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Here is shots of the 1966 Daytona showing Pedro Ferrari #21 (Chassis 0838)- 4th place
But remember as per the Four Kings story and the Mule book famous Corvette researcher guy, Pedro/Chinetti couldn’t get a Ferrari for Sebring!
Thus here is Pedro Ferrari #26 (same Chinetti chassis 0838) NRF (not running at the finish, but completed 70% or better to the winning car).
Sebring results, if only they knew the Gurney trick to park it at the line, and bump the starter, they would have placed 15th, but they kind of had an accident on lap 189. Oops!
You Corvette guys should be ashamed of your claimed story! This is how the important records on Corvettes and their true histories get mixed up. Pedro and Chinetti really needed a Corvette badly! I guess since the importantly needed Pedro’s Corvette was on the Transporter, they had to UPS ship Ferrari Chassis 0838 on down to Sebring! A 4th place at Daytona running Ferrari, must have really been in bad shape to make the next race. Oh wait, it did!!! PS I am looking for Chinetti’s transporter picture! Many times I find paddock pictures of such!
Corvette picture at Daytona (Picture caption--- I just can’t get enough of that hood seal, I can stare at it for hours on end).
I really should post a clearer picture! I know I have a better one of this shot!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 02:57 AM.
[QUOTE=Dr L-88;1600049283][QUOTE=TCracingCA;1600047721]I am not a guy that collects friends. I am not real politically correct, a speak my mind type. Rex if I could pick a role model Corvette enthusiast, you would be a guy that I would like to be more like! You walk successfully in all of the various circles of our hobby.
Your car I am about to picture, is the same! It is liked by all circles of our hobby![QUOTE=TCracingCA;1600047721
Thanks for the kind words Derek and thanks for sharing your vast wealth of information with all of us. YOU are indeed a valuable asset to our hobby and the preservation of Corvette history.
Rex[/QUOTE]
Some don’t think so! But thanks! I just try to provide lively entertaining posts! Thought provoking at times! But the intentions are from my heart!
I am just one of those guilty till innocent kind of people!
There are a whole long list of cars I suspect! Guilty guilty guilty! Trust no one, making money! Follow the money!
Here is a picture of the Gordon Wilson car (before):
Guys buy parts and sometimes good parts! Apparently the claim of this car also rests solely on the discovery of a found M22, with Lynn Butler’s name written on it! Lynn sold the car to my former Corvette Owner Dave Cormany (late 1970, 1971 season), and Dave sold it to get the Garner AIR 1968 L88 (1972 season).
Since I have the small block car, David’s 3rd Place 1972 ARRC (changed in 1972 to the CSPRRC (Champion Spark Plug Road Race Championships) Medallion is in my possession! He probably sold that spare M22 to the San Diego enthusiast. Who knows!
So you guys don’t total think I just find things from the internet!
For the James Garner car history! Enjoy! Cormany should have taken it to get his name engraved.
Pictures of Medallion and I will even show you guys the before the before picture of this Gordon Smith car with the shark toothed grill!
PS maybe I can donate this for the Steve McQueen car. if ever found!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-27-2019 at 06:15 PM.
Ok I am going to stop joking now, and try to use the productive time for the project, around work. I was up late on some emergencies last night, working on the end of the month closing things, so took the morning off work in trade for the long hours into last night. I now have to get back to work. But I will go back to the project as much as I can spare. In just days I took this pretty far. I also need to see if the Tiny Pic site going down, took down my pictures. So far I see like all of the 1967 L88 cars still up. Cool!
I think I will work on first race appearances, inconjunction with the HD, and L88 timelines. Throw some Chaparral, Penske, Traco, Bill Thomas, development dates in, etc.. some of that history in with it all, dates!!!!!!! I am going to spend some time looking thru all of those learning curve posts from like 2013, 2015, 2018 on these subjects leading up to now. As my focus progresses on this Big Block stuff (Big blocks aren't my thing), and some know I recently started this quest on it's history and have come this far. I have come a long way, and as I caught up to everyone, close on the true experts, I would like to rewrite some of those old posts, but will resist that. I am going to delete the ex-girlfriend pictures thou! That might come back to bite me on one of those gals, the other died of cancer while we were together. One of those tragedies that takes priority over the Hot Rod Corvette hobby! Keeps one from racing or enjoying the cars.
