As a matter of fact I have! One book I am especially impressed with is King of the Boards: The Life and Times of Jimmy Murphy. That it concerns a period of racing which fascinates me is one of the reasons I bought the book, basically sight unseen. Another reason was that it is written by someone whose grandmother raised Jimmy Murphy after he was orphaned in the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire. This "inside track" helped make already fascinating story sparkle with information and access not readily available to most biographers.

Gary Doyle is a man after my own heart: he understands the concept of placing events within their context. He also fills in as many of those little gaps as he can. It was interesting to see Chief Yellow Calf having lunch before his nap and then presenting Jimmy with the Arapaho war bonnet which the chief brought from Wyoming to present to the winner of the 1922 Indianapolis International 500 Mile Sweepstakes. It was equally fascinating to see stills from the movie in which Jimmy appeared, Racing Hearts, starring Agnes Ayres and Richard Dix. Nor did I know that Jimmy was a single-digit handicap golfer.

The book is well-written, profusely illustrated, and worth every penny that Gary Doyle is asking for each copy. The bibliography alone runs 18 pages. And the chapter of the 1921 Grand Prix de l'Automobile Club de France at Le Mans has photos that I was unfamiliar with is perhaps one of the best tales of this event I have yet to come across. If you love American racing and if you love this era, this book belongs on your bookshelf. I think that it is safe to say that we now have the definitive biography of Jimmy Murphy and one which be one of the starting points for research into this period along with Board Track: Guts, Gold & Glory by Dick Wallen.

Another book which I heartily recommend - and the author tells me that he needs the support, so please buy it - is the latest entry in the Buddy Palumbo series by that Man among Men, Burt "BS" Levy. The Fabulous Trashwagon takes up the tale where the previous volume - Montezuma's Ferrari…And Other Adventures - left off, the morning after our hero Buddy gets married. For those of us who admire Moxie in its most brazen forms, Burt is one of the stars of the show. Having self-published all three volumes (with St. Martins Press getting a shot at the first book, The Last Open Road), Burt not only spins a good yarn (and NO! I will certainly will not help you identify those who just may not so "coincidentally" resemble some who are still living or have gone on to the Great Paddock in the Sky - and as Burt sez, "Some just wish it were them…") but urges you to not only buy the book, but to invest in the book as well. To see what I mean, just check out the "Road America Program" in the center of the book and you will see.

During a chat with Burt at Indianapolis in September - WHAT!? You were there and didn't roll by to see Burt and buy a book!? - he mentioned that the next episode is being sketched out and there is a distinct European flavor to Buddy's next adventure. It will be set in the latter part of the 1950s and, well, if you want more, help Burt fund the next adventure…

Another book on the shelf which deserves mention is the Mario Andretti/Gordon Kirby collaboration, Mario Andretti: A Driving Passion. It has been out for a while, but I still find myself wandering over to the bookshelf and thumbing through it quite often. It is just an excellent book about Mario and his career. The pictures are simply great, and Kirby does a good job of letting Mario tell his story. Too few today seem to realize just how truly versatile a racer Andretti was: "stock cars" on the bullrings of the Eastern Pennsylvania region, Midgets, Sprints, and then Champ Cars - qualifying on the inside of the second row at Indianapolis in the first rear-engined race car he ever drove and winning the USAC National Championship as a rookie. In 1967, Andretti not only won in Champ Cars, but the Daytona 500 (in a Ford Fairlane run by Bill Stroppe/Holman & Moody), and the Sebring 12-Hour race with Bruce McLaren in the Ford GT Mark IV. If you have been hemming and hawing about the book, buy it!

There isn't much that I often have to say about championships which is very positive, but there are exceptions. The struggle during the 1992 season for the NASCAR Winston Cup Series Championship is one of those exceptions. From his early entries into the world of NASCAR and the Winston Cup Series, Alan Kulwicki just connected with not only myself, but many others. Here was a guy from Wisconsin, a pretty successful racer in the ASA series, a college-educated engineer literally leaving for the South to try his hand at mixing it up with the seasoned professionals of NASCAR. In ASA, Kulwicki was a driver-entrant, preparing and racing his own cars. He was determined to do things his way. In Race With Destiny: The Year that Changed NASCAR Forever, David Poole weaves the tale of that 1992 season around the stories of not just Kulwicki, Bill Elliott, and Davey Allison but also reminds us that 1992 was the final season of The King, Richard Petty - and the season which saw Jeff Gordon make his Winston Cup debut.

