Speedster
Racing in the 60s - Part III
This is one
of a series of articles written by Pat Tobin which appeared
in '356 Talk' . It is reproduced with the kind permission of
the Author.
The ambience
of racing in the 60s
The handful of pro racing shops
that existed were dedicated to pro efforts. Dan Gurney's All
American Racers started up in this time frame, and there were
a few others dedicated to Indy and other racing venues which
paid prize money. More were spawned when the Can-Am series was
initiated. But SCCA was strictly amateur in those days; we raced
for $10 trophies. At one of my driver-training sessions at Riverside,
instructor Bob Challman, a Lotus dealer, briefly waxed philosophical.
I don't recall the context, which I think was a little far-fetched
in any case, but he said that we were out there to "dispose
of disposable income." I was stunned, and the faces of the
other fledgling drivers showed the same reaction. Most of us
were out there on money that should have gone to buy new shoes
for the baby. The idea of that being "disposable income"
was startling, at best.
In the upper modified classes,
cars were often supplied and sponsored by a dealer who had a
lively interest in racing and could benefit from the advertising.
John von Neuman, who owned Competition Motors, the Porsche and
VW dealership in Hollywood, owned and had his shop prepare the
Spyders driven by the late Ken Miles. Otto Zipper, who co-owned
a dealership in Beverly Hills, provided Spyders and later a 904
or two for top drivers. Vasek Polak owned and prepared Spyders.
Bob Challman Lotus was also in Manhattan Beach. There were a
few others, and of course I am speaking of Southern California
where I lived. I imagine the situation was similar in the East;
I recall reading of young Roger Penske driving Spyders for a
dealership in Pennsylvania owned by his father, if I remember
correctly.
Very Little
Sponsorship
But in the production classes
there were few full sponsors which provided the cars and did
all the preparation. The only one which comes to mind is Chick
Vandagriff's Hollywood Sports Cars which prepared winning British
cars (MG, Sunbeam Alpine etc.). But there were a number of independent
repair shops whose owners participated in racing preparation
on the side, and sometimes also drove. In the Porsche camp there
was Roger Bursch (inventor/supplier of the exhaust systems which
bear his name); cars which he sponsored by assisting in the preparation
bore the name of his repair shop, "Scientific Automotive."
Al Cadrobbi was very active in a similar way, and there were
probably others after I was no longer racing. The slogan Al chose
for his Porsche/VW repair shop cracked me up. During an era when
service at the dealer's shop usually meant exorbitant prices
and often shoddy work to boot, Al chose as the name of his prosperous
independent shop, "Cadrobbi's Werkstatt - Unauthorized Service."
95% of the drivers did all their own wrenching, relying on a
friendly repair shop owner for special tools and equipment beyond
the realm of private ownership. For example, Bursch's Scientific
Automotive had a Clayton chassis dyno which was invaluable for
tuning and testing. Al Cadrobbi built my first racing engine
with me at his elbow. He taught me the ropes, sold me an engine
stand, even gave me a few tools. From there on I did it myself
with Al's consultation and support.
Getting the
parts
There was one young doctor running
in E production when I was there; his engine had been built by
Vasek Polak, personally I think. Vasek was amazing - I don't
know when he slept. Even by that time he already owned a couple
of very prosperous dealerships and was very active in modified
(sports racing) classes with the Spyders and heavy aluminum.
The thought of him working late at night, personally building
up a 356 racing engine for a customer is just mind-boggling.
Yet I have seen a photo of him doing exactly that. Most of the
Porsches running were 356A Speedsters, 56 through 58, just six
to eight years old in 64. All parts were easily available through
Porsche dealers; there were virtually no independent parts suppliers
such as we have today. We got "racer's price" from
dealerships which supported racing. That was usually the dealer's
cost plus 10%. Vasek usually stocked unusual parts that a dealer
wouldn't have. I bought my ZF limited slip from his parts department,
about $150, if I remember correctly. In rare cases parts would
quietly be provided free to really top drivers. For example,
after the Spyder days, Ken Miles invaded E production with a
Sunbeam Alpine. He was beating the Porsches. It is rumored that
Davey Jordan, the top Porsche driver at the time, was given free
parts by Competition Motors. It was also said that Davey was
skipping lunches in order to finance his shoestring racing campaign.
Don't laugh - this was not that uncommon. If I remember correctly,
Davey eventually succeeded in beating Miles and returning E Production
to Porsche domination.