PS one last one!!!! Can't resist!!!! Chinetti not having any Ferrari for Pedro to race loaded up that transporter with the Corvette. Therefore there were no Ferrari's on that transporter!!!!! Poor Andretti and Rodriquez were relishing the thought of Corvette fame and glory? If there was any Ferrari at all on that Sebring bound transporter, then the number #1 and #2 NART Team drivers (Andretti and Rodriquez would have gone into a Ferrari. Interesting????? Actually the Ferrari was updated to 2/3 spec, with the 4 liter motor. This was the precursor to NART campaigning in the Can Am Series. The 365 cylinder displacement was off for this race, as it was essentially a big block Ferrari. Ferrari arranged for Chinetti to handle the transport of the two Italian Team Ferrari cars down from receiving them in New York. Scarfotti, and Parkes (330 P3) came over. They invited local shoe Bondurant to pilot also, and if Pedro had actually been without a Ferrari ride, I can guarantee for season points (super important to the Championship of Makes, Manufacturers Championship), they would have put Rodriquez in that car instead of Bondurant. The development 206SP was run also from the Factory team sent over for the smaller displacement class, and Scarfotti was double stinting in that. If Andretti (the lessor driver ) had no ride, they would never had needed or had him double stint. I have no clue how Andretti (bad driver) ever won a lucky F1 Championship in 1978. I saw him personally drive and he was just reckless. Personal opinion! I never liked the guy. This all was in preparation for the upcoming LeMans. The Drago body was on the 330 P4 cars even for 1967 (the prettiest Ferrari race cars of all time, my opinion again!
Ok back to the project now. I will try to keep focused on helping the history here!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 12:43 PM.
The first Cars & Coffee (take note of the boxes of donuts on the fender)!
I got sidetracked on exploring whether the Slaton Chevrolet Heinz #7 car was the former Penske racer! I am also fine tuning my Penske history.
Penske car Vin
#194376s110556 (Tutorial picture on how to get a cars Vin number!)
I at first tried to make a Guldstrand joke about having time for vacation and sightseeing plus I accidentally typed the Vin as 00556, not 10556, and came up with the wrong born on date, going to fast. This Vin is dead on for 1/10/1966 prior to Daytona! They actually had to hustle on this car. As the race was going down on Feb 5-6! With Practice and qualifying naturally earlier.
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-29-2019 at 09:32 AM.
That's because the photos are flip flopped. Rogers car is 17055 and Daves car is 20407. I saw them both at Bloomington recently.
I will pull articles. I think I have Vins with those or dig out notes!
I just saw the Super Chevy article showing the Judski cars and they have his white one as 055! I pulled this info forward from an old post. I am sure I have it perfectly correct in other old posts! I might have been tired and hurried and it might have been me that flipped them accidentally moving info forward. I am going back to look!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 12:55 AM.
I never do what I plan next! Instead of what research I was going to do, the Gorries thing was kicking my butt! I think this car is mixed up as a 1965. I was kind of desperate to get something up, so I looked at the RCR and they had the same picture I am showing here, as I have. My notes say 1966, but with a question mark, and theirs says 1965 with a lot of unknown info! I don’t think anyone knows very much about the Gorries stuff! I know I looked into this a few years ago, like 2016. I don’t remember finding much!
Do I have Canadian stuff to look through, no!!! Except for the Big boy professional series, that swung north.
PS in the Canadian mostly FIA they were flaring early! I have threads explaining rules! Basically the Grand Sports/Grady Team Gulf car is an example, of early flared cars, but SCCA restricted it! It wasn’t till IMSA that there was a rules return to Flares!
Behind this car is a 427 Competition model Cobra (side oiler, single Holley car)- 19 made, those were out late in the 1965 model year. This picture has a high probability of this being 1966. Cordts jumped into big time Professional racing in the Can Am next.
PS--- yet again, please denote the special squished down collector Big Block special factory side pipes, indictative of one of these HD built competition models, or supplied by Duntov, as his Zora Service Kit Package!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 01:14 PM.
I see where I reversed these! My photo collage with the mistakes came up again in early 2017. I went on to explain the errors of this first attempt, and thought I would share the researched axle ratios, and I reversed it typing those!
I found somewhere the Judski car had a 3.55, but it would be great to verify that, and we need to know what MA Code 43 dealership.
All the more reason to do this! I am surprised no one called me on this!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 12:24 AM.
And back to the project! I think best on everything I see, the weakness in these cars records (HD pre-L88s) is the scarcity of the racing records!
