Can-Am Challenge Race

Mosport Park, 14 Sep 1986

All cars are 5-litre Can-Am unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. Frissbee-Lola KR4 [Lola T400 HU9] (Paul Tracy): New to Eppie Wietzes (Thornhill, Ontario) and raced in the SCCA/USAC F5000 Championship in 1975 and early 1976. Retained by Wietzes until 1986 and used as show car by Canadian Tyre in mid-1980's. Sold to Horst Kroll and converted to Can-Am Frissbee specification as "Frissbee KR4" for Can-Am 1986 and CAT in 1987. Retained by Kroll until sold to Glenn Richards (Auckland, New Zealand) in mid-2010. Raced by Reg Cook in the 2010/11 F5000 Tasman Revival series, and then by Richards in the series every season from 2013/14 to 2017/18. More information about Lola T400 HU9
2. Frissbee-Lola KR3 [Lola T330 HU2] (Horst Kroll): See full history: Lola T330 HU2.
3. March 85C [51] (Bill Tempero): Bill Tempero's #2 March 85C Can-Am car was identified at Willow Springs in 1987 by Martin Spetz as 85C-51 "ex-Rahal".
4. Photon JH2 [March 78B-15] (Jeremy Hill): Jeremy Hill's 1984-86 'Photon' was based on a March 78B Formula Atlantic car but fitted with a 2-litre Hart 420R engine, and a Frissbee-inspired body. A later advert for the car on Race-cars.com gives the car as March 78B/15, an ex-Brack car used for a season by Hill in Formula Atlantic before being converted to Can-Am spec.
5. Lola T333CS [T332 HU46] (Ray Reimer): See full history: Lola T332 HU46.
6. March RX10-B [73B-17] (Seann Burgess): New to Bruce MacInnes (Sharon, CT) and raced as part of a two-car team with Ron Cohn. Raced in the Players Canadian FB series and in the SCCA Pro FB races at Road America and Watkins Glen. Retained for 1974, and raced in the Players Canadian series again, and in the US GP support race at Watkins Glen in October. Sold to Joe Ostrowski (Trenton, NJ), and raced in NEDiv SCCA Nationals in 1975 and 1976. Presumably the March he raced in NEDiv in 1977 and 1978. Retained by Ostrowski until early 1982 when it was bought by Seann Burgess (Caledon, Ontario). Burgess won the CASC Ontario Formula Atlantic championship and the BARC Drivers Championship in 1982 as well as appearing in 'pro' events. After two more seasons of Atlantic, he converted the car to Can-Am specification at the end of 1985 and then fitted a McLaren M1B body and a Mazda 13B rotary engine for 1986. This "March RX10-B" was raced through the 1986 season. Burgess kept the Can-Am body after the car was retired from racing and sold the March to Richard Smith (Barrie, Ontario) who raced it in 1989 and 1990, still with the Mazda engine, and fitting 1975 bodywork for 1990. He sold it to Chuck Sieber (McLean, VA) who imported it back to the US in January 1991. He raced it in Solo events in 1991, and maybe in one or two more seasons until selling it back to Seann Burgess. Burgess initially restored it to MacInnes' 1973 livery, but at the request of the Villeneuve Museum traded his 73B bodywork to Marchives for a set of 1975 bodywork, and rebuilt the car to resemble Gilles Villeneuve's Skiroule March 75B. By May 2010, it was on display in the Musée Gilles Villeneuve (Berthierville, Quebec).
7. Royale S2000M [17] (Jeff Wright): Jeff Wright's Royale was entered as a RP37, the 1984 Sports 2000 model, but Wright's son has confirmed to Martin Krejci that it was a 1981 S2000M, chassis 17. Royale records, quoted in Paul Lawrence's book "Nowhere To Hide", show that this car was originally invoiced to Cooke Racing in the US. According to Doug Waters, the car used a standard Ford Pinto engine for its Can-Am and CAT appearances.
