1964 LaBoa MkII – Italo-American Serpent

I have been road racing since the early 1980s and vintage/historic racing since the late ’80s; always in 105 series Alfa Romeos. But I remember, back in the early ’90s, racing with this little blue sports racer called a “LaBoa”. When I say “racing with” I mean I saw it briefly at the green flag, then again when it came around to lap me.

The majority of the LaBoa Sports Racers (the name translates to “The Snake”) were built in the early to mid-’60s utilizing a variety of engines including Coventry Climax, Corvair, Lotus twin-cams and the Alfa Romeo 1300 and 1600 powerplants. They were hand-built by a talented man named Al Baurle whose company was called Competition Engineering in nearby (to me) Wheaton, Illinois. The LaBoas were built to compete against the Lotus 23s and the Elva Mk VIIs of the time. The fiberglass bodywork of the LaBoa Mk II used a combination of a slightly modified Lotus 23 front end, while the gorgeous shape of the tail section came from the Detomaso Vallelunga. The chassis is fabricated using steel tubing and aluminum panels. The engines were mounted amidships with the transaxle behind. This made for a very light, very fast combination.