Whether or not most of us realize it, a most unusual man is among us. Until the late ’50s, he...
One of the most enjoyable—at least for me—of fifties events was the Pebble Beach Sports Car Road Races. The last...
On June 7–8, 1958, the Texas Region of the SCCA hosted a weekend of sports car racing 10 miles north of Fort Worth. The organizers laid out a 3-mile course at the National Guard Air Base near Eagle Mountain Lake, where 112 entries showed up to contest 10 scheduled “Sunburn”...
I don’t remember when I first met Lance Reventlow, but it must have been through my buddy, Bruce Kessler, who...
I have included a few remembrances about Lance in some previous Vintage Racecar columns, but because he was such a...
There were a number of outstanding road-race weekends during the fifties. Phil Hill’s win at the first Pebble Beach comes to mind as well as Carroll Shelby’s at the last. In Southern California, one of the best-loved venues was Palm Springs. It had everything: a famous resort, wonderful winter weather,...
Two months before the end of WWII, an American P-51 Mustang was shot down over Germany. The pilot was Captain...
Enzo Ferrari telephoned his driver Peter Collins before the 1956 Grand Prix of Italy for one of “those” conversations. The Great Man said he would not ask Peter to give up his chance of winning the year’s Formula One World Championship in favor of Fangio, but he wanted to know...
A number of those among us stood head and shoulder above all others during the Golden Age of Motorsports. Juan...
Jaguar’s XK120 Roadster was introduced at the London Motor Show in the fall of 1948. A year later, cars began...
October 2010 Little Bit Effyh Dear Editor, Mark Brinker’s Hidden Treasurers article on the Effyh “Special” brought back some vivid memories. In July 1956, as a teenager, two friends and I drove overnight from Toronto to Wilkes Barre in a TR2 to spectate at Senator Wood’s extraordinary Brynfan Tyddyn road...
Warren Olson arrived in Southern California fresh out of South Dakota in the late 1940s, just in time to take...
USAC Road Racing Fades as the SCCA Overcomes Its Aversion to Racing for Money When we left the USAC road...
During the November 1952 running of Mexico’s fabled Carrera Pan-Americana, the Karl Kling/Hans Klenk Mercedes 300SL makes a pit stop for new tires in the Sierra Madre after Tehuantepec. Note that the windshield has been smashed by hitting an errant buzzard at high speed, and that Klenk is wearing goggles...
Every Brit in motor racing of a certain age blames Bill Boddy and Denis Jenkinson for the fact that we...
Fewer cars rolled across the block than in recent years during the auctions in Scottsdale, but the amount bid for...
The finned Cunningham D-Types of Walt Hansgen and Sherwood Johnston, wait with Duncan Forlong’s AC/Bristol and Curtis Attaway’s XK-120.Photo: Bob Schroeder Over the years Texas has seen its share of oilmen who were actively involved in sports car racing. One of them was Dallas resident Samuel Allen Guiberson, who was...
Sixty years ago was when—for me—the world became modern. Many people will laugh at that; some will understand but have...
Following their conquest of Mexico’s Pan-American Road Race in November of 1952, Mercedes-Benz factory drivers Karl Kling and Hermann Lang...
2013 Mercedes-Benz SL550 Photo: Mercedes-Benz 2013 Mercedes-Benz SL550 While the 300 SL of the 1950s was unquestioningly a sports car...
My personal record with the Mercedes 300 SLR was six starts, three wins, two 2nd places and one “withdrawn when...
Karl Kling was born too late to join Rudolf Caracciola, Manfred Von Brauchitsch and Hermann Lang in their rampage through Grand Prix motor racing of the Thirties, and too early to give Juan Manuel Fangio, Stirling Moss and Hans Herrmann any real competition in the W196 of 1954 and 1955....
As you’ll see, throughout both sides of the magazine, this month we recognize and celebrate the 60th anniversary of Mercedes-Benz’s...
Like so many great automobiles of our time, the Mercedes-Benz SL series can trace its origins directly to the racetrack....
The story of the production model 300 SL really picks up where our story about the W194 Le Mans racecar ends. After a highly successful 1952 racing season where the W194 “Gullwing” won the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the Carrera Panamericana, the entire sports car program was closed,...
More than 100 friends of John Fitch gathered at his home in Lime Rock, Connecticut, to honor him on the...
• McCormick’s Palms Springs Collector Car Auction will be held November 16-18, 2012. Among the early entries are a 1953...
In remembering and memorializing John Fitch upon the occasion of his death, Vintage Racecar has produced this brief photographic summary of his racing career. John FitchPhoto: Mercedes-Benz Before, after and during that career, however, John Fitch was much more than a racing driver. He served as pilot of both Light...
