[Trevor Legate]

To respond to various comments and add assorted thoughts:

I only mentioned that SA had won the races with their GT40s and Holman Moody did not - but utter Respect to H&M. They have more history than I've had hot dinners and they have to be amongst my favoritest race teams of all times. Also had the honor of spending time with Lee Holman who is a true gent - anyone who takes the time to scare the bejeezuz out of me by taking me up the road in his GT40 always gets my vote. ( I survived!!) And as Lee pointed out, someone had to guard the cars and pack up the tools as the Shelby crowd went off to party after the races....thats a quote from him, not me.

The old, old tale that the Cobras were were classified as Shelby Cobras with the FIA is the line that keeps being trawled up by the SAAC, who continue to make the claim that AC were only an outside contractor who supplied parts to Shelby. True, but stretching the truth further than any politican would dare. The boxes of parts seemed to arrive in the form of an almost complete car.....Of course Shelby registered them as Shelby Cobras. He would would'nt he? And did he think to discuss this with AC? Would AC object - of course not, they were not bothered about going racing on a big scale, that was what Shelby was there for and they were hardly going to bite the hand that was feeding them! Would you? They were doing very nicely punting out a '50s stye sports car and getting paid. Luvly jubly, as we say over here. I really do not think that AC were aware that they were making a piece of motoring history, or even about the future history, they were too busy punting out cars (sorry - parts). Hindsight is a wonderful thing!!!

The other thing that a lot of people forget is that, during the 60s, the Cobras were just another sports car, devalued like any other car on the used-car market and had little value and only a minority following. After Shelby stopped taking the 427, AC then built their own version, the AC 289 Sports that was the nicest example of the breed, with a 427-style body and the most practical engine. (That was the car that really grabbed me, although I was lucky enough to go to Art College in Worthing, virtually next door to Ken Rudd's AC dealership. The sight AND SOUND of a Cobra rumbling around that crappy old retirement town was enough to hook me for life! Guess where I spent my lunch breaks?) The 289 was then dropped in 1968 for the simple reason that nobody wanted them, not when the same money brought a Jaguar-E or a Porsche 911S, even an Aston Martin etc. The discussion as to who built/registered/owned the Cobra only surfaced in the 70s when values began to increase and Angliss arrived on the scene to start manufacturing spares, which in turn grew into a larger business....only weird people like me ever bothered to pay the car any attention back then.

Slightly off-topic......I have great respect for SAAC, even if I have to disagree with a few of its "teachings" regarding the history thing, as I have attended one of their conventions, at Charlotte and I was a bit impressed to say the least. (Altough...hundreds of Cobras and only 6 originals....?) Rick Kopec invited me on stage to say why I thought there was such a thing as an AC Cobra. What I MEANT to say was that for people such as myself, the Cobra could only be an AC since every car we saw in England was covered in AC badges - I even used to make the journey to Thames Ditton to stand in front of the big glass window and lust (sorry) after the guardsman blue AC 289 Sports that stood there for years. Also, Shelby was hardly ever mentioned over here and California was a bloody long way off back then!! So of course people in the UK thought they were AC Cobras - in this sceptered isle, they were.

One final point - I think that Derek Hurlock has been greatly misunderstood in the US of A, as it was his uncle Charles who was a bit of "tightwad"....but I realised that Derek was more proud of his connection and dealings with Ford than with Shelby. Not that he disliked Shelby at all, he found him charming and funny - just a little loud for British tastes, you understand!! Maybe he had a point, as one of the comments made by a senior Ford "suit" was that whenever Shelby left his office, he always checked to see if his wallet was still there. But everyone admits that the guy got things done and knew how to pick the right people to do his bidding!!!!!!!

Here endeth my latest ponderings......feel free to disagree, etc