[Don]

2ND PRESS RELEASE

" Rickes Predicts at Lime Rock Park! "

With so much to see at this weekend’s Rolex Vintage Festival Presented by BMW at Lime Rock Park, it would be easy to be overwhelmed by the sheer selection of remarkable machinery on hand.

So to help guide us through some can’t-miss highlights, we thought we’d get some guidance from a guy who really knows what he’s talking about. After all, that’s what he does all the time at Lime Rock Park. Introducing once again our guide for this quick preview tour - Lime Rock Park’s man on the mic, Greg Rickes as he clues us in on what to look for on and off the track this weekend.

Group 1 – Pre 1941 Sports and Racing Cars
These aren’t just cars, they’re heirlooms, each with its own stories to tell. They range from European nobility to American can-do, but for sheer whimsy you can’t beat the Morgan 3-wheelers of Jeff Jacobson and Chris Towner.

Group 2 – 1946-1955 Sports Racing and Production Cars
Here’s where modern day road-racing in America began, starting with the classic public road circuits at places like Watkins Glen, Elkhart Lake, and Bridgehampton.

Among these many noteworthy pioneers, Bob Millstein’s Hansgen Jaguar Special occupies a special place of honor. Constructed by Walt Hansgen, a man most worthy of the title “legend,” this car, based on a production Jaguar XK120 chassis with its elegant one-of-kind bodywork, embodies the era to perfection.

Group 3 – 1955-1963 Formula Cars
This is the crossroads of racing technology, from the classic flowing front-engine lines of Italian design to the purposeful engineering of the mid-engine creations of John Cooper and Colin Chapman. This theme would change everything from road racing to the Indianapolis 500.

James Stearman’s Dagrada is the very essence of what Count Giovanni Lurani had in mind when he created “Formula Junior,” and while it won’t be the fastest, it could well be the loudest! How does that little 1100cc Lancia V4 make such a racket?

Group 4 – 1955 – 1961 Sports Racing Cars
This class has some fantastic examples from the Glory Days of the Italian Racing Car, with all its passion and intricate engineering.

Who can resist the sight and sound of a Ferrari Testa Rosa, and its worthy adversary the Birdcage Maserati?

And yet for contrast we have those tributes to American individuality and ingenuity, like Eno De Pasquale’s Chevy V8 powered EDP Special and the Charles Bordin’s Philson Special, which got eye-opening performance out of a pushrod in-line six that was originally at home in Ford’s economy compact Falcon. What’s perhaps even more surprising is that at least over the short run these homebuilts could match performance with the Italian thoroughbreds.

Group 5 – 1955-1962 GT/Production cars under 2200cc
This is what really established the foundation of Sports Car Club of America, production car racing encompassing mass produced two seaters from England, Italy and Germany.

The car to really seek out is Jim Glabicky’s #5. At the time it represented something totally different, and not very highly respected. It came not from Europe, but bore the label “Made in Japan,” and in that curious way the Far East has with the English language, it was dubbed the “Fairlady.” Its racing success in the hands of Bob Sharp would build his reputation and that of company called Datsun, which today you know as Nissan.

Group 6 – 1956-62 GT/Prod over 2200cc & 1962-64 under 2000cc
There are lots of worthies in this group, but even though it falls a little outside the timeline, having been built in 1973, my favorite is the Reinertsen Motors SAAB 99. This car brings back youthful memories of the raucous days of Showroom Stock Sedan racing, and the annual gathering of the rabble known as the Car & Driver Showroom Stock Challenge. Some years it was Indian Summer, and others it rained buckets, but through it all the partisan crowd whooped and hollered (fueled no doubt by copious quantities of Schaefer Beer, included with the price of admission) as the magazine’s editors raced it out against the readership. A car just like this one, wheeled by Swedish rally ace Stig Blomqvist, won the last ever C&D race in 1976.

Group 7 – 1962-1966 GT/Production Cars
This one’s simple - Cobra. Michael Stott and William Cotter have a pair of the originals, with Ford’s 289 V8 for power.

Group 8 – Group 8 1965-1972 FIA Sports Racing & CanAm; IMSA GT to 1980
This class might mean just a little bit extra to me because I was here when it all began on Memorial Day weekend 1972, when the era of John Bishop’s masterplan for professional American road-racing under the Camel GT banner started a Golden Age.

And what a run it was, from production based GT and sedans in 1972 to the ultra high-tech GTP cars of the 1980s and ‘90s.

The one constant through the entire epoch was the Porsche 911, from nearly stock in the beginning to wildly outrageous by the end. One popular bon mot of the era was “No matter how much you spend you can’t make a pig into a thoroughbred. But you can make one mighty fast pig!”

Not that the 911 was deficient in any way, but turning a production car into a racer always involves compromises. The turbo-charged Porsche 935 was the culmination of this development, producing nearly 1000 horsepower, all of it hung out behind the rear axle.

The performance was fearsome, and the 935 could, and did, win everywhere from Lime Rock to LeMans. Chart its evolution from the Bruce Leven (remember Bayside Disposal?) ’77 to William Cotter’s ultimate, the 1979 K3.