[urq] Watkins Glen week-end...

[Louis-Alain Richard]

Hi all,

 

We (Brady and I) are just back from the Historic races at the Glen. 

 

It is nothing short of amazing; we saw (and heard and smelled….) all kind of
older race cars:

Hundreds of MGs, 2 Ford  GT40, 1 GT40 Mk IV, 30 Trans-Am cars (including the
famous “Lightweight” Sunoco Camaro), almost all racing Porsches (908, 910,
914, 911, 956 but no 917), Lister-Jags, Lister-Chevy, Allard-Hemi, even a
Saab Sonnet 2-stroke!

We spent the bigger part of the week-end walking the paddocks, since the
races are, well, not really races… Too much gap between the big boys (read
“rich boys”) and the true amateur vintage racers.

Nonetheless, a great  week-end.

 

MAC: we took my Quattro to get there. The car was perfect except when we I
had to brake fast because we missed our motel entrance; I think one of the
upper strut mounts disintegrated under the braking load, I don’t know yet. 

 

At the track, we parked the car right beside the information center in the
middle of the infield. During the day, I saw people taking picture of the
car, I’ve heard others saying “it’s a kind of an expensive VW…”, another
said “these were fast cars in their time”.

But the most satisfying comment went from a nice young woman, who stopped
her PT Cruiser to tell me :

“I must tell you something; you’ve almost got the coolest car in the
paddock!”

Well, that kind of comment is more than welcome…

But it makes me wonder: what was her coolest car then?

The pristine Maserati Mistral? 

The genuine Renault-Alpine? 

The cool 3.8 liter OHC 6-cylinder Pontiac Firebird? 

The concours-winner Ferrari 275 GTB/4?

The modded Volvo Amazon wagon?

The mint silver 1980 VW Scirocco?

 

Interesting fact: we saw newer cars like Touring 5-series BMWs, CTS-V
Cadillacs, XJS Jaguars, and all of them were equipped with a manual
transmission. Very rare cars indeed.

But then, as Brady said wisely: “ You can expect to see the cream of the
crop here, so there is no surprise to find a genuine lightweight 2.7 RS or a
real Shelby Mustang”.

 

There were just so many gorgeous cars everywhere; you can imagine now why we
spent so much time in the paddock…

 

Louis-Alain

Who now dreams of entering an IMSA 90 or a Trans-Am 200 or a tarmac-prepared
rally Quattro…