Close racing
with Uncle Bob
As I said in a previous installment,
motor homes were all but non-existent; I began to notice them
around 65 or 66. Most drivers, with family and helpers, came
to the course in a station wagon filled with parts and tools,
towing the race car behind. At most tracks there were no permanent
rest rooms; we just contended with the hot, stinking "Al's
& Annie's." It was anything but comfortable. Now, back
to the racing. After Willow Springs, where I brought home a 3rd
after briefly leading, it was Santa Barbara, if I remember correctly.
I don't recall how I finished, but probably not very high, because
I never did well at Santa Barbara. Once I spun late in the race
and finished dead last. What I do remember is Uncle Bob Kirby
and I having our own private little ding dong in practice. It's
great fun to race hard in close company with a buddy, often just
inches apart in some turns, with full confidence that he is not
going to do something stupid and screw you both up. Even more,
I appreciated Bob's feeling confident enough in me to stay that
close, especially in practice when it wasn't necessary except
for our own amusement and a crunch might have put one or both
of us out of the upcoming race. After all, Bob had about a decade
of experience on me. Alan Fordney, the P.A. announcer for the
Cal Club/SCCA races for many years, had a favorite expression
for two cars in such close company: "You could throw a blanket
over those two cars!"
A new line
at the Pomona track
Next came Pomona. Just a flat
course on the huge paved lot of the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds,
but there was one little section of the course that I owned.
We ran it counter-clockwise; it seems like I recall hearing that
later they ran it clockwise, but I'm not sure about that. At
the end of the long straight, turns 1, 2 and 3 were left-right-left
in quick succession - virtually a set of S's. Turn 2 went under
the bridge. Each turn was slower than the one preceding. In the
middle of turn 3 was an up-ramp of about a foot where the pavement
changed level. Conventional wisdom was to take it fairly easy
through 1 and 2 because you had to be very slow in order to hit
the ramp just right and not too fast. I discovered that, by cheating
on line, I could make my own tiny little straight between 2 and
3. Probably no more than about 30 feet, but enough that I could
straighten the wheels briefly. This allowed me to storm through
1 and 2 like the hounds of hell were chasing me, then, with the
car momentarily straightened and balanced on all four, stomp
very hard on the brakes. This all took place in no more than
two seconds, and I was down to a safe entrance speed for turn
3 and its whoop-de-do. You'd be surprised how many cars I passed
as they slowed through 1 and 2 because there wasn't really a
straight between 2 and 3 if you used conventional line. I passed
Alan Johnson between 2 and 3 one day, but hit the ramp about
1 mph too fast. That tossed the tail up briefly and while I was
waiting to get traction again, Alan re-passed. I'm sure that
there were other drivers who used the same or even a better technique
through that section, but I worked it out for myself and it was
more fun than the law allows.
Racing in
the rain
I don't recall my Saturday finish.
I think that both Alan Johnson and Bob Kirby were running that
weekend, so I probably finished third or lower. Sunday I finished
second to Alan Johnson in a hard, pouring rain. I wore an open-faced
Bell helmet, with goggles. The lenses remained covered with water,
but there were narrow ventilation slots about 1/8" high
across the top of each plastic lens. I drove the race peering
through the vent slots! Visibility was just a few feet, and at
the end of the long straight there formed a junkyard which increased
in population with every lap as drivers, unable to see, overshot
their braking point and crashed into the other cars already there.
Sad to say, some of our POC Race Team compatriots were among
those who played bumper cars in the rain. Officials stopped the
race when enough laps had been completed to make it official.
Side note: some drivers used ordinary Pirelli Cinturato street
tires for racing in the rain. The tires had excellent wet adhesion.
I didn't even have a spare set of wheels, let alone tires. But
the Blue Streaks had a pretty good tread which kept them from
being as useless as slicks are in the wet.
A new starting
technique!
Odd as the scheduling may seem,
a few weeks later it was mid-June and we were back at Pomona.
On Saturday I started on the front row. Rita said our car came
off the line like a bullet. I had used a new technique - flooring
the hrottle and holding the revs at 5,000 (the bottom end of
the torque range) by carefully controlling clutch slippage for
that second or two until the car "catches up" with
engine speed. Yes, I know it sounds elementary - duh - but I
had never used that technique before. It put me into a lead I
never relinquished, and I won. At this point, please allow an
appropriate digression. The contribution of a wife or significant
other to racing cannot be over-stated. Rita ran a hundred racing-related
errands while I was at work. A frequent routine on Monday morning
was for her to tow the race car to Fred Sebald's body shop in
Glendale if I had picked up any scars the preceding weekend.
She made the numbers for the car by scissoring them from adhesive
shelf paper. She made the lunches, organized the kids and a hundred
details. She contributed constant support and enthusiasm, never
complaining about the pressure that racing put on the budget
for luxuries such as food, housing and clothing. What a great
pleasure it was to earn our first checkered flag, and present
it to her, on her 30th birthday!
