rayvaflav

One of my favourites:

Goodwood Green http://www.goodwood.co.uk/motorsport/motorsport.aspx

What's yours ? (please provide venue information)

Ray

gbvette62

I did a story on the Corvette color names, and their associated race tracks, for a local Corvette club.

Some are pretty easy, such as Daytona Blue (or Daytona Yellow), LeMans Blue and Sebring Silver. Others get a little trickier, like Glen Green (Watkins Glen), Elkhart Blue or Green (Elkhart Lake WI, now known as Road America) and Laguna Gray or Blue (Laguna Seca in Monterey CA, Mazda Raceway today), but some are down right impossible to know, except to some old time hard core racers.

How about Lynndale Blue, Marlboro Maroon, Mulsanne Blue, Donnybrooke Green, Mille Miglia Red, Ontario Orange, Bryar Blue, and the 2 toughest of all; Steel Cities Gray and War Bonnet Yellow?

Lynndale Farms Race Course operated from 1963 -1967, in Pewaukee, WI. Today it's a housing developement.

Marlboro Motor Speedway was a road course located just east of Washington, DC, on Rt 301. Though closed since 1969, much of the track and it's structures, still remain, though in a somewhat deteriorated condition.

Mulsanne is the name of the 3.7 mile long straight, that is part of the LeMans 24 Hour Circuit. Prior to the 2 chicanes being added in 1990, cars were known to exceed 250 MPH, on the Mulsanne!

Donnybrooke Speedway, in Brainerd MN, became known as Brainerd International Speedway in 1963, and still operates under that name today.

Mille Miglia is Italian, and roughly translates to 1000 miles. The Mille Miglia was a 1000 mile road race over public roads in Italy. It was first run in 1927, and other than during WW II, continued untill 1957, when a number of drivers and spectators were killed. It was revived in later years as a road rally for vintage racers.

Ontario Motor Speedway was a 2 1/2 mile oval, located east of Los Angeles. It closed in 1981, was torn down, and a hotel, shopping center, condos and an ice hockey arena were built in it's place.

Bryar Motorsports Park was located in Louden NH. The original oval track was torn down in 1990, and replaced with the New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Some of the tracks original road course still is in use.

Now, Steel Cities Gray and War Bonnet Yellow.

War Bonnet Park Raceway was located in Mannford OK. It only operated from 1966 to 1970. The SCCA's Trans-Am series raced at War Bonnet in 1968, a race won by the late Mark Donohue. Today War Bonnet is housing developement, but the orignal track remains as an access road, named the Keystone Loop.

Steel Cities International Raceway was located in Warren, OH. Steel Cities is the one track I've never been able to find much history on. I do know that it was built around 67, and the name was changed shortly afterwards to Nelson Ledges. Nelson Ledges is still operating, and hosts many SCCA and club events (including many with National Council of Corvette Clubs). Nelson is probably most famous as the location of Car & Driver Magazine's 24 hour race for showroom stock cars, The Longest Day of Nelson.

JR Germany

You missed Bridgehampton Blue:



But what about Sunflower Yellow?

Regards

JR

rayvaflav

Fine work GB, what could possibly remain ?

Brands Hatch Green was the most popular car color choice for new buyers of Stingrays in 1971. The color is named after a motor racing circuit near Swanley in Kent, England.

http://www.motorsportvision.co.uk/brands-hatch/

Ray

Stingray1967

Nassau Blue?

Stingray1967

Mosport Green?

rayvaflav

You got it (and it's a great colour !) :


http://www.mosport.com/


Ray

MarkL36

I live a few mile from the Marlboro Raceway.

From Wiki.
Marlboro Maroon Metallic", a color available on the 1967 and 1970 Chevrolet Corvette and one of many paint codes named for famous racing venues, was named after Marlboro Motor Raceway.

gbvette62

I'm well aware of those colors/tracks, I was just hitting a few of the less obvious ones, but if you want more, here goes.

How about Silverstone Silver? The Silverstone circuit, like so many old race tracks, started life as a WW II airport. In the case of Silverstone, it was an RAF bomber base. Racing started there in 1948. From 1964 to 1986, the British Grand Prix alternated between Silverstone and Brands Hatch. From 1987 to 2009, all British Grand Prix's were held at Silverstone.

Monza Red is named for the famous Italian Grand Prix circuit. The Monza track was built in 1922, and still in operation today. The track is probably best known for the very steep, fast, long sweeping "Monza banking"; even though it hasn't been used since 1969.

Monaco Orange is of course named for the Monaco Grand Prix, run through the streets of Monaco/Monte Carlo.

1972's Targa Blue is probably a reference to the Italian Targa Florio, a road race run on the mountain roads around Palermo, Sicily. Other than during WW I and WW II, the Targa Florio was run from 1906 till 1977.

