Race Car Stuff

Yes, I have promised to start writing again in the past, and I am going to do it again. Maybe I will actually keep my promise this time. Life for me has gone through many changes since I was getting 10-20 articles a month here, some for the better and some not so much for the better.

Ideas for articles are always floating around in my head. Some of the ideas are the best ever written, but they never seem to get flushed out of the cerebral spheres to the digital media. That is a pattern that has to change for the better. There is too much pent up frustration in keeping good articles about racing in my head.

Tonight, my favorite racing news show, Wind Tunnel had a special episode for the week of the NASCAR All-Star race. The Jarretts, Ned and Dale, were special guests. They had the usual questions about their careers, and Dale’s impending last race of his career. But the thing that got my attention was the comment about Ned’s broadcasting with ESPN. Dave Despain said that the years of Ned, Benny Parsons, and Bob Jenkins were thought by most of the hardcore racing fans to be the best broadcasts ever done for a race.

This comment made me start thinking. I had always felt that way, but why? In prior years there had been teams that were usually made up of an “expert” and a couple of professional broadcasters. What was better about Ned, Benny, and Bob? The thing I liked about it was the fact that they realized this was a “series”. Prior to the ESPN years of the ’80’s and ’90’s racing was occasionally covered on mixed in with figure skating on ABC’s Wide World or Sports. The sport had to be “sold” to fans of stick and ball sports. That meant that every race had to have a presentation of the art of drafting, the examination of pit crew members jobs, and more crashes in the tape delay post production than laps of good racing. Saying it simply, we were being treated as 5 year olds every race.

With the growth of cable TV in the early days, the creation of 24 hour sports networks, and dedicated sports fans all came together to make the most of a special opportunity. Racing was an easy fit in that many of the races could be cheaply covered, and sponsor opportunities were everywhere. The influx of money gave the production team the opportunities to develop new ideas with moving scoring, in-car cameras at all angles, and reporters that were participants in the race.

Soon rather than coverage of 3-5 races a year, we had coverage of every race, live flag to flag. Instead of targeting a baseball fan, that only knew how to put gas in his/her daily commuter, now the broadcast was aimed at people who watched from week to week. The fans now knew all of drivers, they knew how drafting worked at Daytona and Talladega, and they were tired of being treated like 5 year olds. The broadcast team now could target a true fan for a change. They could discuss one car being stronger in the middle of a turn, and another being better at corner entry. They could handle discussions of camber and caster angles at Charlotte being different than Pocono. The fans could be treated like RACING fans.

The other big factor was the fact that the costs involved with the coverage were still fairly low. There were relatively few commercials. We got to watch racing… not graphics shows, constant repeats of the “best parts”. It was just good simple racing coverage. Just what the doctor ordered.

Today, the broadcast seems to be aimed more at entertainment, which honestly the racing has been geared more in that direction as well. The graphics and cyber replays are nice, but the true fan would probably rather see the battle going on for 14th place than an analysis of if Dale Jr. moved down or Kyle Bush moved up. The true racing fan appreciates what the sponsors had given then free of charge (at least directly) but there are as many commercials in a hundred laps now as there were in the whole race back then.

Thanks for what you gave us Ned, Benny, and Bob. It was something we will never see again.

This has been around the internet for some time. If you have never seen it, take a few minutes and watch the video. The workmanship is literally amazing.

Most viewers of Speed Channel have probably caught what looks like a tacky low budget show called “Back In The Day” as it comes on or goes off. Few have probably taken the 30 minutes to watch it. The show looks very low budget, and it probably is. It has Dale Earnhardt Jr. introducing the show and leading in and out of the commercials.

In spite of the poor quality of the show, it is something that every race fan NEEDS to watch. Back in the late 60’s and early 70’s we did not have cable TV. There was only ABC’s Wide World of Sports that occasionally showed races in tape delay format spliced in with an afternoon of figure skating, or Olympic weight lifting. There were very rare occasions that we would see some live coverage.

During this time there was a Saturday afternoon show called Car and Track (wonder where they got that name???). They mixed in some test drives of current performance cars and film coverage of various races. There was coverage of NASCAR Grand National as well as other forms of racing. The coverage by todays standards was poor, but it was all we had at the time. There was a guy named Bud Lindeman that went with a friend, a microphone, a tape recorder and two handheld cameras. If you didn’t live near a race track, this was your only way to see many of these old vintage cars in any form other than still photos in Competition Press magazine.

Today Dale Jr. seems to have a real respect for the racers from this era. It seems to be more than lip service in front of cameras. He has put the old NASCAR footage from Bud Lindeman with some info about the era done in “Pop Up Video” format along with some introduction. It is not great TV, but it is fantastic to see these old races, cars, crews, and drivers in action.

You get to see pit crews in short sleeve shirts, drivers in open face helmets, gasoline spilling everywhere as the gas man twists off the gas cap, and Bud marveling at 25 second 2 tire pit stops. It is truly a window into the past. This show just can’t stay on Speed for very long, so catch it before it is too late.

From our friends at AutoBlog.com comes this important news:

The Sports Car Club of America will keep the longest-running U.S. road race series on track for at least another year. With 2006 marking the 40th anniversary of the famous series, two events are scheduled at Heartland Park, Topeka, Kansas, starting with “Trans-Am Thunder in the Heartland” in September.

Heartland Park Topeka owner Raymond Irwin says that he and the SCCA are trying to keep the Trans-Am series alive in the hopes that the new generation of Ford Mustang, Chevy Camaro and Dodge Challenger will bring back the series’ glory days of the late ’60s and early ’70s, when factory-sponsored Mustangs, Camaros, Challengers, Barracudas and Javelins fought it out on America’s road courses.

