Hometown hope Carpenter keeps perspective as Indy 500 pole sitter

INDIANAPOLIS — He’s the hometown hope, the Butler University alumnus and die-hard Indiana Pacers fan who has put his modest, one-car program on the pole for the Indianapolis 500 ahead of powerhouse programs from Penske Racing and Andretti Autosport.

There’s more, though, and it runs as deep as blood.

The unflappable Ed Carpenter is also the stepson of series founder Tony George. That means his family tree has roots tracing all the way back to Tony Hulman, who bought Indianapolis Motor Speedway after World War II, and includes Mari Hulman George, who still serves as speedway chairman and on Sunday will proclaim once more, “Gentleman, start your engines!”

So to say that much of Carpenter’s life has been lived in Gasoline Alley, where he spent his formative years, is about as fitting for him as the maxim that “haste makes waste.”

It also means that Carpenter is carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.

“I started racing quarter midgets when I was 8 years old, and at that point I was already part of the Hulman family. That’s the way it’s always been for me,” said the 32-year-old Carpenter, whose quiet voice and disarming smile belie a fierce competitive streak.

“I don’t feel the pressure,” he insisted moments later, as if driving home the point. “As far as the local fan base and support, it’s fun. I don’t think that translates into pressure.”

Perhaps it’s not that Carpenter feels pressure, but that he no longer recognizes it.

He’ll be making his 10th start in the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing,” but his first from the pole. And while peering eyes have been trained on him most of his life, Carpenter insists the pressure he endures on a daily basis is not overwhelming.

“I don’t like to say it means more to me because I’m from here,” Carpenter said, “but it does mean a lot because of how much I love this place.”

His first memories of Indianapolis go back to 1991, when he sat in the balcony overlooking the track and watched Rick Mears qualify for the pole. Even then, Carpenter knew that he wanted to one day drive over the hallowed ground that has been in his family for decades.

He proved at a young age that he could find Victory Lane, too, winning national championships in midgets and sprint cars. He graduated to Indy Lights and made his IndyCar debut in 2003, when he was hailed as part of the next wave of young American drivers who might someday wrestle the series back from a surge of foreign stars such as Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti.

But things got sidetracked along the way, as they often do in racing, and Carpenter became an afterthought. He bounced around to different teams, trying to find new magic.

It wasn’t until 2011, when he hooked up with Sarah Fisher Racing, that he won his first IndyCar race. And last year, after founding his own team, he surprised everyone but himself when he took the checkered flag at the series finale at California.