Somehow, Riverside Red has yet to come up, too. Riverside International Raceway was built in 1957, just outside LA. Over the years, Riverside hosted just about every imaginable form of road racing, including a US Grand Prix, and numerous NASCAR races. The track was closed in 1989, to make way for a shopping center.

Though not a track, Can-Am White had to be named for the SCCA's road racing series for "unlimited" sports cars, the Canadian-American, or Can-Am Series. The Can-Am started in 1966, and featured many of the great racing sports cars of the day, including Jim Hall's Chaparrals, Lolas, McLarens, the Porsche 917/10 & 30, etc.

Until the mid 60's, cars racing in international road races, usually were painted a specific color to represent their country. Great Britian's color was dark green, or more specifically, British Racing Green. Germany was silver, Italy red, France blue, the US was white or white and blue. That is why early Lotus & Jaguar race cars were green, the Mercedes Gullwings were silver and Ferrari's and Maserati's were always red. That is also why Cunnigham's LeMans racers were always white, as were Hall's Chaparrals, and Shelby's Cobras were blue with white stripes.

British Green surely refers to Britian's international racing color of green, and 1968's International Blue, is probably a reference to the US's racing blue.

Corvette for 65-68 offered Rally Red. Rally's are controlled time, speed & distance, automobile performance events.

1966 featured Trophy Blue, and you couldn't have a race without a trophy. For a real stretch, could Milano Maroon be referring to Milano Italy(Milan in English), the home of both the Monza race course and Alfa Romeo, and could Marina Blue be named for the famous marina that borders the Monaco course?

1Sweet66

I love this thread!

rayvaflav

I surprisingly have not seen mention of the not so popular "Nurburgring Violet" ......

Ray

JR Germany

Short excursus:

German race color originally was white and changed to silver in 1934 when the era of the "Silberpfeils" started.

The day before Eifel race at Nurburgring in June 1934 Mercedes race cars were a bit to heavy for 750kg-Formula and team manager Alfred Neubauer decided to remove white paint up to bare metal to save some weight.

From that day on Mercedes and Auto-Union race cars were painted in silver.

It was an anecdote for a long time but some years ago pictures were found from practice and race with the different colors on the cars.

Regards

JR

rayvaflav

That would be a stretch my friend as I own a Milano Maroon coupe and I am sure that the colour was based on this :



I could be wrong and yeah, I probably am ....

Ray

sub006

I never heard of Silverstone Silver, just Sebring Silver and Silver Pearl.

My '64 was originally Riverside Red. Drove it in an autocross near the Riverside start/finish line around 1971, then led about five other Corvettes behind a pace car (at up to about 80 mph) for ceremonial laps on Closing Day, July 4th AIR 1984. The Porsche Club had about 150 cars for the same event. And the poor president of the Camaro Club was all alone in his '69 convertible, I invited him to lap with the Corvettes and he came along.

By 1984 the car's color had been changed to Porsche Guards Red.

gbvette62

Silverstone Silver was available in 1968 only, paint code 986. Besides Sebring, Silverstone and Silver Pearl, there were actually quite a few different silvers; among then Sateen, Cortez, Nevada, Pewter, Inca and Satin,

There actually is a track named Sunflower. Sunflower River Race Track is a dirt oval in Mississippi, but it's only been named Sunflower for about 5 or 6 years, so it had nothing to do with the Corvette color.

rayvaflav

Do you remember a thread where a guy talked about the colour on his C5, "Viscosity Yellow" ?

Ray

FastEddy

I'm not too far either - walked the track not too long ago - was wild to see the grandstands still there, and 90% of the pavement intact.

gbvette62

Years ago, I worked for a company that had a plant in Brandywine, MD and later one in Forestville. I had stopped by the track a couple times, when I was in the area.

The first time I went by Marlboro was around 1975. At that time, the track still looked pretty much like a turn key facility. I probably stopped 2 or 3 other times. It was both interesting, and a shame, to watch the track sit undisturbed, and yet deteriorating. The last time I saw it was 10-12 years ago, and it was surprising just how much of the facility was still there. I did go through the area again about 4 years ago, but it was at night, so I didn't bother stopping.

Marlboro truly is a "ghost track".

FastEddy

I think I may have stirred up a few ghosts when I jumped on the old Marlboro Raceway for few laps on the oval !!! Track was a little rough, and quite slippery with all the grass!!! Over growth kept me from getting too far off the oval. Been wanting to do that for years... ever since I found out a lot of the pavement was still there..

This pic is approaching the start/finish at the Grandstands...

FastEddy

Gonna have to go back with a real camera, instead of just a phone, and see if I can run the oval a little harder