INDIANAPOLIS — A.J. Foyt defied a lot of death to amass 80 years of life.

There was the near-drowning, being pinned under a bulldozer, the attack of a 60,000-bee swarm and clinging to a buoy off Galveston as a teen. And then there were the racing accidents in an era that ravaged drivers, including being pronounced dead by a track doctor after a crash at Riverside (Calif.) Raceway in 1965 until Parnelli Jones saw him twitch and scooped out the mud that was suffocating him.

A.J. Foyt earned 80. So age and post-operative infections, heart surgery and medically induced comas seem no suitable exit for a man whose mystique stretches like Texas beyond his status as the top winner in open wheel history, with 67 victories and a record seven national titles.

But even as he’s faced ill health and the realization that his clenched-fist hold on mortality is impermanent, the lure and hope of Indianapolis Motor Speedway provided a temptation and a goal. As he recovered from complications from open heart surgery in November, he set about getting ready to return to the speedway where he won a co-record four Indianapolis 500s. Within Gasoline Alley there could be normalcy again.

And he made it. The joy in that, for those who treasure him for his accomplishments or his aura, is that the fire seems to be reignited behind the eyes of the old firebrand, too.

“I feel pretty good,” Foyt told USA TODAY Sports. “Every day I’m getting stronger and stronger. About mid-day, along about now, is when I start to get a little bit pooped. But all in all, I come back pretty strong.”

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Sitting at a picnic table in garage stall A7, a day before Indianapolis 500 qualifying, wriggling a thick finger into a jar of nuts and holding court with some of the many old friends who had come by to check on him, Foyt was not the vision of the feeble man some had expected. As he spun yarns, memories accumulated of how he’d become the only human to win the Indianapolis 500, Daytona 500, 24 Hours of LeMans, 24 Hours of Daytona and 12 Hours of Sebring, and it was apparent that the unfiltered, unabashed A.J. Foyt was home.

Not that it had come easy. A man who once nearly lost an arm to a guard rail and rehabilitated the bad break by painting miles of fences said his recent troubles have been his worst.

“It’s been a hard time to try and get up and get going,” he said. “I guess when you get up there in age, things just happen, you know?”

Much has happened since 2006, including the first of four knee replacements, one of which led to a staph infection in 2012 that nearly doomed him. There was a hip replacement and having to learn to walk again. In 2013 he had back surgery.

His latest bout with ill health in November had a distinctly Foyt-ish twist. Determined to run 300 feet of electrical line at a new property he’d bought near his Houston home, Foyt was in deep woods with an employee when what he described as a “bad burning” overtook his throat. Concerned enough, he phoned his wife, Lucy, and asked her to consult his physician.

“He said, ‘Where you at? Just sit down and don’t move. Let somebody drive you,’ ” Foyt recalled. “I’m 20 miles out in the woods, so I said, ‘Hell.’ I got in my car and drove to the race shop, had my daughter-in-law drive me home, then I went home and took a shower and all that and had them wait for me in the emergency room.”

Foyt had open heart surgery soon after. A titanium plate was inserted to gird his chest back together. His lungs and kidneys began to fail after the first week in the hospital, however. His famly was summoned and told, Foyt said, “It’s not looking good for A.J.” Foyt was placed in a medically induced coma, and his wife had vowed to adhere to his wishes not to keep him there long if he couldn’t reasonably be expected to recover.

“They knew that,” Foyt said. “And then the next day, for some reason, everything started working.”

Foyt had “slept,” he said for about 10 days. In a humorously appropriate Foyt moment, he had to be convinced that was in Houston, not Indianapolis. He pledged to get there eventually.

“I’ve been hurt two or three times in my racing career and that was my big goal, to make it back here,” he said.

Except for a one-day trip to New Orleans for an IndyCar test in March, his arrival at Indianapolis on May 3 was his first track appearance this season.

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There was more to the journey than just hoping for it. Foyt lost his appetite and his taste for his favorites, steak, eggs, ice cream. He shed 50 pounds but has since gained 10 back with raids into the nut jar and the race shop freezer for his daily ice cream sandwich. After nearly 60 days of hospitalization he returned faithfully to the bulldozer work that has been such a source of tranquility and trouble.

It was on a such a machine in Waller, Texas, that he nearly drowned in August 2007, when an embankment collapsed, trapping him in the lake below. He was clearing brush in Hempstead, Texas in 2005 when he sustained 200 stings to the head, inducing systemic shock when attacked by a swarm of Africanized killer bees.

“I wanted to get on one of my dozers and everybody thought I was crazy,” Foyt said. “So I had (team manager) Craig (Baranouski, who was born in 1959), a boy who works with me, I said, ‘Just help me get up on it. Don’t let me fall backwards because I want to do some work.’ I knew rainy season was coming. So I went on and did that, and then I backed it back into the barn and they all thought I was crazy but that’s kind of what I’ve been doing for therapy.”

And when some post-operative wounds required additional care, he went back to another old crutch, horse medication. He remains a believer despite mixed results. He credits DMSO analgesic for helping him recover from a 1990 crash at Elkhart Lake, but nearly died from a severe allergic reaction when a miscommunication led to the use of Stadol, an equine pain-reliever.

Undeterred, he applied Granulex in his most recent recovery because, he said, “it really helps the horses when their flesh is out.”

“It’s been working real good,” he smiled, proudly. “That’s a true story. Doctors said it looks real good.”

With no pending medical procedures, all Foyt has to do is keep looking real good and enjoying the company of longtime friends and, if he wished, old rivals alike who sometimes cannot fathom that the man is 80 years old.

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“A.J. is old. He’s old. No, A.J. and I are good,” joked Mario Andretti, who turned 75 this year. “We definitely could have a beer together, no problem now. We don’t always agree, but that’s fine. There were times when there was some tension while we were driving against one another, but that I think was pretty healthy stuff.

“I think A.J. and I basically have a healthy relationship because to me certainly on my side I have the utmost respect for him.”

Certainly the edges are still rough. But Foyt — either because of age or because he finally reached an appropriately frightening number of near-death encounters — seems introspective these days.

“It’s been a great life, if I left here today,” he said. “If I was ever reborn, I’d want to do the same thing, because it’s been a wonderful life. I know what it’s like to be on bottom. I know what it’s like to be on top. The way I look at it, what else can I ask for in life? It’s been wonderful. It’s been a lot of fun.”

Outside of the Foyt Racing garage, old friend Jack Housby sat on a golf cart waiting for Foyt to take a ride out to pit road. Grinning, he asked, “What did A.J. have to say?”

Foyt had required an extra moment to push himself up from the picnic table, but he did it himself, and would soon make his way out to sidle up next to Housby and resume their reminiscing. He’d waited too long to waste this.

“I’m just so much better than I was three weeks ago, say, or two weeks ago,” he nodded. “Every day is like a new day right now.”

Each one hard-earned.