Back to Pomona
We lived only about thirty miles
from Pomona, so we went home Saturday night. We taped the flag
to the roll bar and towed the race car home on the San Bernadino
Freeway to cheers from occupants of other cars, some of them
probably race spectators. The kids thought this was just too
cool to be believed. They had probably given up on ever saying
"Daddy" and "won" in the same sentence. We
arrived in understandable good spirits Sunday morning, then got
the bad news. They had decided to run D & E Production together.
Great. After winning on Saturday, I was 16th on the grid Sunday,
behind all the class D cars. But the fun was about to begin.
My grid position was so far on the outside that I worried about
traction. E.Forbes Robinson Sr., who had approved my first national
competition license a year and a half previous, was standing
nearby. I motioned him over to the car and asked him to look
ahead of the left rear wheel to see if there were gravel marbles
or any other debris which would deter my getting underway. He
said it looked clear.
Straight into
second place
The start was something else.
As the starter fluttered the green flag over his head and we
held the revs up, ready to pop the clutch, a couple of cars crept
forward. He slowly lowered the flag and motioned for them to
move back into position. Most of the other drivers also let their
revs down, expecting him to go through another "ready"
phase. I saw no reason to let the revs down. Sure enough, as
soon as the errant cars had backed up (and, hopefully, shifted
out of reverse!) the starter began waving the flag low, at waist
level! I had about two milliseconds of indecision, then figured
what the hell, if I make a false start they won't kill me. I
dumped the clutch. To this day I don't have the slightest idea
how I got around or through the six rows of stationary cars ahead
of me. Perhaps I drove around them on the outside, but I was
so close to the edge I'm not sure there was room to do so. Perhaps
I zig-zagged between them, or jumped over the tops of them! All
I know is that a couple of seconds later I was racing, looking
at the tail of only one car. That was Johnny Lumkin, an experienced
and seasoned driver, in a class D MGB. My first thought was relief
that at least one other fool had decided to give it the benefit
of the doubt; if they crucified me I would at least have company.
Someone has
to do it
I expected to see red flags before
the first lap was completed, after which they would arrest Johnny
and me and then restart the race for the others. It was with
a great sense of relief that we came around to start-finish and
the grid was no longer full of cars! Even better when I realized
that they were all behind the two of us. So Johnny and I, with
our questionable head start, just ran away and hid. We didn't
see another car except those we lapped. After about two laps,
at the end of the S-F straight, Johnny discreetly raised one
hand barely above his left shoulder - where it wouldn't be seen
by spectators - and motioned me around. I was happy to accommodate.
So at Johnny's confidential invitation, I led most of the race.
With one lap to go he blew my doors off as he came around me
on the S-F straight, but I had my class win. Then I was in for
another surprise. After the cool-off lap they waved me, along
with Johnny, into the victory circle. After he was presented
his checkered flag, the party moved to my car and I was also
given one, along with the requisite kiss from the race queen
du jour. And that wasn't the worst part - her kiss was a lot
juicier than the more businesslike type who was dealing them
out on Saturday. It's tough work getting kissed by a new woman
after every race, but someone has to do it. Then Rita jumped
in the passenger seat and we did another victory lap, our second
in two days. I still don't know why - never before had I seen
anyone except the overall winner given the spoils of victory.
I don't know whether they were starting a new policy that day
or whether they decided to give it to me because my class E car
had led most of the D & E race and finished second. I asked
no questions nor did I confess to Johnny's generosity. I grabbed
the flag and beat it the hell out of there.
Running on
borrowed heads
However, all was not well with
the engine - later in the week I found both cylinder heads cracked.
These were the heads which had come on our 60 super Coupe, and
they probably had 40,000 street miles on them before they went
on the racing engine; they didn't owe me a penny. Willow Springs
was coming up in just a couple of weeks or so, and I couldn't
buy and set up a new pair of heads that quickly. Dick Lovell,
an active POC member who later founded Performance Products,
kindly loaned me a pair of heads which had formerly been on someone's
racing engine. They had the pre-A 8 mm valve stems which were
used by most of the 356 racers until the mid 60s. Then, back
to Willow springs. I felt that the engine was running well enough
with the borrowed heads, but a friend in the pits said that my
car didn't have a healthy, even-sounding exhaust note.
That damned
Elva again!
