Replica Cars in Historics Races

The real issue is, as the grids get fuller with $50-100,000 "hot rods", the owners of the "real" $5-45,000,000 cars are becoming less willing to risk them in the same company. The great cars disappeared from Elkhart Lake about 10-15 years ago, as all the $50,000 Corvettes with the 600 bhp engines began to fill the grids. The same is happening to Monterey, with fewer and fewer owners willing to risk the really valuable cars on the same track as a guy with a $50,000 Mustang and "red mist" in his eyes.

 

Same everywhere and the Laguna Seca organisers do not even want real Ferraris anymore. They are not listening to the spectators and prefer Can Am cars and stock cars, all American machinery, and don't understand that it would be nice to have some Alfa Romeos, Bugattis, Ferraris, Jaguars, Astons, Triumphs, Panhards, Alpines, Porsches, Maseratis, Matras, BMWs, and other European race cars. As said so many times before: Steve Earle did it right. Once he was made to leave it all went downhill. A real shame.

Marcel Massini

 

I have to be included in the camp of previous 2 posters....
The names of the guilty have been changed to protest the innocent, I mean guilty(;-) :

There was a guy who found a '65 Mustang-6 cylinder with a 3-speed slush-o-matic auto trans-in a "Barn"(NO Bull S**T!) in someplace like Kansas or Nebraska. a 20,000-ish mile first paint, first owner, PERFECTLY preserved example. It is what it is...
However, this is ONLY the beginning: it got taken ALL the way down to the bare frame, chassis and "tub, so to speak. The guys doing this were Mustang pros-no doubt-as they made this into a 350R "clone" which was soo good, without checking the numbers, the "marque experts" would've been fooled-except there are no "missing versions" so it is-as we like to say-what it is...
The alloy block(as has been reported to me-was coated with a hi content ferrous paint: such that a magnet would stick to the side of the block!
Total "white lightening" runner motor....

The guy wanted to "screw with the dick h**d with the 15 million dollar Ferrari"(this was a while ago-but NOT that long ago....he dove for the pole, big crash, all the owners of hi value cars heard about the "whole thing", and those cars very quickly just stopped coming...

Fast forward to middle 8 figure valuations, and now you have invitation only events for owners...
In plain English: its to keep out the riff-raff....the guys with egos writing checks their bodies can't cash!

While it sounds like "elite" BS for the super rich, I say: hog wash, it s plain common sense...I would do exactly the same thing if I had one of these really, really, expensive vintage cars with HUGE historical racing history...interesting perspective, but realistic IMO........
Oh my God, I've become: "one of the Old Guys"....

 

There has been discussion at Monterey about forming a Group 3A (1955-60 over 2 liter sports cars) association. The members would agree to provide a certain number of cars for the event. However, THEY would determine who was accepted and what cars were allowed. The people who have discussed this have no problem with cars of lesser value running with the expensive cars, but they want to insure ALL the drivers are capable and respect the special cars out there. It is a good idea, but probably will go nowhere.

 

One of the reasons why there was a super exclusive tour for owners of genuine 250 GTOs ONLY and why there will very soon be another highly exclusive (private and non factory) tour solely for owners of another extremely legendary Ferrari model.

Marcel Massini

 

There needs to be separation between the replicas and authentics for racing categories and within those categories needs to be broken up by era of car and the price. If I was fortunate enough to own a piece of history like that, I certainly would never race it against someone who has a fake (or low priced real car) that doesn't care about damage to their car let alone mine.

 

Did he leave or was he pushed out?

 

Texas: Steve was "pushed" out by the track. They saw the money to be made and finally sent him packing. Steve ran the Sonoma event at Sears Point for a few years after that, but this event has now been sold and he has no current involvement in historic racing. Like many of us, he is also no longer young and probably does not want to continue to deal with all the hassles. Steve had great vision in 1974 when he ran the first "Historics". He is not a people person and also pursued a "my way or the highway" philosophy with this events. That approach did help preserve the cars, and gave them a relatively safe place to run. However, he certainly did not make a lot of friends among the competitors.

