South West Division SCCA Formula B 1974

The big news for SWDiv was that Dallas International Motor Speedway had ceased to exist, the land being sold to Xerox - then a dominant maker of printers and copiers - for a new factory. Texas Region initially scheduled an event at Gray Airfield, within Fort Hood, then entered into negotiations to use Greater Southwest Airport, redundant after the opening of Dallas/Fort Worth Regional Airport in January 1974, but it would be September before the first National was held there. Houston Region and Alamo Region were continuing to use Aloe Field, and Southwest Louisiana Region continued with its Cajun Grand Prix at Lake Charles, but Lone Star Region's only press announcements in 1974 concerned Autocross and Rally events.

Reigning champion Norman Johnson upgraded from his Brabham BT29 to a Brabham BT40 for 1974, but only scored 17 points and did not take up his invitation to the Runoffs. Charlie Derbes easily outscored him in his own Brabham BT29 to win the title. Former Formula A racer Tim Duke also scored in a Tecno, and Peter Nye, transplanted from Ohio to Texas, scored two points for his exploits in his March 71BM.

Final standings

Southwest Division SCCA Nationals in 1974

After SWDiv had only four points scorers in Formulae A, B and C in 1973, there was a slight uptick to seven in 1974. Formula Ford was up from 12 to 14, and FSV changed only from six to five. Houston Region again fractionally increased its total count of point scorers from 31 to 32, but Texas Region was down again from 43 to 39. Sowela, Lone Star, Delta, Alamo, West Texas, Red River, Central Louisiana and South Texas Border only contributed a handful of runners each. Can anyone provide some background on SWDiv fortunes during this period?

Southwest Division sources

Coverage of SWDiv was much slimmer in Competition Press & Autoweek than for other Divisions. To make the historian's life even more difficult, a couple of the Regions that organised National events do not appear to have had their own newsletters for much of this period: Alamo Region in Texas and Central Louisiana Region in Louisiana. The known Regional publications are:

• Deltagram (Delta Region)
• Journal (San Jacinto Region)
• Lone Star Draft (Lone Star Region) - from 1979
• Roundup (Texas Region)
• Spinout (Southwest Louisiana Region) - from 1978
• Border Bulletin (South Texas Border Region)

For much of the 1960s, the most important publication for this area was Southwest Racing News, published from 1963 onwards by Bill Gay from Dallas and running on until at least 1974. We are exceedingly keen to acquire copies of any of these.

We are also keen to get scans of entry lists from all SCCA Nationals and Regionals in this Division.