John Fitch lived a life filled with adventure and invention that is difficult to capture in a brief such as...
Just before we went to press, we received the very sad news that American racing pioneer Briggs Cunningham Jr. had...
The late 1960s brought a host of changes to the famed 24 Hours of Le Mans. The wave of “professionalism” that was sweeping across other forms of motorsport began to exert its influence at Le Mans. With increased money and prestige now flowing through professional racing, the caliber of teams...
On August 4, 2007, an icon of American racing and my dear friend, John Fitch, turned 90 years old! In...
The Greenwich Concours d’Elegance will celebrate its 23rd year of showcasing significant cars, motorcycles and one-off automobile creations on June...
Briggs Cunningham was one of the most important figures in U.S. road racing during the era of the 1950s. He raced automobiles and yachts, manufactured sports cars, established a significant auto museum and distributed Jaguars. His overriding goal was to win Le Mans with an all-American car driven by Americans....
As everyone knows, after the 1960 racing season, Carroll Shelby retired as a driver and became even better known for...
Luigi Chinetti Briggs Cunningham Photo: courtesy Art Evans 1 Kazuyoshi Hoshino, who participated in two F1 races in the 1970s, born...
The J. Frank Harrison story Given today’s racing environment with its multi-million-dollar corporate budgets, it can be hard to imagine a time when private individuals paid these expenses. Wealthy enthusiasts such as Lindsey Hopkins (a Florida investment banker), John Edgar (a California industrialist), Joe Lubin (a California tractor parts dealer),...
Briggs Swift Cunningham: one of the greatest racing figures, car engineers and team owners in America. Racing from the ’40s...
Photo: Casey Annis The story of the Corvette and how it came to race at Le Mans is one in which the dreams of a number of individuals intersect, over a prolonged period of time. While each of these dreamers came from vastly different backgrounds and held often times very...
In late March, around the time of the New York Auto Show, Jaguar made the surprising announcement that it would...
Away from the start of Race 3 at Eagle Mountain in April of 1957, Dave Tallaksen’s 3.4-liter XK-SS (#147) shares...
The main thing about the 1953 race at Watkins Glen was the question of whether there would be a race at all. The previous year there had been a fatality on the 6.6-mile course that ran right through town on Franklin Street. The Austin-Healey 100 pace car leads the pack...
On June 7–8, 1958, the Texas Region of the SCCA hosted a weekend of sports car racing 10 miles north...
At the 24 Hours of Le Mans, in June 1963. Americans Briggs Cunningham and Bob Grossman drove this Cunningham-entered, works-supported...
Frank Williams Erik Carlsson 3 The Intrepid, with Wayne Taylor driving, makes its IMSA GTP racing debut with a 2nd place finish at West Palm Beach, Florida (1991). 5 Rally champion Erik Carlsson is born in Trollhattan, Sweden (1929). Become a Member & Get Ad-Free Access To This Article (&...
In honor of the 60th anniversary of Chevrolet’s Corvette, the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion has selected “America’s sports car” as...
The Don Dear Editor, These days I tend to read Vintage Racecar from the back forward, in as much as I particularly enjoy Mike Lawrence’s “Last Lap” articles. “The Don” rang a strong bell with me, as Don was always a hero of mine, and while a little on the...
I’ve had a dream, one of the rare ones I remember clearly and can’t stop thinking about. That must mean...
I had just been discharged from the Army and was pursuing my education with the help of the GI Bill....
January 2009 The Le Mans 24 Hours; Le Mans, June 10-11, 1961. Augie Pabst seems serene at the wheel of the battered and besmudged Briggs Cunningham-entered Maserati Tipo 63 that he and Richard Thompson drove to 4th place overall at Le Mans in 1961. Photo courtesy of: THE KLEMANTASKI COLLECTION...
Mike Hawthorn George Follmer 1 Paul Frere drives an Ecurie Belge Cooper T51-Climax to victory in the 80-lap Formula Libre South...
In remembering and memorializing John Fitch upon the occasion of his death, Vintage Racecar has produced this brief photographic summary...
The 7th running of the fall races at Watkins Glen, N.Y., was held at the Interim Course, a 4.6-mile, 9-turn circuit on public roads, up the hill from the village, in Dix Township—the second year for that course. People would later call it “the course on the hill.” It was...
Soon after motor vehicles were invented they were raced. Initially the contests were held on open roads, often from city...
Lyn St. James Jim Clark Photo: Trevor Taylor Collection 2 Rupert Manwaring, team manager and assistant team manager for several...
The 23rd annual Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance, scheduled for March 11, 2018, on the grounds of the Ritz-Carlton Amelia Island in Florida, will honor MG, celebrating the cars from Cecil Kimber’s Morris Garages that helped launch American sports car road racing in the years after World War II. The M.G....