 

There is a GTO tour
There is a 250 TR tour

There will probably be others...I could certainly see a SWB Cal Spyder tour...and one for LWB Cal Spys...both are right around 50 cars...
I"m going to opine that total numbers made will be a factor-like it or not...there IS an "exclusivity" factor, call it "a seat at the big boy's table"
It is what it is, after all, the first two tours are for cars which I doubt that a "real" car can be had south of 35M USD these days....at the low end for "C- cars"...B and B+ cars, I'd further opine numbers which start with a 4, and soon, very soon, it will take a 5....crazy? Maybe, maybe not: but these are the times in which we live....

 

I think it's disgraceful to allow replicas in these races. When did this practice start?

How scummy of the track to chase out Steve Earle!

Let the fakes have their own class if they desire, and call it the Fake Class. Or Fake Class '61 to '65, or Fake Class 2 liters and less.

Nothing is real anymore and the bulk of the people don't seem to care. People still attend. I guess that's just the way the world is going.

(I was watching a New Year's show where I live in Eastern Europe. One after one all of the country's biggest stars came out to perform and sing, then they all sang together, and did the countdown to midnight. Turns out the entire show was pre-recorded. And the people watch this. Welcome to the 21st century!)

If you can afford to buy it, you can afford to gentlemen race it against other historical vehicles, if you know how to race.

 

Historic racing is an oxymoron IMHO. Today it's mostly about ego. These cars had their moment in the sun, now let's pay some respect and not bang fenders like this weekend at Goodwood. I'de rather see genuine, unmolested historic cars at a good demonstration pace than a mix of replicas and original cars duking it out. Also, gentleman drivers and hired hot shots don't mix well either.

I'd vote for a separation of classes with one for unmolested originals and one for replicas. The first at a fine demonstration pace, the second to suite the big egos. But at least it's being honest towards the spectators. Now I don't know if I'm watching the real thing or not.

 

Thanks for the update. Too bad, strong personalities are no longer in anymore.


Sent from my iPhone using FerrariChat

 

If replicas are censured. Are they to then be made to race in class with the other fake Mustangs and Corvettes?

I do not want to characterize drivers of Mustangs and Corvettes as uncaring about others driver's cars. Nor am I willing to characterize drivers of replicas as such.

I believe there are broader forces at work that serve to create the (limited) fields that we see on the track more than any replicas that may be there.

I would like to see more authentic cars on the track. We all would. And out in public too. So I am in favor of invitation only events. Where presumably other authentic cars, like Astons, Alfas and Masers, and Mustangs and Corvettes too will be participating. I think we all know that this is what all race fans want. A fun and good racing event. Event organizers then might make drivers reputations as important as their cars provenance. Hopefully making for safe events.

 

Goodwood Revival always has a few tool room "replicas." I hesitate to call them that because of the build quality and attention to precision re-creation. At Members' Meeting a couple of years ago there was an all GT40 grid which must have had a very high percentage of recreations.

The other side of the coin is authentic cars like E-types and FIA Cobras that have been so highly developed mechanically that they bear no more resemblance to an original car than a high quality recreation, in terms of their on-track performance.

The other day Autosport.com did a good article on the subject and compared lap times of the cars that won various races at last weekend's Revival with the lap times of the winners of the same races 20 years ago. It was pretty eye opening.

As for demonstration laps.....forget it as far as I'm concerned. They always have a few at GRRC Members' Meetings. That's generally when I go to the loo or get in out of the cold! And there's no guaranty of demonstration laps protecting the valuable rolling stock. I watched Nick Mason crunch his McLaren F1 during one such demonstration.

But Nick has the right attitude. A few years ago at Revival an interviewer asked him if it made him nervous racing his 250GTO, a car worth £10M (I said it was a few years ago) and he replied with, "Well, it doesn't cost £10M to repair it!"

 

The original organizer of the Historics was an enthusiast himself, he took pride in his gig so originality was not an option. But in reality, for every one of us "discriminating enthusiasts" there have always been at least 100 average father/son Joe's that don't know or give a hoot about the cars' originality. This is something that today's organizers have come to realize. They know that, by and large, their customers come to see the "million dollar" Ferraris go fast and make noise (and hopefully even crash). In this sense, it makes no difference whatsoever if a GTO is based on a GTE.

john

 

Some want the truth, others don't mind being fooled.