Uncle Jack said:
<< I very much respect your concern for the loss of this type of racing,
and I too lament its passing. I raced SCCA on and off for thirty years,
but I will not again race SCCA. I'm a big boy now, and do not go where I
am not wanted. I race Vintage, and have more fun in one season than in
my entire previous thirty years in SCCA. >>
Yeap!
Sad, but a lot of people feel that way. I spent some time talking to Vic
Skirmits at Mid-Ohio. He was paddocked across the road from me. His long
time SCCA success with a Nazi Bath Tub is well known. Sad to say, but he has
an SCCA Emblem on his trailer, with a circle and a line through it. That is
sure sad, but there is a lot of that going around.
I've held an SCCA Vintage License since the mid-1980s. I have no axe to
grind with them. Maybe it is because my exposure is limited, but I sure hear
a lot of folks who do. The only SCCA sanctioned event that we will do this
year, is the vintage sessions of the WEST MICHIGAN GRAND PRIX.
Bill Dentinger
PS
Some vintage clubs would look with a jaundiced eye at racers who run in
'current' events and then try to run 'vintage' events too. I cannot recall
for sure, but I think the VSCDA has a rule that vintage race cars will not
have run a 'current' event for so many years back. They absolutely encourage
gorgeous, pristine examples ala Uncle Jack and Joe, and discourage old war
rigs, that show their wear and tear, regardless of how impressive their
performance and/or record might be. No one knows better than I, when all
this Vintage Racing began, the oft heard quote was, "We want beautiful museum
pieces, running at speed, and not a bunch of rusty TR3s." It used to hurt my
feelings, and make me polish my car. Vintage Racing has become pretty racy
since. Fortunately, even now, the vast majority of the vintage TRIUMPH
racers I am aware of, meet that bench mark, but some don't, and we certainly
have LOST some of the rare museum pieces we used to see.
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