Historic Grand Prix: The Best Reason to Visit the USGP

At just a bit after five o'clock on Friday afternoon came the defining moment for me at Indianapolis 2002. After watching the cars being prepared, they were now approaching the last turn on the Grand Prix circuit and entering the long sweep onto the main straight. I had scouted out a spot in the Southwest Terrace which afforded a view from the turn - still Turn One to me - and down the "front straight" into the first corner of the GP course. And, into the pit area.

As the cars entered the turn and were heading down the straight, a number of the mechanics in the pits stopped what they were doing and listened to the sounds of the Ferrari boxer-12's, the BRM V-12, and the oodles of Ford Cosworth DFV's that were once so familiar to Grand Prix fans of not that long ago.

By the second demonstration lap, the few mechanics who had headed for the fence on the first lap were now joined by many others in the pit area, many of them waving and yelling as the cars went past. By the third and final lap, the fence along the pits was jammed with mechanics and others, all who were obviously enjoying the sight of the cars parading past.

For perhaps 15 or so minutes, Indianapolis entered a time warp and folks were once again seeing Grand Prix machinery in action. If only they had been able to race...

He pointed to this wonderful machine and simply said, "I helped build it." At that point, Laurie Gerrish, former-BRM apprentice, former Shadow mechanic, former Penske mechanic, late of PacWest, all-around entertaining chap, and technical inspector for the Historic Grand Prix Association once again had me doing the Big Silly Grin routine. This is a BRM P160E, chassis '09' - built by the esteemed Mr. Gerrish. This, I thought, is a proper Grand Prix machine.

Laurie Gerrish began his apprenticeship with the Owen Racing Organisation by repairing the holes in the blocks of the P142-series engines. The engines had a tendency let go rather often and rather than cast lots and lots of new blocks as they would today, Gerrish would grind the hole in the block and then patch the hole, put the bits back in, and send it in the queue to be used once again. That after it had been tested, of course.

Once patched and the internal parts restored, the engines would be placed in the old green vans used by the mechanics to haul the engines to the engine test site at the Folkingham Aerodrome. There the engines were placed on the dyno and run through their paces. Gerrish said that on his initial visits he was mightily impressed by the quantity of shrapnel on the floor and in the walls of the test bay. The image of lots of grinding of blocks by over the years by BRM apprentices remained fixed in my mind's eye to this day after he spoke about those visits.

As you may have figured out, I felt right at home with the HGP crowd. Laurie Gerrish was a fabulous man to chat and we could have gone on and on for hours, but he did have a few obligations that went with the job that he needed to attend to and so off he went. Everyone associated with HGP was not only gracious, but went out of their way to make time to speak with me.

I would like to say that this was in great part due to my role as the esteemed Scribe of Atlas F1, but almost entirely due to the efforts of Dave Kane - a regular contributor to the Atlas F1 Nostalgia Forum and owner of a March 741, and the director of HGP, Becky Hale-Tweedie. I was established in the official HGP gofer golf cart and these two, especially, Dave grabbed folks and dragged them over for me to talk to! Wow, never had that happen before in my years of prowling paddocks and pits for a goodly number of decades. Needless to say, the bribery worked.

For the Record, '09' is owned by Dave Springett of Sacramento, California. This is a chassis formerly used by the wonderful Swiss driver Gian-Claudio - Clay - Regazzoni, Peter Gethin, Jean-Pierre Beltoise, and finally, Francois Migault.

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Speaking of Dave Kane, this is HIS March 741. Although in the livery that Hans Stuck, Junior used, it is the '02' chassis used by Howden Ganley and Vittorio Brambilla. I know this because not only did Our Dave offer that bit of info up, Marc Bahler - of Marc Bahler Engineering who did the restoration work - and I had a nice chat about it. It made time to watch the mechanics did the preparation work necessary for this machine to make it onto the track. It brought back no end of memories since one of my greatest joys in attending races to watch the mechanics work on the cars. Sadly, this is no long possible in the Brave New World of Formula One. However, it is possible with HGP.

The preparation of the Ford Cosworth DFV along is worth the price of admission. Although it has been a few years since I watched the ballet of hooking up the water heater, checking the plugs, and all the various other items once very familiar to those of us from the Cosworth DFV days, I was a Happy Camper. That I got to have a good talk with Bob Slade - as in THE Bob Slade!! - while this was being done was icing on the cake. Slade started with Traco Engineering, the little Culver City shop started by Jim Travers and Frank Coons in the late-1950's. Among other things, Slade was once responsible for the preparation of the Cosworth DFX's by Traco for some guys named Andretti…. Slade now has a shop near the Laguna Seca track. I was assured that he had perhaps 45 or so DFV's in the shop at the moment so if I wanted to drop by and take a look….

While I thought I was relatively well-informed about the Cosworth DFV and DFX programs, well, Slade opened my eyes to a few items. That the DFV and DFX blocks were basically interchangeable for either use leads to any real attempts to sort out the history of many of the engines an exercise in futility. Slade was a genuinely remarkable person to chat with - that he took time out for a sit-down with me on the golf cart followed by a stroll through the HGP paddock for more on the engines was a dream come true. Big Silly Grin time again.

And, yes, I did get to sit in the March and dream the dream that it was 1974 and there I was…. Through dogged determination I had dragged '02' into third and was gaining on the second place car and I had him in my sights, all I had to do was….

Vroom, vroom...

