Molson Championship Race

Mont-Tremblant, 4 Oct 1970

All cars are 1.6-litre FB unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. Lotus 59/69 [59-F2/XB-40] (David McConnell): New to David McConnell (Montréal, Quebec, Canada) and raced in the SCCA Continental Championship for Formula B series and the Quebec Region Molson Championship during 1970. The car was entered by Jim Russell RDS (Canada) Ltd, and generally wore #86. McConnell then took the car out to New Zealand for the start of the 1971 Tasman Cup, where the car was described as a Lotus 69. After a run of poor results in New Zealand, he fitted an 1800cc Cosworth FVC engine for the Australian rounds, but failed to qualify for the Warwick Farm race. Local Lotus agent Leo Geoghegan tried the car in practice at that event. After one more race, McConnell abandoned the series. The subsequent history of the Lotus 59/69 is unknown.
2. Lotus 59/69 [59-F2/XB-42] (Jacques Couture): New to Jacques Couture (Laval, Montréal, Quebec) and raced in the SCCA Continental Championship for Formula B series and the Quebec Region Molson Championship during 1970. The car was entered by Jim Russell RDS (Canada) Ltd, and generally wore #86. Sold to Eligio Siconolfi (Montréal, Quebec) for 1971 and raced in the Players Canadian Formula B series and the Quebec Region Molson series. The car was acquired from Siconolfi by Mauro Lanaro (Montréal, Quebec) who took some time restoring it, and then raced it in regional events in Canada in 1973. Lanaro recalled to Joe Griffin in 2021 that "after a bad accident at Mosport, I sold what was left it to Peter Draggfy". Peter Dragffy is known to have had several Lotus 59/69s in the 1980s.
3. Stebro-Chevron B17B (Peter W. Broeker): Peter Broeker (Pointe-Claire, Montréal, Quebec) raced a Chevron B17b in Canadian Formula B in 1970, often descibing it as a Stebro. It replaced Broeker's earlier B14, so the two cars were often confused. The B17b was raced by Craig Fisher and John Powell (both Toronto, Ontario) in 1971, entered by Penguin Racing Enterprise. The later history of the car is not known. Although it has been suggested that this was the car Broeker raced in 1974, when he returned to Formula Atlantic, that car appears to have been his older B14 updated.
4. Brabham BT29 (Peter Roberts): Peter Roberts (Granby, Quebec) raced a Brabham BT29 in 1970, appearing as #71 in the main Canadian series and as #1 in the Molson (Quebec Region) Championship. His best results came in the Molson series with two third places at Mont-Tremblant. Roberts had earlier raced a BT29 that he had borrowed from "an Ontario racer" but whether this 1970 car was the same one is unknown. Robert did not continue in Formula B after 1970 and after sitting around unused for 18 months, the BT29 was sold to Derek Johnson (Montreal, Quebec) who was making a comeback after injury. The Montreal Gazette quoted Johnson's chief crew Bob Beale saying that nobody had driven it for a year, and Roberts' mechanic John Lo Bosco confirmed that Roberts' BT29 went to Johnson. Johnson bought the car the Friday before the opening race at Sanair and it was rented by Ian Coristine for that race after his new March 722 could not be readied in time. Raced by Johnson for the rest of the 1972 season. Subsequent history unknown.
5. Brabham BT29 (Brian Robertson): Brian Robertson (Brockville, Ontario) bought a Brabham BT29 late in 1969, debuting it at Sebring in December. He raced it extensively in 1970, taking in the Quebec and national Canadian series as well as rounds of the SCCA Pro series. He was entered by Fred Opert Racing Canada, a business in which he was a partner with Opert. Robertson upgraded to a BT35 for 1971 and his BT29 is likely to have been sold via the Opert operation. It does not appear in Opert's early 1971 advert so one possibility is that it was BT29/23, the car Evan Noyes took to the Tasman series.

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.

The 1971-1973 Canadian Formula B race results have been compiled by Chris Townsend based on material in Canadian Motorsport Bulletin, results sheets where available and from information drawn from Canadian newspapers.

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.