This car has a special meaning to me. I had arrived in London in Sept. 1972 and went to McLaren's at Colnbrook seeking any job and they kindly sent me down to Croydon to interview at Trojan Works. As I was having lunch there I looked out and a transporter was leaving with a blue Trojan McLaren M8FP loaded on. They informed me that was the last Can Am car to be built at Trojan which came as a shock to me because I was in awe of these cars. They said do not worry we would have plenty of work with the Formula 5000 cars.
I never knew what happened to that blue M8FP until the other day at Laguna Seca and there it was still looking great after almost 44 years. I thought of the Trojan workers as I looked at all the rivets that those craftsmen had put into this magnificent machine now ably driven by Rick Knoop. Chassis # 9-72. ( Which meant September 1972 the same month I met my wife in London. Fond memories indeed. Both the car and the good lady still look great !)
( The heaps of grunt department. 8.3 litre McLaren Chevrolet engine ! )
Rick was telling me that he has just celebrated 40 years driving McLarens' His father Fred had another McLaren before this one.
khyndart in CA wrote:This car has a special meaning to me. I had arrived in London in Sept. 1972 and went to McLaren's at Colnbrook seeking any job and they kindly sent me down to Croydon to interview at Trojan Works. As I was having lunch there I looked out and a transporter was leaving with a blue Trojan McLaren M8FP loaded on. They informed me that was the last Can Am car to be built at Trojan which came as a shock to me because I was in awe of these cars. They said do not worry we would have plenty of work with the Formula 5000 cars. I never knew what happened to that blue M8FP until the other day at Laguna Seca and there it was still looking great after almost 44 years. I thought of the Trojan workers as I looked at all the rivets that those craftsmen had put into this magnificent machine now ably driven by Rick Knoop. Chassis # 9-72. ( Which meant September 1972 the same month I met my wife in London. Fond memories indeed. Both the car and the good lady still look great !)
( The heaps of grunt department. 8.3 litre McLaren Chevrolet engine ! )
Bruce302 wrote:This is me and Ken at the Monterey Historics, Laguna Seca. It took a couple of tries meeting up as neither knew what the other looked like. Bruce.
This is the 303 ci Pontiac Tempest built by Herb Adams and his team of Pontiac engineers for the T/A series and has a bunch of trick parts on it. It punched well above it's weight when it ran in the day.
This is the new Ford GT, in tribute to the McLaren Amon Le Mans winning car, which incidentally as at Laguna Seca but I didn't get a photo of it. (next time) The guy was just revving it but it didn't sound that great to my old ears.
This is Mike Eddy's Falcon, it's always worth seeing again. Mike looks after Vic Edelbrock's cars and is very talented.
Of course this and all Edelbrock's cars are immaculate. It is a 289 and goes extremely well.
These are some of the cars prepared and supported by Chad Raynal's crew, The Penske Javelin, the Porsche RSR, the Sam Posey Dodge Challenger, his own '69 Camaro, the '82 Duracell Camaro, the Shelby team Cobra (out of shot) a street '69 Z/28 (display only) and a stretched (10" extra) Mini Moke as a pit car (behind the maroon street Camaro)
When I was in my youth (a long time ago ) I had a poster on my bedroom ceiling of John Surtees coming up the hill to Druids at Brands Hatch in 1965 in a Lola T70. I have to admit I thought it was a better looking sports car at the time compared to what Bruce McLaren was driving. Anyway at Laguna Seca the Lola T70 still looks wonderful coming through the Corkscrew Corner. I am not sure who the driver of car # 47 is as it was not in the official programme.
Byron DeFoor in # 8 Lola 1965 T70 coming through the corner.