This is one those books that perhaps you have second and third thoughts about reading - much less buying - but it sneaks up on you. Any season which features the possibility of any one of six - as in 6 - drivers emerge the champion has to be an interesting season. This the sort of Mother Lode that writers live for. David Poole is one of the writers for the Charlotte Observer covering the stock car racing scene the way others would cover the more traditional sports elsewhere in America. He knows his subject, has done his homework, and spins an entertaining tale. I knew what happened and still found it an engaging story. This book is worth your while.

The six drivers who went into the last race with a shot at the championship were: Davey Allison, Alan Kulwicki, Bill Elliott, Harry Gant, Kyle Petty, and Mark Martin. Sadly, the next season would see two of these perish….

There is a book which if you haven't picked it up yet, well, shame on you! It has been out there for a good while and can still be found on the shelves of Borders and other booksellers. The book? American Sports Car Racing in the 1950s by Michael T. Lynch, William Edgar, and Ron Parravano. This is one of those books which you wonder how you managed to exist without before it came along. There is not another book which covers this period as well as this one does. Buy it! Now! Otherwise, someday when it is long gone and being hawked for eyebrow-raising prices, don't expect any sympathy from me….

Also sitting on the shelf is a revision of an old favorite of mine, Lola T70: The Racing History & Individual Chassis Record (Revised & Enlarged 3rd Edition) by John Starkey. The Lola T70 has always been one of my favorite racing cars and this book is easily the best thing out there on this series of cars. There much more packed into this book than a dry recitation of race data and a list of owners for the various chassis - Starkey reminds of exactly why some of us get a certain glint in our eye and a certain, far-off look on our faces as we journey back to the days of when the cars where powerful, and most certainly reminded one and all of the fact by making loud noises, slip-sliding through the corners, and reminding mere mortals that there was indeed a difference between a Racer and a racing driver….

John Starkey has another book out there worth grabbing since once you have it in your collection, the refrain of "How did I ever manage….?" will be on your lips in a skinny minute: Racing With A Difference: The History of IMSA. A big, heavy book - don't drop it on you foot or you will be wearing a cast - and one of the few books to tackle one of the most interesting racing stories of recent times: how John and Peggy Bishop created the International Motor Sports Association. Few recall that IMSA didn't begin with sports and GT cars, but rather with open-wheeled cars, Formula Ford. The book is a bit of a puzzle to describe. It is certainly big, thick, and full of pictures and statistics, but not quite all that one expect from someone who is generally pretty thorough. Also, the book ends with the final round of the 1993 season in Phoenix. Although IMSA would continue sanctioning events for several more years and become absorbed into the American Le Mans Series, that part of the story goes unreported.

Having said all that, it has the distinction of being one of the few books to tackle a subject which cries out for attention, IMSA and its place in the history of American racing. There is no other book which looks at IMSA from literally cradle to almost its grave. This is a book that just lures you back to it time after time. Some of the pictures evoke an immediate flashback to memories of the days when the IMSA cars were the ones that made the heart beat just the bit faster as you watched men like Al Holbert, Peter Gregg, Hurley Haywood, Rick Knoop, Dan Marvin, Bob Akin, Wayne Baker, Derek Bell, and so many others slip and slide their cars through the corners…

Another book on IMSA is Prototypes: The History of the IMSA GTP Series by J.A. Martin and Ken Wells. This is a lavish and well-illustrated book on one of those Golden Ages of Racing, the period between 1981 and 1993 when IMSA created and field the GTP Series. These were probably the last of the dinosaurs in racing: big engines, big tires, brave men (and women) who rode them into battle and left a legacy which only now is beginning to be fully appreciated. These were probably the last true link to the days when men and not technology decided the outcomes of races, although by the end this was perhaps coming less and less true as the spirits unleashed by the technological equivalent of Pandora's Box began to infiltrate IMSA as well.

