Here's something good to read

When it comes to enthusiasm, you can count on one of the guys who helped build the Connew F1 car. Here's a web page about his affection for the eternal underdog... can you guess who?

http://www.retroracing.co.uk/theunderdogsyndrome.htm

Hmmm .. thirty four years ago today when Dan the Man became the second man to win a Championship GP in his own car. How time flies!!:) :)

So you remember this too? Seems there's a few of us around... even those who think the Eagle was a good looking car!

I was only just out of short pants, but yes, I do remember it! 67 was the first season I really took an interest in racing. And I've always thought the Eagle was a handsome car, in a brutal sort of way. After all, it had a beak, just like a real eagle!

You must be a candidate for GPL then... quite a good year, that one. Not a single wing had fallen off a car till that time.

Originally posted by Ray Bell
You must be a candidate for GPL then... quite a good year, that one. Not a single wing had fallen off a car till that time.
Yeah Ray, it was the year I was born!!!!! :) ;) :lol:

Photos I shot of Dan the man at the Canadian GP in 1967 I think. At corner 5 in the rain.

Race was at Mosport.

I give up!!!!!!!!!!!

The year you were born, fines?

Also a good year for Goodyear... two teams won on their tyres... and a good year for me, I was married that year.

Thanks Ray for an enjoyable read before going to sleep. Born in '63 so obviously do not have any memories of those years, but what comes to mind is him in the Porsche gp car with his head and helmet sticking up much too far past the rollbar.

Hans, I have found that I have to keep a photo file size to around 12k or less for it to come up properly, please try again, as we would all like to see the shot. chus

I don't know that you can thank me for much, djb... it was Barry Boor who wrote that and put it up on the net. I did, however, retype an article on his early career, and this is part of it:


Dan still speaks nostalgically of "the old days of drag racing at night on deserted roads out of town. They were some of the best. Since we couldn't afford tow cars, we ended up using our street racing machine for everything. The car we really liked the best was a 1935 Ford two-door 'Zeet-back' sedan. It was gutted completely and drilled full of holes to lighten it as much as possible. With the enlarged 4.6-litre Mercury engine installed, together with a lot of speed equipment, the old girl managed to build a formidable reputation after much midnight drag racing. Arleo, my wife, became a remarkably proficient driver of this car, which was her only means of getting to the grocery store, and always likes to remember the time she ran out to the car to drive down town but couldn't get it to start. After making a lot of uncomplimentary remarks about our faithful old car she climbed out and opened up the bonnet. The three carburettors and the intake manifold were missing; one of my friends had borrowed them and I had forgotten to tell her.

"Those were the days when we would race at the drop of a hat. I even remember being called out late at night - and going out with a coat over my pyjamas - to take on a 'hot dog' from some 'foreign' town. Most of this activity has stopped now, because the population in this part of California has increased so rapidly that people are living along all the old deserted roads that we used"

Then he saw his first road race at Pebble Beach, California. "I thought I wanted to drive even before I got to the race; when I saw it I felt I could do as well as most of these guys. But financially I couldn't figure out a way to do it." His parents were opposed to the whole idea, he could not afford his own car, and there was no professional racing in the United States at that time, so the first essential was to get a job. Dan joined the Hunter Engineering Company, who were developing a machine to carry out continuous aluminium sheet casting, a project on which over 3 million dollars were spent. He worked for this firm for over three years, starting as a "flunkey" and eventually becoming a foreman. The machine consisted of two water-cooled rollers in a frame, rather like a clothes dryer, and the molten aluminium was fed between the rollers where it solidified before being squeezed out as a sheet. The idea was simple but there were plenty of problems.

"But all this time I was still angling towards racing, so I saved up enough money to buy a sports car and bought a Triumph TR2 second-hand in November 1955. I looked around all the available machinery and the Triumph seemed to offer the most for the money, so it was an obvious choice."

Dan's first race was at Torrey Pines. He had tried to modify the car back to standard but was unable to do this, so ran in the modified category, finishing fourth in his class and ninth overall. He felt he had done "pretty well," especially on the twisty parts of the circuit. "But I hadn't learned how to heel and toe then, so I must have looked pretty funny trying to get slowed down for the corners."

Dan, it seems, was 'the man!'

I'll try again. I have 3 photos of Gurney at the 1967 Canadian GP at Mosport. The first two I shot in the rain, during the race, at Moss Corne (5).
One shows Dan leading 2 other cars and the second one he has on full opposite lock as it was slippery. The third is just a head shot taken in 1967. All the files are converted to .jpg and are quit small. So we will see if it works.

