Canadian Road Racing Championship

Harewood Acres, 17 Aug 1969

All cars are 5-litre F5000 unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. Lola T142 [SL142/38] (Horst Kroll): See full history: Lola T142 SL142/38.
2. Kiki Mk 6D (Tony Simms): Doug McArthur (Toronto, Canada) built a number of one-off racing cars in the late 1960s. These included a Mk 2 that raced in Formula C, a Mk 3 which had a Ford 289 engine and was said to resemble an overgrown Lotus 7, and a Mk 4 that ran in Formula B until Doug Durrell demolished it at Mont Tremblant in July 1969. For 1968, local papers noted that McArthur was planning a Formula A car with a spaceframe chassis and Chevrolet engine. The car was first seen in Canadian Formula A in 1969, when it was driven by Tony Simms (Willowdale, Ontario). It had a mild steel space frame with a few stressed aluminum panels around the cockpit plus the undertray, and used a Hewland LG gearbox and McLaren wheels. The Chevrolet V8 engine was prepared by Dave Billes at Performance Engineering. Simms returned with the car in 1970, but its only documented appearance was at Trois-Rivières in September. It was then sold to John Powell, who was moving up from racing a MGB. Unfortunately, the car got airborne while testing at Harewood Acres and was destroyed. Some surviving components were being used in a Kiki Mk 8 until Powell's budget ran out.
3. Brabham BT16 [F2-1-65] (Bruce Jensen): Driven by Alan Rees for Roy Winkelmann Racing in 1965. Presumably Rees raced the same car all season. Bought in 1966 from Winkelmann by Bob Fuller (Connecticut), fitted with a Cosworth Mk 12 and raced in FB in 1967. To Steve Brownstein (New York) for 1968 and raced again in FB with the Mk 12. Then traded to Fred Opert for a new Chevron. To Bruce Jensen and raced in Canadian FB in 1969 and then to Bill Pickthorne (Ottawa, Ontario) who raced it in 1970 and at the beginning of 1971. It was then stored for 18 years until bought by Murray Wivell (Brantford, Ontario) in October 1989. Restored and used in US vintage racing for ten seasons, initially with the Ford twin cam engine and then with a Cosworth SCA for the last two seasons. Sold to Ivan Scotti (Zurich, Switzerland) November 2004. This is presumably the ex-Alan Rees BT16 run at the 2013 Solitude Revival by Bruno Weibel of Schaffner Racing.
4. Cooper T76 [T75 F2-4-65] (John R Babchek): New to Tyrrell Racing Organisation for John Surtees to race in F2 in 1965. Raced later in the season by Bob Bondurant and Chris Amon. To Reg Howell (Dayton, OH) May 1966 to be used in SCCA racing. Sold to Dick Leppla (Cleveland Hgts, OH), fitted with a Cosworth twin cam and Colotti T46 5-speed gearbox and entered in Formula B events for David Dours (Hudson, OH) in 1967, but described by them as a T76. It was one of the quickest FB cars in the east of the US at the start of 1967 and Dours won at Cumberland in May but it was no match for Chuck Dietrich's brand new McLaren M4A in Central Division. Later fitted with a Vegantune engine and won at Mid-Ohio in September. To John R. Babchek (Romulus, MI) for CenDiv Formula B from 1968 to 1970. He advertised the car in June 1970 as an "ex-Surtees team car" with Vegantune engine, and again in April 1974 when it was just described as a T76 rolling chassis . History unknown until bought by Murray Batson (Australia) in 1979. Then via Bruce Sutton 1981 and Murray Richards (Murrumbeena, Victoria) 1992 to Bob Harborow (Camberwell, Victoria) 1994.
5. Lola T142 [SL142/29] (Eppie Wietzes): See full history: Lola T142 SL142/29.
6. Brabham BT21 ["BT21-9"] (Al Justason): According to a biography of Bill Stone, his 1968 Formula 3 Brabham started out as a crashed BT18 frame bought from Frank Williams. Stone built this car up and entered it as a BT18/21B in European F3 events in the latter half of 1968. Early in 1969, Stone appeared with a Brabham powered by a Ford twin cam engine and said to be a BT21B when he raced it at Silverstone in April. At the Madrid GP, Autosport described it as a BT18 with a 1800cc Ford twin cam engine. It was called a BT21A when Del Bennett drove it at Silverstone in May. This car was then sold to Al Justason (Toronto, Ontario) for Formula B racing in 1969. Photographs of the car in Justason's ownership show that it had BT18 upper bodywork and it is likely that this "BT21" was actually Stone's BT18-based car from 1968. Justason sold the car to dealer Joe Grimaldi as a rolling chassis and its subsequent history is unknown.
7. Brabham BT21 [9] (Cam McKenzie): New to Brian Classick for F3 in 1967. To Peter Hanson for 1968. To Cam McKenzie (Squamish, British Columbia, Canada) in Formula B specification for 1969, and retained by him for 1970 and 1971.
8. Chinook Lola T92 (Alfred Ruys de Perez): George Fejer (Toronto, Ontario, Canada) acquired an ex-Mecom Indy Lola T90 or T92 and entered it at the Phoenix USAC race in March 1969 as a Chinook. After that race, it was converted to Formula A specification for Alfred Ruys de Perez to run - with a remarkable lack of success - in SCCA and Canadian Formula A races later that season. Ed Butt, who worked for the Fejers at this time, recalls this car as "the Lola T90 that Jackie Stewart drove in the 1966 Indy 500". However, the shape of the fuel fillers suggests it was a T92, not a T90, so there is a greater similarity to the T92 that Stewart drove in the 1967 Indy 500. Subsequent history unknown.
9. Lotus 59 [59-FB-23?] (Don Merriman): Donald G. Merriman (Willowdale, Ontario, Canada) raced a Lotus 59 (or 59C) in Formula B in 1969, appearing in both SCCA and Canadian races. He was second at the Grand Prix de Trois-Rivières in September, and picked up several other good placings. He returned with the car in 1970, but his last known appearance was at Westwood at the end of May. Merriman told later owner Joe Griffin that he sold the car to Jack (Jackie) Burnett, so this would be the car Burnett drove at Trois-Rivières in August 1971. It was then in Brian Stewart's shop for a while, showing signs of race damage, perhaps from Trois-Rivières, and was then bought by Tommy Meecham (Oshawa, Ontario), who converted the car some time around 1973 to Formula Ford specification, and fitted Lotus 69 bodywork. He raced the car in the Bulova Formula Ford Series in Canada in 1974 and 1975. Meecham later crashed the car at Shannonville, and it was still in rough condition when bought from him by Ron Fellows in 1977. He had the car rebuilt by Wayne Pinney, of ASH Engineering, who designed his own bodywork for the car and named it ASH 001. Fellows and Pinney's customer Randy Packham raced the car from 1978 to 1980, until Packham crashed the car heavily at Shannonville, and Pinney rebuilt it again as the ASH 002. Fellows started to rebuilt it again, but this was not completed and the car hung in the rafters of Derek Harkema's workshoip in Toronto from 1981 to 1986. It is then unknown until John Lindsey acquired it in the 1990s, and he retained it until his death in 2015. Lindsey's widow sold the part-restored car to Joe Griffin in 2018.

