AIR

Legend

Dan McLoughlin was a well known fiberglass wizard. Instead of carbon fiber, fiberglass was somewhat heavier, but it was cheaper and more resistant. The outcome was that cars would last much more. Dan McLaughlin was the Owner of American International Racing(AIR). Dan McLoughlin's credo was to design parts, and he did it the right way. He mastered this job. Design without drawings, which was purely amazing. And he became good at it when he was as young as eighteen. He began working at his dad's shop, who operated a body shop and boat franchise in Colusa, California. [...]

BMW GTP

Cars

BMW was no newcomer to IMSA GT Racing, with many attempts at winning the overall crown. It started in 1975, when the CSL fought the unbeatable Porsche Carrera RSRs, then in 1977-1979 with the boxy 320 Turbo and in 1981, with the March born BMW M1C. Then, the Bavarian make would be represented only by privateers, mainly with M1s. The return of the works team was to take place by the end of 1985, when a new prototype entered the Daytona Finale. Hans Riedel, BMW North America sales and marketing chief, appointed Erik Wensberg to organise the racing program in the USA.[...]

Bob Akin

Drivers

Akin's racing career started with dragsters in 1957, and he began road racing in 1959. He retired from professional racing in 1991 but stayed active in the sport. He raced vintage and historic cars, wrote magazine articles and did television commentary. His business, Bob Akin Motorsports in Ossining, N.Y., restores historic racecars and prepares them for competition. ''We were gentlemen racers together,'' said Paul Newman, the actor and a longtime driver. ''Bob was on the cutting edge of historic and vintage racing, which has become a huge sport.''[...]

Del Russo Taylor

Drivers

Del Russo may have not been a terrific driver, he has been driving for more than two decades, mainly at the wheel of Alfa Romeos. He was the perfect amateur, doing most of the job by himself. He was assisted by his wide, Janis, who was occasionally his co-driver. He would be on the starting fields for more than twenty years. After competing with Alfas for a while, he switched to a GTP Chevron, which would be fitted with an Alfa Romeo engine, then a Buick. The car was a former prototype upgraded to the fledgling GTP class. Del Russo Taylor had added a second roll bar to the car, then a rear window which was taken from a Corvette as a windshield. [...]

Bob Lazebnik Chevrolet Monza

Cars

Amongst the many Chevrolet Monza racers that were built, this was probably one of the most unknown cars. However, it was to be built by Ron Fournier, who was responsible for cars entered by Roger Penske or FoMoCo. He was contracted by BMW driver Bob Lazebnik to build a GT racer from scratch. The latter chose another way from most racers who went the Dekon way. The result was as attractive as possible. He also hired no less than John Morton to be the lead driver this car. The car would be built within four months and was debuted at the 1975 Daytona Finale.[...]

GTP issues

General

In 1981, John Bishop had initiated the GTP class, which was supposed to give the IMSA series a new appeal. It was obviously the way to go for a man who was responsible for a great Championship. But the Porsche domination had threatened the series of being stripped from its competitors, and the AAGT class was born. Yet, the American born cars would scarcely be a threat to the European sportscars, so the GTPs were the obvious choice. While usufruit a new era, those cars were exciting and would be spectacular, giving the GTX cars a fantastic competition. [...]

IMSA classes

Categories

GTP : the class was introduced in 1981. It was aimed at trying to end up the Porsche 934/935 domination of the late 70s. It was a non-production based formula, rules by a set of scale to weight/displacement. Lights : the equivalent of GTP cars, but for small displacement engines. Jim Downing suggested the name. He also won most of the titles.[...]

Jason Len Chevrolet Corvette

Cars

Jason Len was an amateur racer, who wanted to have a go at IMSA racing and he would enter the series in 1981, after running SCCA. Jason's history with this Chevy first began in 1979. Having raced European sports cars in SCCA, he felt it was time to step up into the professional ranks. "At the time, IMSA was going strong and the GTO class presented the opportunity to see what I could do. The 'cheapest' competitive GTO car was the Corvette," he explained.[...]

Lola T600

Cars

John Bishop, President of IMSA, decided to introduce a new class of sports racing cars into the series. With minor opposition the series had become a Porsche benefit with various versions of the 935 doing all of the winning. Bishop knew that a strong championship needed variety and with Porsche so dominating other manufacturers were reluctant to participate. The solution was the Grand Touring Prototype (GTP) category. He envisioned a low-cost, closed-body cars. The cars would use underbody, ground-effect aerodynamics.[...]

Riverside

Tracks

The first weekend of scheduled races in September 1957, a California Sports Car Club event, John Lawrence of Pasadena, California, lost his life. Lawrence, a former Cal Club, under 1500 c.c. Production champion, went off at Turn 5 (later designated Turn 8). With no crash barrier in place, and no rollbar on the car, the MG A he was driving went up the sand embankment, then rolled back onto the track. Though Lawrence survived the incident, and appeared slightly injured; he died later at the hospital of a brain injury.[...]