valve straight-eight, powerful enough to qualify the car for the 1931 Indy 500 with an average speed of 105.103mph. Shafer and his riding mechanic, Charles Cariens, finished a respectable 12th that year and won $430 after battling their way up from 23rd.