Confusion comes from the afterlife of the Penske car. The early race careers of the Heinz, Oseid (Slaton Chevrolet car), the early history of the Or Costenzo with Guy and McClain1966 car, the Whim competition histories etc. I saw RCR didn’t have the Costenzo, Guy, McClain car showing in what I can see!
i was trying to think what literature I feel like searching? My Corvette News maybe, for my complete Vette Vues collection, I would have to be looking for older stories as those didn’t start publishing till the 70s, Competition Press, Speed & Sport, and I think the effort would be best to get out the SCCA collection of magazines and go after the National Appearance records, appearances and season results! I will think about getting those out this weekend, but not fun. Luckily I only have 12 mags a season or about 36 magazines to research info out of! For all regions, the records were poorly kept, causing a lot of crunching! I have never done the SCCA level stuff, except for SoCal and some NorCal, as I also have a ton of Regional race literature to or I was like after the racing record of a famous driver. My Competition Press collection is getting so fragile, pages rip or tear, at the slightest page turn. Those usually just cover the larger National events!
Dont you guys have Libraries with old newspapers to study in, near these old race tracks around the country? I was putting together the histories of Lions Dragstrip, OCIR, and Irwindale using that search venue! Tedious project! I walked away, and gave it a two year break, in attempting to piece it together.
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 02:53 AM.
I pulled out the Sebring 1966 Program and even found how Ferrari had committed to come to the race! Article in the program for the event! Ulmann family going clear to Italy and seeing Enzo personally with an Olive branch. I hope people here know the Ulmann family-- they hang out in Indianapolis!!!!
Also on the HD car history!
Rex Ramsey ran B-Production at the beginning of the 1966 season, and ran B-Production at Santa Barbara 1966 Memorial Day weekend. So now looking for the first race in Big Block! He skipped Riverside National (But Gary Grove in the Alan Green Chevrolet Yellow HD car came down for that race). Just Got interrupted with phone call. Ok Ramsey has new Big Block at the 8/13-14/1966 Riverside 6 hour Enduro!
Sorry back on the Pedro car again, my bad!!!!!! My next question is who would have raced prepped this World Renowed Race Corvette to be able to go to Sebring?
And I will be checking Hooper next! Pohl had raced at the Willow Springs event earlier! I will look for Hooper’s entry with his big block Corvette after ending his appearances in the Cobra (still driving it 7/23-24/66 at Riverside), and note he drove the Cobra after the Grand Sport replica in Modified class 1965.So Hopper was a Corvette loyalist and drove them since the beginning in the late 1950s, up to 1965, then a guy with a Socal Corvette Shop, gets a Cobra at the end of 1965, and races it up till getting a Times GP borrowed hot Corvette HD car ride, to commemorate his 1962 Riverside (1st Significant C2 Victory anywhere).
So far I would say a Dealership like the Alan Green operation could turn Zora’s Service Parts Kit around quicker than the guys with more privateer operations, with limited dealership direct support! Thus looks like Hooper still didn’t have a Corvette to compete with the Cobra, so he was still in a Cobra Ramsey had his done, and entered it for the big Enduro, popular for it's LeMans styled dash across the track and jump in starts! I will have to find the results for Grove vs Hooper in Cobra.
Timelining, thus in Europe it is believed the Swiss Car was Racing 7/3/66 (if that wasn’t the 1965 car’s appearance?).
Last edited by TCracingCA; 09-01-2019 at 08:35 PM.
I didnt get crap done thou! It will probably cause me to work this weekend!
Posting Jack Gersch’s old San Diego terror flared Vette #66 and it losing those flares was traumatic back when they changed it into the Gordon Wilson car! I cried, and therapy didn’t help much!!!!!
Therapy- back in the day Harry Mann Dealership for sweat dreams.
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 12:57 PM.
At the Big Times Grand Prix weekend at Riverside Oct 27-30/1966. Hooper drove Ramsey’s Big Block (maybe a Licensing thing or personal?), it was still #22 and Ozzie Pohl drove Hooper’s Yellow 427 Cobra! Hooper had a chance to test one of these beasts (Corvette HD cars), and to run it, measuring it against his own competition Cobra driven by Ozzie! I would say he had to make a decision quick! I am surprised as to how late this was! I am now wondering who might have got that car, and Hooper was thinking of doing a deal for it! I am going to check the SCCSCC (Sic Sic) Chevrolet Slalom crowd for a super hot Big Block. I know many of the hot shoes, ordered them. I don't recall Doug Hooper ever really hooking up with the Slalom crowd, but he did tune a bunch of their cars. I am going to check the San Fernando Valley clubs who were running out of Competition Chevrolet, the relocated Baher Chevrolet operation, and the others that housed club meetings. I am assuming this car was probably brought in for service work, and Doug had his eye on it. Was negotiating. I bet that is part of this story. The Slalom Clubs were driving some of the hottest Corvettes of this era. The events had up to 600 cars show up here in Southern California. Some of the WSCC events alone, had that many Corvette competitors for their Annual Pre-Convention and Convention events. PS Hooper's 427 Cobra is in the top corner of this next picture below!
