Well after starting the whole mess thats being discussed now and even
though it has gotten far away from my original query it has brought up
many interesting points. This was my second trip to the glen and the
first came in 2000 before I raced but after many years of interest and
this years trip was to see friends and help pit crew for a few of them
and see the differences in the races from out west. After all the
discussion and my point of what vintage racing is in different groups
and parts of the country this event was different in one way. This event
is all the big famous historic important cars from everywhere with all
the local guys and other vintage cars thrown in. Kinda like Steve Earle
inviting the regulars and asking the Vara group to show up as well. This
was a good thing because out west it seems that some of the big time
guys will show up at certian events through-out the year but mostly go
to the 3 main west coast events Monterey, Fontana, San Diego. We do not
see most of them at all the local events such as Willow,Buttonwillow or
Thunderhill etc. Maybe the reason below is why.
I guess the thing that struck me as disturbing was the unbelievable
amount of carnage and totally unjustified crashes and the word around
the pits from some of the guys was people not paying attention to yellow
flags and the other comment heard more than once was that they crashed
with no help from anyone else. The wrecks included several GTP cars and
many of the small bore group saw many MGs Porsches, spitfires etc and
the driver of the wrecker brought in the Brabham that was parked behind
us with 3 corners missing said that they had towed 26 wrecks on Sat
which means that the wet Thur Fri and the dry Sun which was at least 5
more were not in his total count. I know that the car count was some 470
cars but that sure seems like an awfully high rate of wrecks for one
mostly dry weekend. I guess the old story about vintage racing being a
parade as opposed to a race really isn'st true as it was some of the
best racing I have seen in a long time and if people want to see wreck
that what nascar is all about but I think there may have been more
wrecks here than Nascar. This was the only sad part of a great trip
especially if it was really people not paying attention to the flags
which we have been seeing more out west as well and I hope this is not a
trend because we do not need this one at all. The party was great and
the people were helpful and pleasent in every way. I will certainly go
back another year.
Les
--
Les Cannaday
Classic Datsun Motorsports
345 Olive Ave
Vista, CA 92083
(760) 940-6365
(208) 988-5507(fax)
http://www.classicdatsun.com
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