That is it, I give up.

technology can be pretty damn frustrating isn't it? While I do not know what the file size limit is for pictures, I have noticed that the pixel size 400x400 is very strict. I have tried posting one shot at 403x300something, and the "3" over didn't allow it to work. As soon as I got it down under 400, it worked. Not knowing what scanner and software you are using, I would suggest fooling around with resizing a scan to get it down to these sizes. Somewhere with your software, there must be some way to tell you the pixel size and "k" size of a photo. If it makes you feel any better, I just recently figured out how to do it, and each time it didn't work, I felt like a real doofus, and was p-offed enough to not try again for weeks.

I look forward to seeing your shots one day.

Ray, I was just meaning thanks for bringing the article to our attention, and regarding yours, I can just imagine the looks his wife got from other 1950's housewives when she pulled into the grocery store parking lot in that thing! If my grandmother had been there, she would have been tsk-tsking rather mightily...

It seems that Dan Gurney is a favorite of many, and I'm surprised how many non-Americans remember and revere him. Even his Formula Ford design kicked butt (early 80's) until Swift came along and priced everyone who was not wealthy out of FF competitiveness. Mikey Andretti cut his teeth on an Eagle FF.

Gurney is taken for granted in his own country. Glad he is given his due elsewhere.

There was quit a campaign, it started as a larke and at the later stages became quite serious. I still have a bumper sticker some where in my posession. He would have made a good president.
While covering the Indy 500 in the seventies I was in Dan's motorhome trying to do an interview with him. Every place you could think of there where jars of peanut butter, if I remember he liked the smooth kind, and while talking to me he would reach for a jar and load up 2 fingers and then stick it into his mouth and chew at it. He was the man.
I liked him very much and my first wife was in love with him. The only racing driver she really liked. None of the others ever measured up.
djb
Thanks for the kind words, eventually I'll try again. I converted the files to .jpg, size is about 2.5 by 3.5 inches at 75 pixel per inch. The files are under 13K in size.

I suppose there could be some justification in showing you a bit more of that article... let me see, which bit?

After several further races, in one of which Dan beat Lance Reventlow's Scarab, Luigi Chinetti, the American Ferrari agent, asked him to drive a privately-entered Ferrari at Le Mans. "Le Mans was a real shock to me; I knew men who had been there, and for some reason I thought it would be a real easy place to drive - I was wrong. I had never driven so fast in my life, or cornered so fast. I got down to 4:18 in practice and 4:13 (as fast as the factory practice times) in the race. We were in sixth place at the end of my first driving spell, and Bruce Kessler maintained position - and was in fact fourth due to other cars dropping out - when he crashed, in the rain, about eight o'clock on the Saturday evening.

Following Le Mans Chinetti arranged for Dan to drive in the 12-hour Grand Touring race at Reims with Andre Guelfi, and he tied for second fastest practice time with Phil Hill; Gendebien was fastest. In the race Guelfi crashed when the car was in second place. Then Dan went to Silverstone to have a trial with Ecurie Ecosse, but after the British Grand Prix meeting "Ecosse had no cars good enough to try." Then Bernard Cahier arranged for him to drive a Centro Sud 1500cc OSCA in the Nurburgring sports car race which preceded the German Grand Prix and he finished seventh, behind three Borgwards and three Porsches, lapping in around 10 minutes 20 seconds. After this European venture he returned home and raced Chinetti's 3.5-litre V12 Ferrari at Watkins Glen, where he finished second to Bonnier's Formula One Maserati. Then at Riverside, driving a 4.9 Ferrari Special, he came second to Chuck Daigh's Scarab.

"Following Riverside Chinetti 'phoned and said I was to go to Modena for trials. Ferrari sent me a ticket and I went to Italy. I tried the 2-litre Dino sports car, the 3-litre sports car and a Formula One car at the Autodrome and although I couldn't lap any quicker than 1 minute 2 seconds I was signed up for the 1959 season. I also tried a 3-litre sports car at Monza in the rain but I couldn't go as fast as the chief tester Severi, and I found this drive very tough, particularly as the seating position made my leg go to sleep."