I forgot to look for the Utah In Team boys, but it looks like they appeared for the Stardust weekend round in Las Vegas in November 66.
And John Hill’s 1967 L88, was about to show up!
By early 1967 at Willow Springs 3/11-12/67, Hooper had his AP Corvette, Ramsey was entered in his and Lynn Butler was down in his! Maybe post s record showing all three next! Three HD cars in the same event!!!! Good stuff!
Hooper in the new season car! I am pretty sure that is Briley in the blue car in 4th.
Jumping well forward to Aug 12-13/1967, the two traveled north for the Golden Gate Grand Prix
I
PS Back in the days when I used to network (before I grew to dislike people ), Briggs Cunningham gave me a lot of these records! When I was doing research, I worked with people of this caliber! I even asked him a bunch of questions about his Corvette team! R.I.P. A great American!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-28-2019 at 01:10 PM.
[QUOTE=TCracingCA;1600054331]Ya it looks like in haste, I did accidentally flip them!
My apology to Ratdog!!! I posted bad info!
Here is one of my old picture posts, older than this work where I have it correct. I did this in I think 2013, and erased it I thought, but it repopulated from guys that quoted me containing this picture! The two white cars I at least had correct back then.
Guys I will have to fix it. SBR is pretty damn accurate of a guy and I got the latest list wrong! All my bad!!!!!!! Thanks SBR!
I know that the one story (Corvette Fever?) that I read on Tower's green coupe did NOT recite a VIN or any Trim Tag data. Does he claim that it does NOT have such? I realize that he also claims to have Betty Skelton Daytona Beach car but will not release the VIN or that car either.
And you would put a rollbar into a car that never had one because.......?
Who? Which car?
Because many of these had racing careers! I have cages or roll bars, as certain racing organizations required them, and people can just want one for added safety. I know you know that, so I assume this is related to historically rare models! The Zora Service Parts kits, and the L88s didn’t have them as part of the RPO package! Etc
The "Betty Skelton" car pictured in post #55........
She had an awesome history, but I know the cars back then didn’t have roll bars! On C1, I can find a lot of info, but I pretty much have preferred to research the cars from about 1960 forward, my eras of life! I just looked at the post count, thinking it would be 600 maybe, but this thread in 5 days hitting 4000. Yow! With that type of audience, I never mind off topic, in the lulls! I am about to pull an all nighter for my job, to close the financials for the month’s end! I was just eating!
I was was tired last night, but looked this morning quickly and the 1967 L88 #92 John Hill looks to have debuted in a Regional at Santa Barbara Sept 2-3, 1967. I will have to look to see if he did a Race school prior!
In this time period, Ramsey was building a Formula A car! This was thought to be the direction as even FIA was going to put new large displacement rules in place limiting Prototypes to 3.0 Liter and a higher production count number needing to be built, to run a max of 5 liters ( Group 5/6 rules).The GT classes was going to new Homologation rules for Group 2, 3, and 4! That was mostly based on adequate Production counts to qualify. So the big engines could be ran, as long as they built enough!
The Formula A And F-5000 married well with the Trans Am Sedans with the 305 cube formula!
PS the In Team Big Block should include Clark Silver in its Driver history! Many of the histories in RCR actually are missing drivers and car numbers! Like at the Aug 67 Riverside National it had #46
For the Times GP 1967, Hooper sat that out, Rex drove it to 2nd OA, 1st AP class, getting beat by a ringer Mustang! I like the Corvette Auto Parts sponsorship out of Long Beach on Rex’s Car! We bought Corvette stuff there and at JD Corvette for our Corvette! The Corvette Auto Parts guys I learned later were cutting up midnight auto parts cars! The operation was busted!
Keep in mind this is Regional! Hooper drove the higher Nationals. Many drivers like Rex did both. Thus Rex was 1967 Regional Champion! John Hill has two great finishes in the L88. As you can see Eric Pohl drove the Hooper Corvette in Regional, Hooper drove the Nationals. Lynn Butler ran Nationals, and Clark Silver ran the car in Regionals! Unless you know what is happening, this stuff will confuse the average enthusiasts.
I see a friend of my Father and I tuned up his car once prior to a race- Walt Maas! Also knew Andy Porterfield pretty well!
PS on the Penske car- I typed the wrong 1st digit as an 0 accidentally! The correct date is Jan 10th, 1966 born which is good!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-29-2019 at 10:03 AM.
Just to show you guys how some of these car Ownership’s attempting to flip cars for cash will “”. “”up the car’s record even publicly, as here is the 1968 ARRC End Of Season Championship Race results for Riverside.
