Seneca Cup (Glen Region SCCA National)

Watkins Glen, 15 Aug 1976

All cars are 1.6-litre FB unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. March 76B [18] (Bobby Brown): New to Bobby Brown (Hicksville, NY) to replace a Chevron B34 and raced in Pro events and in SCCA NEDiv FB in 1976, winning the 1976 Run-Offs. Brown won an early-season SCCA National at Charlotte in April 1977 before moving into Can-Am with a March 77S. The 76B was advertised in Road Racers Magazine in November 1977, so Brown must have kept it through the 1977 season. The car is then unknown for the next three seasons, returning to view when it was sold by fabricator Marc Bahner (Santa Ana, CA) to Chris Bender (Reno, NV) at the end of 1980. This is presumably the car Bender used to finish third in Northern Pacific Division Formula Atlantic in 1981. Bender later sold it to Ric Shaw (Santa Rosa, CA) who ran it as a CSR in NPDiv from 1982 to 1985, and then as a Formula Atlantic. Subsequent history unknown, until sold by Mark Rincon (Redding, CA) to Ken Stone (Redding, CA) some time before 2010, then sold to Jack Woodruff (Vail, Colorado) in 2013. It was restored from CSR to Formula Atlantic spec by Bahner but Woodruff wrecked the car at Laguna Seca when the front suspenson collapsed. It returned to Bahner again for a new chassis, and was racing again by 2020.
2. Lotus 69 (Robert Silvestro): An "ex-Jacques Couture" Lotus 69 bought from Joe Grimaldi by Victor Gagliano (Floral Park, NY) and Bob Silvestro (Patterson, NY). They raced the car in SCCA Northeast Division Formula B and then Formula Atlantic from 1974 to 1979, appearing at Bridgehampton, Lime Rock and Watkins Glen. The car was often entered by VAS Enterprises, Gagliano's company, which had previously been the entrant of his Formula C March 703, or by Continental Automotive. Silvestro sold the car to Keith Park (San Diego, CA) in about 1993, and later heard that Park had sold it to Dave Bean (San Andreas, CA). The car was still owned by Bean when he died in 2017.
3. Brabham BT40 [17] (R Peter Gates): New to Ken Duclos (Boxboro, MA) and raced in Formula B in 1973, winning the Northeast Division title, and the National title by winning the SCCA Runoffs at Road Atlanta in November. Retained for 1974, and again won both the Northeast title and the National title, and towards the end of that season was fitted with a Cosworth BDA for Formula Atlantic. Again retained for 1975, now with the BDA in Formula B, and Duclos won a third successive NEDiv title in the car, but this time retired at the Runoffs. In 1975, the car wore Falconer bodywork. Sold to Peter Gates (Claymont, DE) for 1976, fitted with a 1.1-litre Cosworth BDJ for Formula C, and finished third in the NEDiv FC title. To Jon Sley (Claymont, Delaware) for FC again in 1977, finishing fifth in NEDiv, and retained for 1978 and 1979. The car was next seen when advertised by Gates in 1992 as restored with a new tub. After that, it was next mentioned by Michael Rand in February 2018 as having been recently purchased. By April 2015, Rand had sold it to Bob Burnside (Dexter, MI).
4. Brabham BT29 (Dirk Wrightson): Dirk Wrightson (Foxboro, Mass) raced a Brabham BT29 in Formula C from 1974 to 1976, fitted with a 1.1-litre Swidon BDA engine.
5. March 76B [7] (John Mortensen): John Mortensen (New York, NY/Weston, CT) raced a March 76B in SCCA events in 1976 and the livery - Midnight blue with red stripe on each side - exactly matches that given in March records for 76B-7.
6. Brabham BT40 [13] (Mike Rand): New for Brian Robertson (Brockville, Ontario) and raced by him in the Malaysian Grand Prix at Batu Tiga in April 1973, but wrecked the following weekend during practice at the Singapore Grand Prix. The car was rebuilt and raced a few times in Canada as part of Fred Opert's team, including by David Fram at Halifax in October 1974, and by Bob Beyea at Trois-Rivières two weeks later. Then sold to Mike Rand (Greenwich, CT) in time for the 1974 SCCA Runoffs, replacing a crashed Rondel M1, after which Rand raced the BT40 in Northeast Division SCCA Formula B in 1975. For 1976, Rand converted the car to Formula C. He bought a Modus for 1977, and the Brabham was sold to Larry Snover (Langsdale, PA) who raced it in FC and then in FB again. He sold it after the 1979 season to someone who planned to add sportscar bodywork for Can-Am. However, this never happened, and the car was offered for sale by Rick Parent (Asheville, NC) in June 2018, still in Snover's livery, noting that "the car has been sitting since 1980".
