> From SNAKEBITE BULLETIN #45 (Aug SAAC bi-monthly club letter):
>
> CSX2299 Daytona Coupe. '64-'65 team car driven by Gurney, Bondurant,
> Schlesser, Sears, Trintignant; GT Winner Daytona, Sebring, LeMans,
> Goodwood TT; Tour de France leader; lap records Reims, Oulton Park,
> LeMans; orig. owner; compl. documented & authentic; this is THE car
> that toppled Ferrari, the quintessential GT racer; $4,000,000. No
> trades.
I've seen this car, driven by Bondurant at the Historics some five or
six years ago. Bondurant put on the most amazing show, ultimately
demonstrating the difference between driving fast and *racing*.
He was being harried by a *very* fast Porsche 906 whose driver had
the bit in his teeth and was putting in an inspired performance in
a pretty landmark car in its own right. Those two were pretty much
running away with the race; when Bondurant would get hung up in
lapped traffic, the 906 would close; when the Cobra got to the uphill
stretches (this was on the old track layout, the nine-turn bowl in
the hills, all left turns except for the second half of the Corkscrew
and the sweeping right-hand Turn 8 just after the pit entrance), the
four 48IDAs feeding that strong 289 would pull away decisively.
Some two laps before the end, a GT-350 detonated on the uphill stretch
toward the start-finish line, right on the racing line. The yellow and
the pace car came out, they dumped a few bags of oil-dry on the stripe,
swept the big pieces of Dearborn off to the side of the track and the
pack grouped behind the pace car in single file, with Bob in the lead
and the 906 nailed to his butt like a tin can to a yelping dog's tail.
The pace car pulled off into the pits, the engines started to roar as
the cars sped through turn eight, closed up for the hairpin at Nine,
and the flagger threw the green at the bridge over start-finish.
The 906 driver anticipated this and had come alongside Bondurant at
the exit of 9 -- one place the lighter 906's vastly superior handling
had a serious advantage. The 906 was on the outside, at driver's
right, taking the fast exit line, and had a slight advantage by being
a few hundred RPM farther up the power curve than Bondurant.
So Bondurant moved left, ostensibly to give racing room to the 906 --
but coincidentally putting his car right smack through the middle of
the oil-dry. There was a huge cloud of white dust, raised by the
passage of the Daytona Coupe, and when it cleared, Bondurant was four
carlenghts ahead of the 906, whose driver had slowed down because he
couldn't see through the dust of the oil-dry.
I've done much the same thing myself, with puddles of standing water
on a drying racetrack, forcing someone who was trying to pass me to
drive through deeper water that slowed his car and put me ahead.
Thanks, Bob.
BTW, lest the rest of the Britcars list get irritated at this discussion
of Dearborn vs. Stuttgart, it should be noted that the Daytona Coupe still
used the original AC Cars chassis design, with its transverse leaf springs
and ladder frame under that incredible Pete Brock shape, and the Porsche
906 was a complete departure from 904 practice, much more successful than
the 904, and in fact was a very close copy -- Porsche would call it a
refinement, but the similarity was clear -- of the Lotus 30. Just like
racing today, except that then the British chassis had American and German
motors in them, and today they have French and Japanese power.
--Scott "I'll take five Quick Picks, please" Fisher
|