Note Mike Summers 11th place, But was on the same lap as the ten guys ahead of him! Essentially last place, as the next cars are three and six laps down! And the 2007 for sale notice leading up to auction!
The car ran here with #3 pictured just above! Ya right, won Riverside!
Also as the Northeast Division 3rd, 4th, and 5th place cars didn’t make the trip, he was able to petition into the race (if he had at least one top three finish in his home region, especially near year end, this could be the argument for inclusion, as they took the top three cars, from each division! His was the Northeast region! The two top cars for his division were the Cobras of Hal Keck and Peter Consiglio.
pS I see no other appearance for this car at Riverside!
You guys know I will be looking up and reading about that AP Simca Abarth????
Last edited by TCracingCA; 09-12-2019 at 05:08 PM.
I was thinking of just closing up this thread, don’t see any posts or contributions to increase what might be known about the cars! I personally could add a whole lot about things! I like typing that much!
Someone wanted to know more about the Briggs Cunningham thing, so I will just post that up here! I had worked as the Head of the Docents and headed up the volunteer group at the San Diego Automotive Museum! I was one of the organizers for the Museums Vintage Grand Prix Races at Jack Murphy Stadium (home of the Chargers/Padres/The San Diego Chicken Mascot), But That later when I went back and got back involved in the beginning of the 90s. We also set up displays at like the Convention Center, took classic cars to Community parades, etc. and the Long Beach GP. While there, we finished an enthusiast library for Automotive Research, if I wasn’t taking groups thru on tours, I was the lead guy helping as a volunteer to the regular staff, people wanting help from our library! I worked with two retired big time Magazine editors! We started networking with the Briggs Museum to link the libraries! His was totally private, invite only! I joined several Marque Research projects, Registry related to Ferrari Club North America, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Shelby, etc etc. We met an conferenced, we traveled to like the Monterey Historics, Hershey, Amelia Island, Pebble Beach, etc. I was the youngest of the group! We would get in the car with Briggs and go eat or go to an event! When they closed up in 1987, I went up to get literature just after a restructure of the Staffing at the SDAM. There were a bunch of Politics going on, they were putting regular staff out the door (Board of Directors). I heard there was theft of funds, and historic Memorabilia donated (big time dollars and items missing). They cut the budget for the volunteer activities to zero dollars! I did a Volunteer newsletter and a What’s new at the Museum color flyer and was working with the Airplane Museum next door, and that connected me to the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC where I had access to their libraries for both cars and air planes, etc , as the Airplane museum was a Smithsonian family facility. We shared the volunteer teams for events or staffing! The Briggs thing was set up in advance by me, both places were having their own staff issues blowing up. Briggs was closing the doors, and due to the politics at our SDAM he told me, the literature was all mine. Anyways back at SDAM, they wanted me to stay on, they wanted me to keep doing the functions that I was doing, naturally because I was free labor. I was even told if I wanted to print the Volunteer newsletter, I had to pay the cost per copy myself for using the facility copier! They took my colored flyer away, and gave that to the wife of one of the Board Members, and gave her a salary to manage that alone! They actually locked me out of the Library thou, as they locked down everything (all storage rooms, etc). Without Staff, and until they could inventory the place related to figuring out what might have been stolen, I could go do my thing. With Briggs, I came back with the pick up truck and loaded it up! And sInce that time, I have doubled the literature collections, acquiring more to my specific interests! I donated like Packard, Bugatti, Pierce Arrow, Stutz, etc etc materials, mags and books! Occasionally I was contacted by magazine writers wanting help, or to research some obscure facts, information! That just burned up a lot of time, no real monetary reward, and it was kind of thank less! I stopped doing that in the early 1990’s. Thus I have a whole bunch of Automotive literature, and it all has Corvette stuff! When you are hanging with these types, you end up in conversions with guys like Parnelli, Penske, Granatelli, Andretti, Foyt, Fitch, Bondurant, etc etc etc. So if I had a moment to ask questions I did! Often after the meet and say hi, I could then go travel to their pit, or start a conversation in the Track club house! As I was with Briggs Cunningham earlier, that gave me instant creditability, even though I essentially was no one of importance! In many threads I have mentioned talking to many famous guys, it was mostly in this context!
PS I am actually a lousy writer!
Last edited by TCracingCA; 08-31-2019 at 04:05 AM.
08-27-2019, 03:30 PM
But thanks! I just try to provide lively entertaining posts! Thought provoking at times! But the intentions are from my heart!
), Briggs Cunningham gave me a lot of these records! When I was doing research, I worked with people of this caliber! I even asked him a bunch of questions about his Corvette team! R.I.P. 
A great American!
