All Time Greatest One-Two

Mercedes Benz 300 SLR

’55 Gold Cup Winner

Maserati 250F

Stovebolt Special - HWM Chevrolet #49 ?

Photo Carlyle Blackwell, Publised Courtesy Blackwell Archive, for sales enquiry's please e-mail infoATpsychoontyres.co.uk and your contact details will be forwarded to the Blackwell Archive.

On Wednesday when I started today's blog I thought lovely black car rare make, probably not too much history. As you'll see below I could not have been more wrong in my assessment of the task ahead.

Hersham and Walton Motors (HWM) acquired an Aston Martin Dealership in 1951 reputedly making it the oldest such franchise.

Racing drivers & HWM owners George Abecassis and John Heath first built a streamlined body on an Alta sports car chassis in 1948.

The first proper HWM's were also 4 cylinder Alta powered and built for the second tier European open wheel series called Formula 2 in 1950.

This is one of those 1950 open wheel cars allegedly driven by none other than Sir Stirling Moss at the start of his career.

Thanks to information passed on by David McKinney, it appears that this vehicle still fitted with an Alta engine was purchased in 1953 by 20th Century Fox and used in the film 'The Racers' staring Kirk Douglas and Bella Darvi, this film was also known as 'Such Men Are Dangerous' in some countries.

During filming the car was heavily damaged, later Tom Carsten purchased all the vehicles from the film, selling most of them on, but keeping the HWM because it had independent suspension and fitting it with a 302cui /4900 cc Chevrolet V8 which was then bored out to 4994 cc / 305 cui by Edelbrock.

The car was also fitted with a quick change rear axle and experimental disc brakes by Hallibrand.

Bill Pollack, seen in this photograph by Carlyle Blackwell, confirmed as having to be at Pebble Beach by Bill himself, is known to have driven the at least twice in 1956 during which time chassis acquired the nome de course 'Stovebolt Special'.

Bill was a regular winner at events such as Pebble Beach (two times), Golden Gate Park, Reno, Torrey Pines, Stockton, Madera, Willow Springs, Palm Springs, and the Santa Barbara road races, the most famous of which was in an Allard J2 at Pebble Beach from which his book 'Red Wheels and White Sidewalls' takes it's title.

JB Miltonian informs me that a version of this photo with the driver in an obviously retouched red shirt appeared on the cover of Sports Car Illustrated in September 1956 with the caption "Rounding the last turn at Pebble Beach is Bill Pollack in the latest Carstens bomb, the HWM-Chev V8. A complete breakdown of the car starts on p12. Ektachrome is by Carlyle Blackwell."

The Stovebolt Special is known to have been raced until at least 1963.

In 1980 John Matherson restored the car which appeared in the Pebble Beach Concours in 2003.



As seen in this photo by Alan Raine most recently the Stovebolt Special has reappeared in the UK driven by Simon Taylor.

According to one source Simon's car is now listed as having a 5737 cc / 347 cui motor.

There is some disagreement as to the chassis number of the Stovebolt Special with options including #49 - 001 ,49/02 and even FB 102, should Simon Taylor get in touch I'll ask him and add a post script.

My thanks to Carlyle Blackwell for the photo, Ed and Steve Arnaudin who kindly sent it on to me and TNFers David McKinney, Alan Raine, fnqvmuch, Tim Murray, Roger Lund, Mark Godfrey, JB Miltonian, and Vince H, who helped reveal the story behind the 'Stovebolt Special'.

Please keep the Arnaudin family in your thoughts and prayers at this time.

Hope you have enjoyed today's Stovebolt Special edition of 'Gettin' a lil' psycho on tyres' and that you'll join me again tomorrow. Don't forget to come back now !

28 07 12 PS My thanks to Pamela Blackwell who has kindly retrospectively given me permission to post the photo's her father took.

Austin Healey Sebring Sprite

The Austin Healey 'Sebring' Sprite name refers to any Austin Healey Sprite with front disc brakes and more recently to any Sprite with Coupé or Fastback bodywork.