Prototypes is not a linear tale of this period, but rather a look at its parts, which when taken as a whole, defies the laws of nature and creates more energy than was placed into it. By using looks at the individual teams and their cars, this book becomes a priceless collection of short vignettes which sight to stories which might otherwise be left untold. You get to meet people like Phil Conte, Bob Tullius, Jim Busby, and Gianpiero Moretti. You also get the story of those fabulous Jaguars from Group 44, the Electromotive Nissans, the saga of the Polimotor, and Fabcar, to mention but a very few of the tales within the covers of this book.

Rants and Rumblings

When The Season ends, the fans immediately begin hashing over what happened, arguing over who were the Heroes or Zeroes, exchange the latest gossip and rumors, start making lists of "who was the greatest whatever?" and then endlessly speculate about the upcoming season. Once this was done with your mates at school or at work or at club meetings. Or, on rare occasions with a friend overseas through your correspondence which worked its way back and forth in the form of snail mail. Life in the Fast Lane was usually lived vicariously through the words of The Scribes upon whose prose we depended for our view of The Sport.

Today, it is quite different. Motor racing events are now usually telecast and observed by fans in "real-time". Rather than chat face to face with someone about the race and the events surrounding it, fans communicate with other fans who may be anywhere in the world. The written word is now that of one fan communicating with another fan. This also allows differences of opinion to often escalate beyond what one would expect when folks deal with each other one-on-one in person. The anonymity of the internet also abets raising the ante, since few use their True Names and instead adopt pseudonyms. This anonymity often seems to bring out the lesser angels of our nature. This in turn leads to us once again reminding ourselves as to the origin of the term "fan" and gravely nodding our heads and muttering how so much apparent change is actually no change, since we seem to be at the place where the fanatics claim center stage in how the tenor of the sport is discussed.

There seems to be a large number of those who follow Formula One - once known as 'Grand Prix' - racing whose opinion of any other racing series is one of disdain, even outright contempt. Personally, I find this attitude more than a tad disturbing. These folks are constantly reminding one and all that Formula One is the 'Pinnacle of Motor Sports" and this is because of its advanced technologies, the quality of the drivers, and the costs associated with playing the game at this level. This in turn makes all the other series not merely unworthy, but subject to ridicule.

I find myself quite at odds with the prevailing views of those who seem to be more and more the most vocal - if not the majority - of many of those who are F1 fans. What bothers me is that most of those who seem to be F1 fans in the sense of being motivated enough to find a forum on the subject and participate in it, seem to be just that, fans of only Formula One. While this might warm the souls and pad the pocketbooks of those who run F1, I think that this attitude is simply wrong for the long-term health of motor racing.

Since coming to power, FIA President Max Mosley and the owner of F1, Bernie Ecclestone, have completely altered the landscape of motor racing. Not that there was much that they could do which would be anything but an improvement in certain areas. The residual bitterness of the FIASCO War which was waged in the open from late 1979 into the early months of 1981 and which had some heated skirmishes for several years afterward, poisoned the presidency of Jean-Marie Balestre during his terms as the head of the FISA, the renamed CSI. Like Lenin and Castro, Mosley and Ecclestone were rebels who came to hold the reins of power. Like Lenin and Castro, their legacy will be a mixed one.

I happen to be one of those simple souls who merely tries to enjoy motor racing in its many and varied forms. I began following Grand Prix racing sometime in 1953 and was a "fan" by the following year. A year later, 1955, I was committed to a lifelong love of the series. Although I am not very much enthused by what I see of F1 today, I have been following the sport far too long to be able to completely walk away from it. I have moved back more than a few steps, but will probably stay about where I am. This means that I keep an eye on the sport from a middle distance.

Why a middle distance? Because, well, I think that find myself ill at ease with those who have only eyes for F1. I feel that most are fairly recent followers of F1 and they have that dogged reverence and zeal of the recently converted. They believe that F1 is the best of all possible worlds. No other series can dare hold a candle to it. They see the series through a prism of their experience. Few have much time for the history of the sport and tend to often belittle that past.