Back in America Dan drove a Ford in a 'stock car' race at Meadowdale and was lying second when the clutch broke. Other well known drivers in this race included Lance Reventlow, Chuck Daigh, Jimmy Bryan, Jim Rathmann and Marshall Teague. "We didn't get the car working until official practice was over but it really handled well. I wish we could get cars like it over here." He also raced at Pomona, where "after two previous failures with the 4.9 we finally got her working better, and lowered the lap record a little bit before going out with a broken camshaft."

In January of this year, Dan did the Big Bear run - a motor-cycle cross -country race - on a Triumph and finished 21st out of 863 starters - and 200 finishers. "I was lucky in the snow because I had a big tyre on the back and passed 20 to 25 guys in the last fifteen miles." he has a great enthusiasm for motor-cycles, but doesn't want to race them, although he admires those who do.

Right from the start Dan Gurney has been regarded as a 'natural' driver. Whenever he tries a new car he always seems to go fast very quickly, but as well as having a very real feeling for the capabilities of his car he has also studied the technique of other drivers, right from the 'Ted Tappet' days and had learned a lot from Phil Hill. he had his second "practical" lesson during tests at Monza in June, when, not allowing for the fact that new tyres had just been put on the front wheels he went into the South Curve much too fast; the Ferrari left the road sideways and somersaulted, finishing up back on its wheels. "I learned a lot from that, but I'd rather do it other ways." Nevertheless, only a few days later he was lying sixth in his first Formula One race, the French Grand Prix, when a stone punctured his radiator and put him out of the race. But for this he would have undoubtedly have finished in the first four.

Another thing Dan has learned this year is that it is really important to have a comfortable driving position. He is taller than the majority of drivers, which creates problems in long distance sports car races, and finds that being cramped up, or having to brace himself against the side of the car, causes him to tire very quickly. In addition to this, he feels that he would like to know more about the cars he is driving, particularly when changes - however small - are made.

Good, isn't it? From Motor Racing in 1959... David Phipps wrote it, but the editing is atrocious...

Originally posted by Hans.ca
I'll try again. I have 3 photos of Gurney at the 1967 Canadian GP at Mosport. The first two I shot in the rain, during the race, at Moss Corne (5).
One shows Dan leading 2 other cars and the second one he has on full opposite lock as it was slippery. The third is just a head shot taken in 1967. All the files are converted to .jpg and are quit small. So we will see if it works.

Can't one of the administrators help out here, as I would love to see these photos. I remember when we saw a picture of Hans.ca's pet Heidi in the Gravel Trap a while back, Craig assisted in letting us see the picture.

If Hans.ca can get it onto a website, he need only then post this way:

webaddressofthepictureitself/nameofpic.jpg - with the sole difference being that there should be no spaces after or between jpg and

Fat lot of good that was... and I couldn't even delete it!

1967, it was a very good year for fans of F1 and GPL legends. I play the game relentlessly!!! And I drive the Cooper!!!
As for good pics of Dan, Motor Racing Retro has tons.

I've been avoiding getting GPL because I'm afraid
that if I did I would never leave the house! The internet
is bad enough!

Welcome Aye Pirate.

I never thought we'd start discussing Computer games in this forum.;)

Originally posted by AyePirate
I've been avoiding getting GPL because I'm afraid
that if I did I would never leave the house! The internet
is bad enough!

Me too.. I would have to have the simulator frame and steering wheel, pedals and a big screen... how could I leave before I did a 7 minute lap of the Ring?

Welcome Aye Pirate, I saw and appreciated your nice words...

AyePirate and Ray, those are EXACTLY the reasons I've been avoiding it too - I haven't even dared play the demos in computer shops in case I get hooked ....:) :)

Umm, yes. :) I can certainly relate to what you're saying too. I haven't got one single motor racing computer game. Guess why? ;)

I'm still looking for a GPL bargain. If I don't post here for three to four years I probably got it! ;) :rotate:

What a great post I stumbled onto. The other two sites I venture in, have very few folks who remember Dan Gurney, much less his AAR efforts.

This is great to see others here who not only remember him, but appreciate him as well.

Ray: thanks for the article, that is really something. Don't know why I couldn't find it on the Yahoo search engine, as I got his allamericanracers.com site and Racing Retro , but that was it.

Hans.ca: hope those prints come out sometime...would love to see 'em.

Well, as I think you've figured out... you're among friends now.

I've sent you a personal message in case you'd like the full text of that 1959 story.

There were at least two people at Goodwood this year wearing what looked like original "Dan Gurney for President" T-shirts - neither of them looked old enough to have seen the man race but I think they were part of the support team for the Sunoco Special Eagle.