Parnelli Jones, who drove for the Ford factory team, says it best - “The Trans-Am was a no-holds-barred, highly competitive series. We had the best American drivers, we ran on the best North American circuits, and we drove cars that were spectacular to watch and that the fans could easily identify with. The Trans-Am was the greatest road racing series that has ever been run over here…”

In the meantime, the Historic Trans-Am Group is keeping the memory alive, actively racing the cars that actually competed during the heyday of the series.

–>>More…

As you may have realized, this is my favorite racing series of all time. I love the cars and everything about the series. I was somewhat involved during one of the good times for the Trans Am series, the middle to late 80’s. Like everyone else, I think the 67-70 seasons were the best, but I was too young to be involved then.

The 289 Cobra is arguably one of the most significant production based race cars of all time. According to rumors, the four most significant 289 Cobras in racing history will be presented by The Shelby American Collection at this years Shelby American Automobile Club national convention, (SAAC 31).

The last car produced with the Healey badge was the Jensen-Healey in 1976. It is a name with great racing tradition from Donald Healey’s Bonneville land speed record of 203 mph 50 years ago, the numerous specials in various forms of racing, or the club racing staple of the Austin-Healey Sprite.

HFI Automotive has acquired Healey Automobile Consultants Ltd (HAC), owners of the Healey brand, with the intentions of returning the Healey name to sportscars. Plans are well advanced for a high performance sportscar with the DNA of a Healey 3000 - in convertible and coupe derivatives, as well as a modern affordable replacement for the much-loved Healey Sprite. Further down the line, the range will include several other niche-market performance vehicles.

For more information:

http://www.hfiautomotive.com

Berny Herrera of Rotarynews.com sent me a list of all of the RX7 finishes at the Rolex 24 (and 24 Hours of Daytona before the title sponsor). I knew the RX7’s had a great history at this event, but I had forgotten exactly how successful. I remember the first car in the first year of production, and I remember the Firestone sponsored car driven by Lee Meuller, and the Malibu Grand Prix car of Tommy Kendall.

Here is the list of results for the cars. For those of you who don’t know, the SA22C RX7 is the unique 78-80 car, the FB is the 81-85, the FC is the 86-92, and the FD is the 93-99 car. Check out the success:

*****
1979
RX-7(SA)-Overall: 5th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(SA)-Overall: 6th / In Class: 2nd GTU

1980
RX-7(SA)-Overall: 7th / In Class: 3rd GTU

1981
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 5th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 9th / In Class: 4th GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 10th / In Class: 5th GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 11th / In Class: 6th GTU

1982
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 4th / In Class: 1st GTO
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 6th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 7th / In Class: 2nd GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 10th / In Class: 3rd GTU

1983
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 3rd / In Class: 1st GTO
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 12th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 17th / In Class: 3rd GTU

1984
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 12th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 14th / In Class: 3rd GTO
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 18th / In Class: 3rd GTU

1985
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 11th / In Class: 2nd GTO
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 12th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 18th / In Class: 2nd GTU

1986
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 7th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 10th / In Class: 2nd GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 18th / In Class: 4th GTU

1987
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 10th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 13th / In Class: 2nd GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 19th / In Class: 6th GTO
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 23rd / In Class: 4th GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 27th / In Class: 5th GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 28th / In Class: 6th GTU

1988
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 15th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 16th / In Class: 3rd GTO
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 19th / In Class: 4th GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 34th / In Class: 7th GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 35th / In Class: 8th GTU

1989
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 11th / In Class: 5th GTO
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 12th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 14th / In Class: 3rd GTU
RX-7(FB)-Overall: 21st / In Class: 6th GTU

1990
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 7th / In Class: 2nd GTO
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 12th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 15th / In Class: 3rd GTU
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 16th / In Class: 4th GTU

1991
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 13th / In Class: 1st GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 14th / In Class: 5th GTO
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 15th / In Class: 2nd GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 16th / In Class: 3rd GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 26th / In Class: 6th GTU

1992
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 7th / In Class: 1st GTU
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 21st / In Class: 7th GTU
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 36th / In Class: 11th GTU

1993
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 9th / In Class: 1st GTU
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 31st / In Class: 6th GTU

1994
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 26th / In Class: 6th GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 36th / In Class: 18th GTU
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 42nd / In Class: 21st GTO

1995
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 14th / In Class: 7th GTS-2
RX-7(FC)-Overall: 47th / In Class: 17th GTS-2
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 50th / In Class: 18th GTS-2
MX-6 (Rotary)-Overall: 66th / In Class: 23rd GTS-2

1996
RX-7(FD)-Overall: 21st / In Class: 12th GTS-2
RX-7(FD)-Overall: 42nd / In Class: 22nd GTS-2

1997
RX-7(FD)-Overall: 55th / In Class: 23rd GTS-3
RX-7(FD)-Overall: 59th / In Class: 24th GTS-3

1999
RX-7(FD)-Overall: 60th / In Class: 28th GT3

2000
RX-7(FD)-Overall: 59th / In Class: 27th GT

I have managed to get scanned (thanks Dave Redman) and posted several pictures of Shelbys (and a few Mustangs) from back “in the day”. Most have captions, and all were events I happened to have my camera at.

Enjoy:

Old Shelby pictures

It has been recently brought to my attention that the Shelby that used to belong to Bill and Karen Vose was SFM6S2050. I will update the appropriate captions soon.