Following a change in the sports car regulations in 1960 which allowed special bodies, rally and racing driver John Sprinzel commissioned Williams & Pritchard to build 6 aluminium bodied Sprites with coupé bodywork between Dec 1960 and May 1961.



This 1960 vehicle purchased new by Cyril Simson started life as a standard Austin Healey Sprite registered YLN13, Cyril changed the registration to S221 and raced it as part of Team 221 with two other sprites H221 and X221.



Paul Hawkins drove it to victory at Aintree and S221 was part of the Sprinzel Sprite Team that took team honours at the Nurburgring.



Originally powered by a 43 hp 948 cc / 57 cui motor this particular unit, prepared by Janspeed, was shown to be delivering over 85 hp at the recent Race Retro exhibition.



For 1961 the car was prepared by John Sprizel and it was one of the six Sprinzel cars sent to Williams & Pritchard to be fitted with a aluminium coupé body.



The car was then driven in practice by Stirling Moss for the Sebring 4 hours who promptly stripped the clutch and transferred to another team car after repairs were made Pat Moss & Paul Hawkins drove S221 in the four hour race. S221 was then prepared again overnight for Cyril and Paul Hawkins to drive in the Sebring 12 Hours where they came in 37th.



In August 1961 S221 was sold to Peter Clark and it was reregistered and rolled at the Karrussel on the Nurburgring. The car was repaired and an extended fast back body was fitted by Peel Coach works.

The longest term owner of this vehicle Colin Pearcy had Len Pritchard make a new alloy rear end and coupé top and most recent owner Chris Clegg reunited the car with its S221 registration and has driven it competitively for several years with Archers Motors taking care of the race preparation.

My thanks to Janspeed who facilitated the photo's of the engine and interior.

Hope you have enjoyed to days Sebring edition of 'Gettin' a lil' psycho on tyres' and that you'll join me again tomorrow. Don't forget to come back now !

Private Investigations - Maserati 300S

Thanks to Ed Arnaudin's superb photography we can have a look at the Maserati 300S at Lime Rock on May 9th 1959 that was raced by Joe Guibardo in Northeastern America during the 1959 season.



Just 28 Maserati 300S models were built from 1955 to 1958 to compete in the World Sportscar Championship. Thanks to contributions from Sir Stirling Moss the 300S is credited with three World Sports Car Championship victories two of them on the 14 mile Nurburgring in '56 and '57 along with many other wins in national races in Europe and the United States. In fact as with the the Ferrari 860 Monza we looked at yesterday Juan Manuel Fangio also drove a Maserati 300S to victory this time on two occasions in Brazil in 1957.

The 300S was powered by a 3 litre / 183 cui variation, with a lengthened stroke, of the 6 cylinder motor that was used simultaneously in the Maserati 250 F with a lower compression ratio to cope with the most commonly available fuel as stipulated in Sports Car regulations of the time. The drum brakes and stiffened suspension also show strong signs of 250 F heritage.

A trellis structured chassis was covered in an aluminium body penned by Madardo Fantuzzi who was also responsible for the second version of the Maserati 150S.

Perhaps the most incredible of Maserati 300S stories is that a 300S was raced against both a Porsche 908 and 910 in Brazil as late as 1971 ! Unfortunately we do not know the end result for the Maserati in that race but even so I hope you'll agree a quite remarkable achievement just to enter a 15 year old design into a contemporary sports car race.

Slightly of topic regular GALPOT readers who really pay attention may recognise the name of the 5th place driver at Interlagos Antônio Carlos Avallone.

Allegedly Mark Knopfler is a long term Maserati 300S Owner.

Joseph Giubardo appears to have raced in Austin Healeys and MGs from 1954 to 1962 and used this 300S from at least 1957 to 1959 scoring at least one class win at Thompson CT in 1957.

My thanks as ever to the Arnaudins for taking and sending the photograph and to Walter Baemer of International Maserati Research for identifying who this vehicle belonged to.

