CASC North American Formula Atlantic Series Race

Brainerd, 15 Jun 1980

All cars are 1.6-litre F/Atl unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. Ralt RT1/78 [127] (Rick Bell): New to Rick Bell (Lakeville, CT) and used in the 1978 Labatts Formula Atlantic championship. Retained for 1979, again in the North American Pro series. Retained for a third season in 1980, and again raced regularly in the North American Pro series. In 1981, he sold the car, and believes it went through three other drivers until it was bought by a friend of Bell's. Bell has been racing the car in historic racing, mainly at Lime Rock, since then.
2. Ralt RT1 (Roger 'Kip' Penske Jr): Tom Gloy (Lafayette, CA) acquired a Ralt RT1 of unknown vintage as a spare to his newer RT1/79 for the 1979 season, when he was run by Lane Sports. Retained by Lane Sports for 1980 when it was driven by Gloy and by Kip Penske. CT
3. March 79B [78B-19] (Ed Midgley): Sold new to Jerry Hansen and used in SCCA Nationals, winning the 1978 Run-Offs. Sold to Ed Midgley for 1979 and used again only in Nationals. Updated to 79B specification for 1980 and raced by Midgley in the Pro championship until wrecked at Trois Rivieres. Midgley completed the season in a borrowed 78B. The damaged car sold to Carl Berggren and rebuilt. Later with Bruce Cambern.
4. Ralt RT1/78 [128] (Mike Follett): New to Mike Follett (Lewiston, Idaho) and raced in the North American Formula Atlantic series from 1978 to 1980. He kept the car until the end of 1983 when he crashed heavily in a WCAR race at Sears Point. CT
5. Chevron B45/B39 [45-78-03] (Colin Tuckey): New to Rick Shea Racing and in North American Formula Atlantic in 1978, with backing from Jethro Tull. Raced by Shea at the first round, and by Marcel Talbot, Skeeter McKitterick, Bob Earl and Tom Gloy at later races, Retained by Shea for 1979 and raced by Mark McCaig (Calgary, Alberta) in the Pro series. To Colin Tuckey (Calgary, Alberta) for 1980, and entered in the Pro series by FBM Racing. Retained by Tuckey for 1981. Later raced by David Farmer (Niagra Falls, Ontario) in 1983. The car ended up with another Chevron in a museum in Canada, until 1989, when they were spotted by Peter Hemming. The B45 was acquired by Ed Swart in February 1993, and prepared for historic racing. He raced the B45 from October 1993 with a BDA engine in the Formula Atlantic class, and after about five years ran it with a 2-litre BDG engine in F2 classes.
6. March 79B [21] (Carl Liebich): Long-time Chevron importer Fred Opert acquired a March 79B for 1979 and ran it alongside the Chevron B45 he had left from 1978. It was raced once by team driver Marco Tolama and also by European F2 stars Derek Daly (at Trois-Rivières) and Eje Elgh (at Montréal). It went to Carl Liebich for 1980, who recalls buying a car from Opert that had previously been driven by Daly. Retained for 1981 but Liebich does not recall who he sold it to. History then unknown until the early 1990s when it was part of "the Indy Car Experience" at Phoenix International Raceway. It was acquired by Todd Cook of TCE Performances Products (Tempe, AZ) around 1994, then to Jon Gibson, then Jim McDonald, and then to Don Sandy and Art Hebert (San Rafael, CA) in early 2011. It was advertised on motorsportsmarket.com in early 2015 and sold to Charles Arton in South Africa, who ran the car at Killarney in February 2015 in Martini livery and still with Hebert's name on the side. In May 2017, following the Simola Hill Climb, the 79B was destroyed when a transporter containing six cars bound for Cape Town caught fire.
7. Ralt RT1/77 [79] (Bob Hoff): New to Gilles Léger (Lachute, Quebec), first appearing at Trois-Rivières in September 1977. Raced by Léger mainly in the Canadian rounds of the Labatts Formula Atlantic Championship in 1978. Then used as a rental car by Léger for Marc Dancose to race at Quebec in June 1979 and Monique Proulx at Montréal in September. Sold to Bob Hoff (Long Beach, CA) for 1980, when it was run for him in the North American Formula Atlantic series by Gas Saleen Racing. CT
8. Ralt RT1 (Whitney Ganz): Whitney Ganz raced a Ralt RT1 in 1980, but its identity has not been determined. It could be a 1978 or 1979 car. Nothing more known.
9. Lola T560 [HU1] (Bruce Clark): New to Jerry Hansen (Long Lake, MN), and logbooked with the SCCA on 17 August 1977. Then to Bruce Clark (Wayzata, MN) 1 May 1978, and raced in SCCA Nationals and occasional nearby Pro races over the next few seasons. He stopped racing after an accident in practice at the Road America Pro race in July 1981. He retained the T560 until 1989, then he sold it to Richard George. It then went to Denis Tobin in 1990, to Michael Henderson in Australia in 1995, then to Colin Haste (Port Macquarie, NSW, Australia) in 2000. Used in historic racing until an accident at Sandown in Australia 2002 left the car very badly damaged. The car was repaired and racing again by 2010, and raced regularly in Australian historic racing thereafter.

Sources

Note that the identification of individual cars in these results is based on the material presented elsewhere in this site and may in some cases contradict the organisers' published results.

North American Formula Atlantic race results have been compiled by Chris Townsend based on material in Formula and On Track, information drawn from Canadian newspapers and results sheets where available.

All comments, clarifications, corrections and additions are most welcome. Please email Allen (allen@oldracingcars.com) if you can help in any way with our research.