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Speaking of Laurie Gerrish once again, as he was showing me the pictures of the first Shadow DN1 to be built - '1A' - prior to wheels being fitted and then as it literally first touched the ground, he motioned to this car and said it was another of "his" cars. This is a Penske PC3 - probably '002' although I couldn't find the chassis number in the few moments I had with the car - which was driven by John Watson. Gerrish described how the car was built in an unheated shed in the middle of the Winter of 1975/1976. It is owned by Doug Mockett of Rancho Palos Verde, California.

I asked if it was the Austrian GP winner, and although Gerrish said he thought it might be, Mockett said it was the car used in the early races of the 1976 season. Its replacement, the PC4, was the chassis that Watson used to win at the Osterreichring.

Great machine. I loved just being able to have a really "good look" at with Gerrish and Mockett.

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This is a Shadow DN8 owned by Tom Claridge of Fremont, California. Claridge bought it directly from Don Nichels, the man behind the AVS Shadow enterprise. The AVS stands for "Advanced Vehicle Systems," by the way.

The reason I mention that Claridge bought it directly from Nichels is that the identity of the car is fascinating in a, well, "way." This is chassis '2A' and was driven by Tom Pryce at the 1977 South African Grand Prix at Kyalami. Yes, THAT South African Grand Prix.

Despite the fatal consequences of the accident, '2A' was relatively undamaged and it was repaired by the Shadow team. However, when all the assets of the Shadow team were sold off, this was one of the chassis retained by Nichels. Despite a number of offers, kept the chassis. Claridge approached Nichels and after some discussion Nichels agreed to sell '2A'.

It has been restored to the point that I like - as it was when it was raced versus the all too often "over-restoration" that mars many a racing car restoration effort. In that, it is typical of HGP. Claridge was a great man to chat with and someone who impressed me with his dedication to the aims of not only HGP, but of letting the fans once again have access to the cars.

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Ah, one of those cars that always made my heart beat just a bit faster - the Parnelli VPJ4. Chassis '104' is owned by Dave Olson of Orinda, California. While Olson usually drives '104' in HGP events, for Indy he had a "guest driver," Dan Marvin. As in, DAN MARVIN!! Wow!

Okay, perhaps Dan Marvin is not a household name in your neighborhood, but Marvin - I even got to call him "Dan" - is one of those racers I took a liking to in his Formula Atlantic days and followed into the IMSA GTP series days as well.

Chatting with Dave and Dan was a blast. They made me aware of just how much racing has changed over the past several decades. While the "old days" weren't necessarily "better," they were certainly "different." Sitting and talking with Dan Marvin after having not seen his for many, many years was a joy.

And that Parnelli, what memories it evoked when I squinted and imagined Mario in the cockpit...

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This is the Bill Krages Tyrrell 012 that Rick Knoop drove in the HGP demonstration run. Rick Knoop is another of those drivers I liked "back then" and was one of those I place in the Characters With Character category. Knoop put it best when he said that driving these cars perhaps six times a year was "fun," but "12 times a year is a job. I want to have fun. Got me?" Gotcha!

Lest there are those who think that I am anti-Ferrari, here are three machines that I genuinely enjoyed seeing, touching (okay, as with all of them - fondling might be more accurate), and drooling over.

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This is the Ferrari 312 that Todd Morici - of Clifton, New Jersey - fell in love with. And love was again proved to be blind since the first time they started the engine, poof! It was serious history, as in the far distant past tense. However, Morici was undeterred by such minor items as having to have an engine made from scratch. All told, it was a two year effort to produce the car that now takes the track in HGP events.

And, it sounds just "right." It has that particular rasp and wail that only a Ferrari V-12 seemed capable of making. Love - if not lust - at first sight and first hearing….

This particular 312 - chassis '0007' - was usually driven by Chris Amon, but its last forays in the GP battles had Derek Bell at the helm.

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Perhaps one of my favorite Ferraris, this is the 312T2 of Chris MacAllister of Indianapolis. Except when Clay Regazzoni used it at Brands Hatch, '026' was driven by Super Rat - Niki Lauda - during the 1976 and 1977 seasons. Indeed, it was in '026' that Lauda made his miraculous - a word often overused and misused, but perfectly appropriate in this case - return after his near fatal crash at the 'Ring at Monza and then stepped out of at Fuji rather than needlessly risk life and limb over something as unimportant as a winning another championship.

The later 312B and the 312T cars just struck me as interesting machines for some reason. Most likely due to drivers as much as the machines. I did fit, by the way...

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As I squatted beside the cockpit and noted the information on the plate attached to the bulkhead in front of the steering wheel, I wrote, "Telaio F1-312-T5 MAT-046." This was the 312T5 that Jody Scheckter used during most of the 1980 season. The miserable, agonizing 1980 season. If there was ever a case of Hero to Zero in terms of chassis performance, this is one of those winning a prize for that dubious achievement. While the 312T4 gave Scheckter and teammate Gilles Villeneuve a lock on the top two places in the 1979 Championship, the T5 led exactly one lap in 1980. And Gilles somehow managed that incredible feat.

And there is much more where all this came from!

Let me urge you to take the time to drop by the HGP paddock at the USGP. You will be delighted with what you will find - as Rick Knoop correctly put it, a "time warp." Take the time next season to get the HGP schedule early on and make it a point to see these wonderful people and cars up close and personal.

Personally, hanging around the HGP paddock was perhaps the most fun I have had at a track in ages. It sure beat last year's USGP for fun, entertainment, and memories of the best kind.