I hope you have enjoyed today's Dire Straights edition of "Gettin' a lil' psycho on tyres" and that you will join me again tomorrow for a look at a gargantuan Edwardian from the USA that recorded the first international race victory for an American driver. Don't for get to come back now !



PS Slightly off topic but continuing the private investigation in to this photo graph wonderng if anybody recognises either the kid in front of, or the owner and hound in the, 1950 Cadillac Series 61 Sedan ? Thanking you in anticipation of your responses.

Colin's Eleven - Lotus XI

Today's photographs by Ed Arnaudin conclude our coverage of Race 1 at Thompson, CT on July 20th 1958 with a look at the winning Lotus XI of Floyd Aaskov.



Approximately 270 Lotus XI's were produced from 1956 to 1958 including the Series 2, often unofficially referred to as the XIII. the Lotus Eleven Register believes around 200 have survived.

The XI could be built to accept a variety of engines most like Floyd Aaskov's seen here were fitted with a 4 cylinder 1098 cc /67 cui Coventry Climax engine. Like the Lotus IX we looked at yesterday the bodywork was penned by Frank Costain and crafted by Lotus neighbours in Hornsey, Williams & Pritchard.

It is believed the Lotus XI model was driven to over 148 victories in 1956, additionally Stirling Moss set a class G closed circuit lap record at Monza of over 143 mph in a 67 cui XI with a special cockpit fairing and Peter Jopp and Reg Bicknell took class G honours and 7th overall at Le Mans although the boss, Colin Chapman, driving the larger engine Class E XI having survived a miserably wet night was disappointed to retire while running second in the 1500 cc 91.5 cui class to a Porsche with engine failure.

Legend has it that the XI was so close to Colin Chapman's affections that early Lotus road models were given names evocative of the number Eleven,hence the Elite, Elise, Elan.



Floyd Aaskov, in the #12 Lotus XI seen taking the starting flag in second place here is known to have raced from at least 1957 to 1968, records indicate he may have started racing in a '57 Mercedes 300 SL which seems a tad fanciful though no doubt stranger things have happened. Running competitively in the GM class Lotus XI until 1962 he then moved on to the pre Can Am USRRC series with larger sports cars. Records indicate Floyds last season was 1968 when he drove a Camaro in the Trans Am series, this may not be the complete picture on his career, if you know different please chime in below !

The cars I and others have been able to discern on the grid thus far are :-

Row 1 #15 R Nerney, Abarth 207A Spider, #12 Floyd Aaskov, Lotus X1
Row 2 #92 Nick Fallone Jomar MK 2 #28 Ray Saidel, Jomar
Row 3 #113 Paul Bleustein, Cooper, #26 Len Bastrup, Lotus IX
Row 4 # ????? #27 P Sagan, Fiat Abarth 750 GT Zagato
Row 5 #95 J Iglehart, Nardi MD4 Spyder #46 J Mull D B Panhard # ?????? #?????

Interestingly one source has a #150 Lotus XI anchoring the entry list for this meeting scheduled to be driven by one and only 'Walter Cronkite'.

Thanks as always to Ed and Steve Arnaudin for the fascinating photographs, to Terry O'Neil for the results to everyone on the Fuzzy Longshot Identity thread at TNF including Vitesse2 and raceanouncer2003 for their contributions. I believe that is the way it was.

Hope you have enjoyed today's eleventh hour edition of 'Gettin' a lil' psycho on tyres' and that you'll join me again tomorrow for a look at a seriously old timer at Bridgehampton in 1957. Don't forget to come back now !

Sweet and predictable - #43 Maserati 150 S #1643

Thanks to again to Ed Arnaudin for today's photograph of a Maserati 150 S owned by EF Spicer seen here at Thompson CT 20th July 1958.



By the time the smallest ever Maserati, the 150S, was built in 1955 the Maserati brothers were long gone from the company bearing their name working on their new OSCA vehicles.

The popularity of the 1500 cc / 91.5 CUI sports car class racing led Maserati to fill the gap in the lower end of their range with this vehicle.