To me, that is their loss. While I have little regard for the current World Champion, Michael Schumacher, it is a view born of his actions on the track in the 1994 Australian Grand Prix and the 1997 European Grand Prix. Whether there are those who disagree or violently disagree with me is of no concern to me. To me, Schumacher will never be a "Great". Likewise, Ayrton Senna da Silva dropped from grace in my view for his actions on the track. My regard for him was once quite high, but from perhaps 1988 onward I was less and less enthused with his actions and after he crashed into Alain Prost at the 1990 Japanese Grand Prix, well, he ceased to exist in my eyes.

As mentioned, I am a soul who loves racing. I try to watch as many of the NASCAR Winston Cup Series and Busch Series races as possible, as well as those of the CART and IRL series, plus the sports cars races. And, at this time of year, catch up with all the other series I may have missed as the Speed Channel shows them during the off-season. I often find the NASCAR bashing among F1 fans particularly grating and have to grit my teeth and simply chalk it off to their ignorance and the arrogance of the unknowing. Unlike the current F1, I can actually identify nearly every driver and his team in NASCAR Winston Cup and most of those in the Busch Series.

The CART/IRL Situation is one that especially disturbs me. As most seem to fail to realize, there is more than enough "blame" to go around so that all the those who were a party to this schism will not do away empty-handed. The CART directors lost sight of the bubble and those who created the IRL may have focused too much on the short-run versus the long-haul - or vice versa. At any rate, the two series have managed to harm each other to such an extent that perhaps only a final Pyrrhic victory will be the end result.

Although I am someone whose natural inclinations lead him to be perhaps more attuned to the CART side, I also have a great deal of affection for some of those involved in the IRL effort. I happen to like open-wheeled oval racing AND open-wheeled road racing. I am sad that the Indianapolis International 500 Mile Sweepstakes has lost so much of its former luster. I never fully appreciated how much I liked the rather egalitarian approach that Indianapolis took to all who would race there. Whether a famed driver from another series or a long-time driver from the Sprint Car ranks, both had to endure the Rookie Test. And only the fastest 33 qualified for the race. Period.

Perhaps there will be a strong revival of the CART series over the next several seasons. Should plans for CART to race on the Spa-Francorchamps circuit and at several other European tracks come to pass, there is no reason to count CART out of the game. Similarly, the IRL is beginning to sense that it too must begin to deal with certain realities, especially the spotty attendance at several of its venues, a problem it shares with CART. It is a subtle hint of what might come when the new generation of IRL chassis must accommodate refueling from either side of the car. As you learn from many decades of observing motor sport, surprises never cease when changing conditions force folks to recant and perform an about-face.

Frankly, my plans for 2003 are in flux right now. If Zip Racing, spearheaded by Spencer Pumpelly of nearby Mason Neck, really does jump from the Grand American series to the ALMS, it will take quite a bit to keep me from the National Grand Prix at RFK (assuming that it is run again…) and perhaps a few other ALMS rounds. Likewise, I would like to see at least one or two Grand American rounds this coming season. Naturally, I will be glued to the screen watching the NASCAR Winston Cup and Busch Series events. I will generally have to catch the F1 events on the rebound when they are replayed on the Speed Channel the evening of the race. Sorry, but Church is still a much higher priority to me than F1. With Speed Channel planning to show the F3000 series next season, perhaps I will give them an opportunity since I have not been much taken with the series in the past.

Things have changed. Whether those changes have forever altered the context of F1 is perhaps not something we will know for several years or perhaps longer. What is certain is that the tenor of the sport has taken several turns which have alienated some of us forever. Whenever I think about the fortress erected at Indianapolis as the F1 Paddock, with its security badges, goons, and forbidding presence I wonder if it were like this about five decades ago, would I have ever become a follower of the sport? Would I have never had the opportunity to speak with Alberto Ascari or Stirling Moss or Tony Brooks or Phil Hill or Jim Clark?