Again I don't recall how I finished
Saturday, but it couldn't have been too well because on Sunday
I had to work up through some traffic before I saw the lead car
in front of me. I recall passing Bob Kirby on the front straight;
Bob was handicapped that day by a sick engine. When I got within
shooting distance of the leading car, it was the damned Elva
again! No problem. With a couple of wins under my belt I no longer
felt uneasy about leading a race. I wanted this guy, and I wanted
him bad, to avenge the defeat of the Porsches at the previous
Willow running. The driver was no more experienced than I, and
I felt confident I could take him this time. As I began closing
on him it must have made him nervous, because he spun again,
just as he had in the previous Willow race, and at about the
same place - between turns 3 and 4. This was beginning to feel
like deja vu all over again. I would rather have passed him fair
and square, but if he wanted to hand me the lead, I would take
it. I expected him to remain out of the way and re-enter the
course when clear, per the rules. But, with his wildly spinning
rear wheels throwing up rocks and sand, he pulled back onto the
track directly in front of me! That's not a fast part of the
course - I was probably moving about 60 mph. But he re-entered
the track at about 2 mph. I stomped on the binders and my car
went sideways, my right door collecting the left-rear corner
of the Elva. Former divisional champion Denny Harrison, watching
from the pits, told me later that my car left the ground "about
a foot" from the force of the impact. I don't think the
fiberglass monstrosity was even cracked; the Elva continued on
his way, having been given a little extra boost by my car.
Your car is
on fire!
The force vector propelled my
car off course to the left where the nose climbed partway up
the steep slope that came right down to the edge of the track
at that point. There was a corner marshall nearby, and I asked
him to take a walk around my car to see if it looked OK - that
would save me un-buckling, getting out, then getting in and buckling
up again. After a brief circuit of the car he said that there
was a big bash in the right side but everything else looked OK.
I thanked him, backed down the embankment and resumed racing
with a fury. I had lost a little time, and now really had a job
to do. As I passed start-finish half a lap later, I noticed officials
stooping and looking very carefully at my car. Another half a
lap and I knew why. Just as I cleared the top of the hill and
embarked upon the back straight, my engine quit. I cut the ignition
switch, took it out of gear, raised my left arm high in the air
and steered for the right edge of the track, wondering how far
I could coast. Then people began passing me, each driver pointing
frantically to the infield. I thought they were just telling
me to get off the track, although I wasn't really in the way
at that point. But after two or three signals from very agitated
drivers, I became curious and looked in the mirror. My God, my
car was on fire!
A hero with
an extinguisher
Later inspection showed that,
when the car had been wedged up the embankment, upward leverage
on the "stinger" pipe had broken the exhaust system
loose at one of the rear cylinders. The air intake of one of
the carbs had been burned, indicating that hot exhaust had evidently
ignited some over spray from that carb. Without further delay
I steered deep into the infield, well away from the track, then
jumped out of the car and got the hell out of there - at that
point I didn't know if the car was going to blow or what. From
a safe distance I could see that the fire was mostly in the engine
room and under the car where the fuel line had been burned in
two and gas dripping from the tank was feeding the flames. The
tonneau cover over the passenger seat was also burning and carrying
the flames to the front part of the car. I knew I should shut
off the gas valve, but there were complications. I had removed
the stock long fuel valve handle and replaced the valve with
a simple petcock without an extension handle. So to shut it off
I had to reach under the gas tank . But the tonneau I had to
get under was burning! And last but not least, I didn't know
if I could get the seriously-damaged right-side door open. About
that time another competitor (non-Porsche) pulled off - sacrificing
his race - and offered me the use of his on-board fire extinguisher
(we weren't required to carry them at that time). He didn't carry
a very big bottle, but it was better than I had and the course
fire truck was nowhere in sight. I explained to the driver that
if he would play his extinguisher on the burning tonneau, I would
try to get in and shut off the gas. He did so as I tugged mightily
on the door, finally getting it open far enough. Just as his
fire bottle was exhausted I took a deep breath, got down on hands
and knees and crawled under the tonneau, shutting off the fuel
petcock. Sure enough, the fire subsided almost immediately. The
course fire truck didn't show up for another several minutes.
A non-routine
incident!
How about that driver? He sacrificed
his own race and saved my car from much more severe damage -
possibly total loss of the car. Nobody had much money in those
days but I sent him a note of thanks and some money, hoping it
would pay for a re-charge of his bottle. At the start of the
race, Rita and Diana Kirby had enacted their usual routine when
Bob and I were running - they climbed on top of one of the tow
cars and lit up cigarettes. But at the time of the crunch and
fire, Rita was elsewhere - probably standing in line at one of
the portable powder rooms with one of the kids - the usual. Diana
found Rita and her first words were, "He's alright - he's
out of the car and he's alright." Only then did she relate
that I had been involved in a non-routine incident. Rita had
probably heard about it on the P.A., but she appreciated Diana's
priorities.
Al
