Browsing: Vintage Racecar Columns

First Turn
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Last Friday I was mindlessly killing some time on Facebook, when I happened to stumble across the livestream of Goodwood’s Kinrara Trophy race for over 3-liter GT cars. Dubbed as the world’s most expensive race grid, this one-hour twilight race featured 8 Ferrari 250 SWBs, 8 Jaguar E-Types, 4 Ferrari GTOs, 4 Aston Martin DB4GTs, 2 Cobras, 2 Big Healeys and a Maserati 3500 GT thrown in for good measure. With a Ferrari 250 GTO having just sold at Monterey for $52 million, the combined value of the Kinrara field was pushing a half a billion dollars! What immediately sucked…

Last Lap
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As the calendar year moves into its second half, we come to what motor racing calls its “Silly Season,” when there arises lots of conjecture about who will drive for who in the next year or two. Actually, I think the silliest part of it is the name. Why “silly”? It is a natural reshuffle...

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First Turn
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The history of the racing engine—and perhaps to a lesser extent the road going engine as well—has been driven by advancements in induction and valve train technology. Once the 4-stroke Otto cycle form of internal combustion engine became the standard, some of the greatest leaps in performance and efficiency came through improvements in the engines ability to “breathe.” Today, despite claims of the internal combustion engine’s imminent demise, a new technological development is poised to revolutionize and improve the gas-burning engine—EAV, or Electronically Activated Valves. Looking back at the influence of valve train development on racing history, one of the…

Hidden Treasure
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Just how good a racecar was Porsche’s 356? Since the model’s introduction, Porsche 356s of all types (77,895 cars built) recorded victories throughout the world. While an SL Gmund Coupe scored the earliest, important 356 victory (class win at Le Mans in 1951), it was the Speedster (4,144 cars built) that made the 356 a...

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Last Lap
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For the Historic Formula Junior Diamond Jubilee World Tour (quite some title) it really was the “last lap” of this three-year long series, when they held the final races as part of the 2018 Silverstone Classic. I apologize for returning to the Formula Junior theme again (so soon?) but I think it is so special...

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Heroes
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The last time a car featured in my Heroes column was months back, when I wrote about the 1935 Alfa Romeo Bi-turbo, a fast if erratic machine with an Alfa P3 engine, front and rear. It was dreamt up by Enzo Ferrari and his designer Luigi Bazzi in a desperate search for a post-P3 Grand...

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First Turn
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The sport of automobile racing is arguably about 130-years old, assuming you subscribe to the notion that the first organized race, using gasoline-powered internal combustion engines, occurred in France in 1887. But looking back across this 130-year history, there are a number of significant events that stand out from the rest, events like the Vanderbilt Cup races, the Targa Florio, the Mille Miglia, the British Grand Prix and the 24 Hours of Daytona. But within the pantheon of “the greatest races of all-time,” really only three events rise to the top, if for no other reason than the fact that…

Hidden Treasure
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It was not my intention for this story to be all about motorhomes. Alas, I may have failed you in this regard. However, please stay alert as I have not let you down completely; for there is a lesson contained within; an important one for the automotive hunter in each of us. Geoff Hacker of...

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Heroes
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Bugatti had won the Targa Florio three consecutive years from 1925 – 1927 by the time their new recruit, Albert Divo, was flagged away from the Cerda start of the 1928 Sicilian classic. And he didn’t disappoint: Divo not only won the island epic that year, he made it two years running by taking the...

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Last Lap
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There is a small town in Lincolnshire, England, which became the home of not one, not two, but three major racing car manufacturers. Bourne (pop 15,000) a small market town up in “Bomber County” as Lincolnshire was known during WWII (due to the large number of bomber bases built on the flat terrain), has counted...

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First Turn
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In my experience, most auto enthusiasts tend to live dual lives, we have our automotive life (cars, car-friends, events, etc) and then we tend to have a separate parallel life (work, family, other hobbies). But I always find it a little surreal when—once in blue moon—these two separate lives intersect. As you read through the Racecar Profile and Fast Exposure installments this month, you’ll see the name John Sprinzel pop up numerous times. Not only was Sprinzel an accomplished rally driver from the 1950s through to the early ’70s, but he was also instrumental in the aftermarket tuning and performance of…

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