Following Ferrari who in turn was inspired by the fuel efficient advantages of an HWM four cylinder Alta engine, Vittorio Bellanti also ditched the prevalent smooth 6 cylinder engine architecture in favour of a new 4 cylinder alloy block, dry sump lubricated engine featuring hemispherical combustion chambers, double overhead cams and twin plug ignition which produced 140 hp at 7,500 rpm.

Valerio Colotti designed the chassis with independent front and de Dion rear suspension originally covered in a 300S derived body by Celestino Fiandri in 1955.

For 1956 the slightly less derivative body seen here was designed by Medardo Fantuzzi. Stirling Moss drove one of the factory entered 150 S's in a sports car race to second place on the Nurburgring in 1956 beaten by margin of 'just' 3 seconds over 100 miles by Hans Hermann in a Porsche 550 A.

Stirling is alleged to have said of the 150 S that it was " sweet-handling and predictable but overbodied and gutless.”

EF (Edward Farnham) Spicer drove the #43 in the photo to 9th place in the final all comers race on July 20th, 8 spots behind the winning Porsche 550 of Newton Davis.

My thanks and best wishes to Ed Arnaudin and his son Steve for todays photograph, Jerry Entin for vehicle identification and Terry O'Neil for the results.

Hope you have enjoyed today's sweet & predictable edition of 'Gettin' a lil psycho on tyres' and that you'll join me again tomorrow, don't forget to come back now !

Carroll's Cat faster than a 250 F - Lister Jaguar BHL 128

Moving on 20 years from yesterdays blog but staying with the Lister Jaguar cars of the late 50's, this one has a proud boast thanks Bobby Bell who is seen here standing in the fire suit, behind the car, at the British Grand Prix meeting where he was competing in the Lloyds & Scottish championship.

Bobby Bell, who kindly shared the details about today's story is one half of Bell & Covill purveyors of fine, approximately 25,000 at last count, motor cars which have been sold to customers from Twickenham to Tobago.

One might imagine from the BRG and yellow paint job that this vehicle had been raced by Archie Scott Brown to some of the many Lister Jaguar victories, however it transpires that nothing could be further from the truth.

According to Doug Nye's 2nd edition, reasonably priced, 'Powered by Jaguar' the 1959 Lister Jaguar BHL 128 was originally supplied to Carroll Shelby Sports Cars Inc, Dallas Texas as a rolling chassis built to accept an American made body and Chevrolet V8 engine.

BHL 128 also known as 'the Boeing Car' is said to have been part of a Land Speed Record project with input from Boeing and master minded by John Fitch, Doug's research categorically states John Fitch the former Mercedes Driver and Safety Engineer had absolutely no involvement in such a project.

What ever the outcome of the Boeing project the vehicle has no identifiable 'in period' racing history and was recovered to England around 1969 and acquired by Peter Sargent around 1970. Between 1970 and the mid 70's BHL 128 was fitted with both a 3.8 / 231 cui XK Jaguar motor and a, retrospective, 1958 low frontal area 'Knobbly' body in preference to the historically more accurate, but less successful, 1959 Costin body.

Bobby tells me that he acquired BHL 128 in the mid 70's and raced it to many historic race victories and a Lloyds & Scottish Championship.

However one of his favourite memories was the day he put BHL 128 on pole for the 1978 historic race at Le Mans, with a time that would easily have qualified for the 24 hours race proper, ahead of Stirling Moss and Willie Green one of the best if not the best historic racer of all time.

Bobby tells me that on that day BHL 128 was fitted with a 2.9 high ratio back axle which allowed him to hit approximately 175 mph on the 4 mile Mulsanne straight at 6000 rpm.

Both Willie Green in his D-type Jaguar and Moss driving a far superior handling open wheel Grand Prix Maserati 250 F made up ground on the Lister in the corners but could not keep pace with the Lister on La Sarthe's long straights.

Unfortunately on the third lap of the race, the crankshaft broke and as Bobby says, 'that was that'. Stirling might have added "Better to lose honorably in a British car than win in a foreign one", though if he did, it was not recorded on this particular occasion.