7. Chevron B34 [34-76-04] (Bill Anspach): New to Bill Anspach (Palm Beach Gardens, FL) in SCCA Formula C specification with a 1.1-litre Cosworth BDJ engine. Anspach finished second in the SCCA Runoffs in this car in 1976, and won the Runoffs with it in 1977. It was sold to Mort Haaz (Santa Monica, CA) for 1978 and raced in Formula C for four seasons. In 1982 Haaz converted the car to C Sports Racing using Tiga bodywork and with the BDJ engine stretched to 1270cc by Steve Jennings. Haaz raced it in 1983 as the "DRR-2". To Stan Goldstein in 1985, and raced by him in 1987 and in Solo in early 1988 before it was "transformed back to F3" configuration. It is then unknown until around 1999, when it was bought from an advert by Charlie Falcone in the Los Angeles area by Todd Gerstenberger (Gardena, CA). Gerstenberger advertised it In January 2019, when the car still had its sports car bodywork and the 1270cc Jennings BDJ engine, but now had a Bahner monocoque. Sold to Tony Garmey (Seattle, WA) in January 2022.
8. Brabham BT29 [46] (Carl Whitney): Allan Lader had raced as part of the Fred Opert team during the latter half of 1970 but in 1971 he returned to running his own car with Pacifico Inc backing. He again raced a Brabham BT29, his third, and continued his run of excellent results by winning the opening two rounds of the Pro series from pole. At the third round, at Mexico City, he crashed heavily and the BT29 was wrecked. Lader quickly bought a new Brabham BT35 and the wrecked BT29 frame went via Opert to Carl Whitney and some components from it were salvaged to be used on the Formula C BT29 that he built up for the 1972 season. The remains of the wreck were sold (with another wreck) to Ken Duclos to help keep his FB BT29 running. Marty Handshy (Ridgefield, CT) then bought both sets of remains from Duclos. It is unclear how this car was identified as BT29-46 but a reproduction plate was created at the time of the restoration when the frame was reconstructed by Lime Rock Motors in 1999. He retained the car until some time between 2004 and 2007 when it was sold to Shelby Mershon (Springfield OH).
9. Chevron B29 [29-75-21] (Lyle Heck): New to Bobby Brown (Hicksville, NY) who took delivery in England. Raced by David Morgan in two early British Formula Atlantic races, entered by Roger Chalk Racing, before being shipped to the US. Raced by Brown in the Players Canadian Formula Atlantic series in 1975, entered by B&B Racing. Unseen in early 1976, then sold to Lyle Heck (Reading, PA) and raced in NEDiv SCCA Nationals. Retained by Heck for 1977 and 1978, and presumably the Chevron he raced at Summit Point in May 1979. Then to Mike Rand (Amherst, Massachusetts) for NEDiv SCCA events in 1979, then to Nolan 'Lanny' Drevitch (Milton, MA) and Nick Leonard. Devitch was a member of the SCCA's New England Region, and scored one point in SCCA Nationals in 1980 in this car. It was then advertised by Leonard (Pipe Creek, TX) in early 1982, noting that the car was in New York. Then to Chris Perrotti (New Rochelle, NY), and fitted with a Chevrolet V6 engine for the RCCA Formula American class, but Perrotti found he had litle competition. By 1988, the car was with Tony Carpanzano (New Milford, CT), who restored it to Atlantic specification. Sold to Paul Lasko (Las Vegas, NV) in 2006.
10. Chevron B17 [17.70.04] (Sandy Brandt): New to New Zealander Bert Hawthorne and raced in British F3 using Holbay engines. Hawthorne wrecked the car in late May, and after trying a couple of other cars, settled on the new Tui F3 car. The Chevron was repaired at the factory and sold via Fred Opert to Ron Cohn (Modena, NY) to be used in SCCA Formula C in 1971. It was later sold to Bill Anspach (Palm Beach Gardens, FL) and is presumably the car he raced in 1973, 1974 and 1975, winning the FC class at the 1974 Run-Offs. To Sandy Brandt (Ft Lauderdale, FL/Pompona Beach, FL) for SEDiv FC in 1976 and 1977. To Ric Capone (Riviera Beach, FL) for FC in 1978, qualifying for the Runoffs, and advertised by him in October 1978. Subsequent history unknown. In 2017, a car with this claimed history was acquired from Ed Lamantia at Huffaker Engineering in the US by a customer of Damon Milnes in the UK.

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.

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.

Individual sources for this event

SCCA Sanction 76-N-50P. Official results from SCCA records at the IMRRC.