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.

Results for this series originally proved very difficult to complete, due in part to the poor coverage in Canadian magazines such as Track & Traffic. Wolfgang Klopfer provided Autoweek reports, Don Markle uncovered material in the archives then maintained by the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame (CMHoF), Jim Ibey found what he could from Track & Traffic, Tom Johnston provided scans of entry lists and reports from a variety of sources, and Michael Gee transcribed motor sports news articles at Vancouver's main library.

Since those early efforts, Mike Adams and Dominic St-Jean have provided official results sheets uncovered in the CMHoF and Trois-Rivières archives, and complete results have now been found for R1 Mosport 18 May 1969 (official results), R2 St Jovite 25 May 1969 (Autoweek), R6 Harewood Acres 17 Aug 1969 (official results), R9 Mosport Park 13 Oct 1969 (official results), R2 Westwood 31 May 1970 (Autoweek), R3 Edmonton 14 Jun 1970 (Autoweek and also the official results), R4 Rockcliffe 1 Jul 1970 (Autoweek and the official results), R5 Harewood 9 Aug 1970 (Wheelspin 27 May 1970 edition and the official results), R6 Trois-Rivières 06 Sep 1970 (official results) and R7 Mosport Park 11 Oct 1970 (official results).

Please email Allen if you can add anything.