Bobby sold the car in the mid '80's and it has since undergone restoration and now belongs to a lucky Steven Gibbs.

My thanks to Bobby Bell for sharing today's story and to Doug Nye, David Mckinney, Belmondo, Dutchy, Julian Bronson, and Robert Barker at The Nostalgia Forum for additional comments going back to May last year.

Thanks for joining me for a week of Big Cat history, I hope you'll join me again tomorrow for everyone's favourite 'Ferrari Friday' when I'll be looking at one of a series of 387 Ferrari's none of which were sold as new in the United States. Don't forget to come back now !

Cats with Grace & Pace - Jaguar XK 120

The post war success of the Jaguar Company was built around the twin overhead cam alloy head iron block XK engine which was in various guises from was in production from 1948 - 1992.



The motor was designed by William 'Bill' Heyes and Walter 'Wally' Hassan prior to the outbreak of WW2 hostilities, during the period of hostilities Jaguar staff realised the design in between duties as fire watchman over the heavily industrialised city of Coventry which was a major target of German bombing raids.



The XK 120 launched at the London Motor Show in 1948 was the first vehicle designed around a 160 hp 3442 cc / 210 cui version of the XK engine, at the time the XK 120 mph capability made it the worlds fastest production car.



The racing and rallying success of the XK 120 is incalculable including the Daily Express One Hour Race in 1949, Class win at Palm Beach Shores, class win in the Mille Miglia both in 1950 all three with Leslie Johnson at the wheel and a 1,2,3, victory in the 1950 Tourist Trophy. Ian Appleyard took overall wins in the Alpine Rallies of 1950 & '51 and the first Alpine Rally Gold cup in 1952. An XK 120 driven by Al Keller is also credited with being the only foreign 'built' car to win a NASCAR sanctioned event at New Jerseys Linden Airport in 1954 to name but a few.



Leslie Johnson started a three year record breaking spree in 1950 at the 1.58 mile L’autodrome de Linas-Montlhéry outside Paris which features 30 degree banking.

Sharing the driving in 3 hour stints with Stirling Moss for 24 hours they averaged 107.46 mph, covering 2579.16 miles in 1950.

The following year '51 Johnson drove 131.83 miles in one hour saying afterwards 'the car felt so good it could have gone on another week' sowing the seeds for the 1952 attack on the week speed record.

In 1952 a four man team comprising Johnson, Moss, Hadley and Fairman only managed 96 hours at their first attempt at the week record, because a spring broke after 85 hours, Johnson drove with the broken spring for a further 9 straight hours to spare his compatriots any additional risk setting 96 hour, 72 hour and 10,000 mile world and class records all at over 100 mph.

After the spring had been replaced the team then set a full seven day & night record of covering 16, 851.73 miles at an average speed of a staggering 100.31 miles and hour.



The first 242 roadsters, of which the 1949 #267 driven by Roderick Spollon is one, were hand built with aluminium bodies on ash frames, as demand picked up by 1950 pressed steel bodies were used with aluminium bonnet, doors and boot lid. Production of OTS roadsters (no roof) , DHC (convertible) and FHC (steel roof) XK120 variants came to an end in 1954 when the XK 140 was introduced.

Hope you have enjoyed todays 120 MPH edition of 'Getttin a lil' psycho on tyres' and will join me on a safari looking at some big cats in Africa as I continue my quest for new information about events that occurred long ago. Don't forget to come back now !

PS



In memory of former XK 120 owner Barbara Weaver wife of ARCA and founding SCCA member George Weaver who recently passed away I am posting this photo by Ed Arnaudin of the pits complex at Thompson CT during it's construction in July 1958.

Barbara, who's car carried the licence plate 'SCCA' and her husband located the Thompson CT site and with financial assistance from Briggs Cunningham the Weavers built and ran the road circuit until 1967, when land could no longer be acquired for the facility to expand.

