Motorsports Racing Legacies

Marsha asked me a while back for a “simple” explanation of the lineage that led to the two different sanctioning bodies that have been players in the Indy Car / Champ Car fiasco of the past few years.  The recent, and long hoped for, merger back into one series was the impetus for the conversation. The whole long and sorry tale has some interesting dovetails with the story I am writing right now for our upcoming book on the beginnings and transition of American Sports Car Racing, entitled “The Gentlemen’s Club.”

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In an attempt to escape the cold and snow of an Indiana winter, I took a trip to Alabama and Florida in December. There were a number of SCCA Ghost Tracks in that part of the south that I had never visited. I made contact with Corry Field in Pensacola, Florida. And I visited airports at Selma and Tuskeege, and a former track at the Montgomery Industiral Park, all in southern Alabama. I also called in at an old airport circuit at the top end of the state, which is the one I’d like to talk about today. At the very north edge of Alabama sits Huntsville, home to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and former home to some important SCCA racing. Before World War II, Huntsville’s big claim to fame was being known as…… the Watercress Capital of the World. How does that excite you? However, during World War II a major military-industrial complex was built in Huntsville. The Redstone Arsenal and associated munitions manufacturing plants were located there. The arsenal was nearly closed after the war, in 1949. However, instead, through some political manipulations, it became the site of the Army’s missile research program which led to the US Space Program. That has ultimately led to the city’s current status as “The Rocket City.”

Huntsville’s first airport was built in 1941 and grew as the city expanded under the influence of the Redstone project. It became a major center of operations for Eastern Airlines. This airport offered no room for expansion, as it was located in the heart of downtown. In 1967 a new airport was built south of the city and the downtown field was retired and became home to the police headquarters and training program. During this period it also became home to Tennessee Valley Region’s racing program. A 2.2 mile

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The American Howmet TX turbine was pieced together by a group of SCCA drivers led Ray Heppenstall in 1967. A year later, in June, 1968, Heppenstall won the Huntsville National Race, the first race ever won by a turbine powered car. For a detailed history of the car, and its winning 1968 season, go to Pete Stowe’s motorsports page.

In this video from the TX ’s first race in 1968, at Daytona, Ray Heppenstall talks about his car.

When the Sports Car Club of America was founded in the 1940’s, it was quite a different club than it is today. Early members came from the social elite. They were all men and they viewed themselves as both gentlemen and sportsmen. Their desire to own expensive, or at least eclectic, cars came as much from their wish to stand apart from the crowd as it did from any desire to go fast. Even as the speed and competition aspects of the club develop in the 1950’s, the early racers continued to compete strictly as amateurs, and the leadership of the club took a staunch position against such things as prize money, sponsorship, or even open membership. This philosophy persisted into the 1960’s, when the Chairman of the SCCA Board of Governors proclaimed that the SCCA was, quite simply,……”a gentleman’s club.” This led to a fundamental struggle between the progressive and traditional elements of the membership over just what SCCA would eventually become.

Pete Hylton writes of the transition an elite group of amateurs to the recognized sanctioning body in his next book, “A Gentleman’s Club: The Growth and Transition of American Sports Car Racing“, to be released in the fall of ‘08. 

Email us to receive excerpts, special new release pricing, and release announcements.  

Racingeditor@gmail.com

Last month, the racing news was all about the of IRL/Champ Car merger.  In an effort to understand the geneology of all of this, I pulled up Wikipedia on my computer and started writing down acronyms and dates.   After double checking with Pete, I figured it out…in a manner of speaking.   What it boils down to is that the sanctioning bodies of sports car, championship, sprint and midget car racing have spent the last fifty years or so arguing with each other over one thing or another.  

Not to offend my fellow Southerners, but it is a lot like the independent, non sectarian, formerly Baptist churches that dot the corners around my adopted city in Western Kentucky.

Or Liz Taylor’s marriages.

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I was invited to be the guest speaker for the December 8 banquet that was to kick off the 50^th Anniversary season of the Des Moines Region of SCCA. Since I have lots of SCCA friends in that part of the mid-west, and since I love to talk about old tracks and old sports cars any chance I get, I readily accepted. Just a week prior to the trip, I came across a course map for a ghost track that I wasn’t even aware of.

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