She was an affirmed motor sport aficionado allegedly falling in love with the Maserati belonging to her husband to be before falling in love with it's lucky owner.

Amongst many roles in motor sport she played host to Fangio, Shelby, George Constantine, Jackie Cooper and Joan Fontaine, Bob Holbert, Bob Grossman, the entire Cunningham team, Chuck Daigh, Lance Reventlow, and Walter Cronkite.

A full and proper obituary of this wonderfully decidedly hands on character is linked here.

Sincere condolences to Barbara's family and friends.

Black Jack & Le Car - Renault 5

The Renault 5 was a versatile super mini launched in 1972, in Europe many countries ran a one make virtually stock Renault 5 Championship which brought many drivers their first taste of semi professional competition including Austrian Formula One driver Gerhard Berger.

In the States this vehicle known as Le Car dominated the 1977 SCCA Showroom Stock class C division and gained added notoriety when La Conner Washington police department traded in one of its full size cruisers for three Le Cars.



In 1980 three time world champion Sir Jack Brabham was persuaded to come out retirement for the first time in 10 years to take part in a British Saloon Car Championship race at Brands Hatch which took place on the same day as the British Grand Prix.

Though the car was giving away 200 cc 12 cui to the class leading Toyotas VWs and Audi 80's prepared by GTi Engineering, one of which was driven by the equally recently out of retirement Stirling Moss, it must be assumed that Black Jack was game for a laugh with his old sparing partner from the late 50's early 60's.

The Renault was woefully uncompetitive having neither the power or the handling to keep up with the class leading Audis but come race day Sir Jack Brabham had an ace up his sleeve, falling further and further behind the pack on the long Brands Grand Prix Circuit much to the amusement and in full view of 80,000 spectators Jack decided to take a 1 mile short cut by using the club circuit link road and so finished ahead of Stirling Moss on the road even though he was of course obviously disqualified.

Hope you have enjoyed today's Black Jack edition of 'Gettin a lil' psycho on tyres and that you will join me tomorrow for a 6 cylinder edition tomorrow. Don't forget to come back now !

Maserati 250 F

I apologise to all my Rowdy friends who will have seen this car before on rowdy.com but I have expanded on that original post in this blog in honour of Canadian artist Paul Chenard who very kindly helped me out with another project I am working on. If you like drawings and paintings of old racing cars you'll love his gallery linked here.

The 250 F was first raced in 1954 by 1951 world drivers champion Juan Manuel Fangio who took a maiden outing win in Argentina and then won again, having missed the 1954 Indy 500, at the following race in Belgium.

Juan then went on to become Champion in 1954 driving for Mercedes Benz for the rest of the season. With Mercedes at the height of their power in 1955, Maserati were locked out of the top spot in Formula One but in 1956 the 250 F was again driven to two victories by Fangio's former Mercedes team mate Stirling Moss.

Having been crowned world champion from 1955 - 56 the now four time world champion Fangio returned to Maserati for 1957 and promptly won four of the eight championship races to set a four peat world championship record that stood until 2003.

In that 1957 season Fangio drove one of the races of all time during the German GP, having failed to out fox the Ferrari team after a disastrous pit stop, Juan Manuel set 7 consecutive lap records on the 14 mile Nurburgring Nordschleife making up over 48 seconds before taking the lead from the Mike Hawthorn's Ferrari with a lap to spare and record the 250 F's 8th and final Formula One Championship victory.

Fittingly JMF drove his last ever race in a 250F at the 1958 French GP coming 4th, winner Mike Hawthorn sportingly refraining from lapping him on the final lap.

The 250 F continued to appear ever more uncompetitively until 1960.



This 1957 250F is the last of the 26 built. Complete with a six cylinder 240 hp engine.
This car is differentiated from most by a short wheelbase Piccolo chassis.
The 250 F is recorded as being the most forgiving of the 2.5 litre (152.5 CUI) F1 cars by Willy Green who has driven every type of 2.5 litre F1 car competitively in historic races.

Hope you enjoyed today's post and will join me again tomorrow.