8. March 74B/77B [10] (Mauro Lanaro): The early history of this car is unknown, but it may be the car raced by Gilles Léger (Lachute, Quebec) from Mosport Park in July 1974 onwards. By 1980 it was owned by Bob Roy ( Montréal, Quebec, Canada) and was being used in Can-Am. The car later went to Mauro Lanaro (Montréal, Quebec), and was raced by him in Can-Am then CAT races from 1984 to 1987. At some point, Lanaro found the monocoque had bent due to the Can-Am car's downforce, and replaced the tub with that of 74B/12. The tub and associated parts from 74B/10 remained with Lanaro until he sold his remaining stock to David Clubine (Brantford, Ontario) in 2018.
9. Frissbee-Lola KR5 [Lola T300 HU15] (Joe DeMarco): Invoice date 30 Mar 1972 (sold to 'Haas', colour 'Yellow'). Horst Kroll (Canada) US 1972-1974; driven by Bert Kuehne US 1975 (5 races); Kroll US 1976; damaged in crash at Watkins Glen but rebuilt and converted to Can-Am. Kroll Can-Am 1977; rental car thereafter: e.g. Marcel Talbot Can-Am 1978 (1 race: Trois-Rivieres - 04 Sep 1978), Can-Am 1979 (1 entry in "T300": Road Atlanta - 06 May 1979, entry list only); Mike Freberg 1981; Duff Hubbard 1982; John Macaluso 1983; Walter Lechner 1984; Joe DeMarco 1985 and 1986; John Graham 1986. Rebuilt as "Frissbee KR5" for 1986. Mike Engstrand recalls driving Kroll's T300-based Can-Am car at St Louis and Hallet in 1986; used until 1987 - Chuck Haines (St Louis, MO) 1989 - Don Jensen (US) about 1998: used extensively in vintage racing still in Can-Am specification until 2007 - Andrew Kluver (Sydney, Australia) August 2007.
10. Cicale-March 77B (David Locke): Rick Koehler (Milwaukee, WI) raced an Excalibur EE2B in Formula Atlantic in 1978, with sponsorship from Brooks Stevens. The car was essentially a March 77B and was described as ex-Shierson and ex-Brack in adverts in late 1978 and 1979. It was leased to Joe Castellano for the Long Beach race in April 1979, and then sat unused until August 1980 when it was sold to David Locke (Cambridge City, IN). Locke fitted the car with 79B bodywork and Bobsy fenders so that it could be used in Can-Am racing, using an 1850cc Hart BDA engine and Hewland FT200 gearbox. In October 1981, Locke ordered a Kevlar Cicale body for the car, and used it in this form in 1982 and 1983, but without success. He acquired a Hart 420R engine from Jim Trueman for 1984 and raced the car in Can-Am and then CAT until 1987. Chris Townsend advises that it was sold to Lee Johnson in Colorado in April 1988, and was still with Johnson in 2012.
11. Osella PA9 [110] (Tony LaRosa): Jacques Villeneuve Sr drove an Osella PA9-BMW sports car during the 1982 Can-Am season. This car had began life as a PA8, chassis 091, for Gimax in 1980 and had been converted to PA9 specification and renumbered 110 for Villeneuve's Can-Am run. The car reappeared briefly for Scott Goodyear to drive in 1983.
12. Chevron B51 [51-80-01] (Tod Tuttle): Martin Spetz observed the number 'B51-80-01' on Tuttle's Chevron at Road Atlanta in 1984.
13. Chevron B24 [24-73-05B] (Rupert Bragg-Smith): Built for 1974 season. James Dunkel: raced in US 1974, US 1975 (1 race + 1 DNS) - Ed Kaprowicz August 1976: raced in US 1976 (1 race), SCCA FA 1977, SCCA FA 1978 - Steve Bollinger January 1982 - Randy Reso April 1982 - Rupert Bragg-Smith December 1982: raced in Can-Am 1983 (2 races), Can-Am 1984 (2 races), Can-Am 1985 (1 race) - Jack Boxstrom December 1987 - Dick Leppla December 1992: raced at HSR Mid-Ohio July 1994 - Jack Boxstrom (again) of RM Auctions, Inc. (Canada) February 1997 - Albert Way (Oceanview, NJ) Feb 2001 - Philip Jewell (Rushcutters Bay, NSW, Australia) May 2012 - Dean Camm (Melbourne, Australia) December 2016.
14. Lola T333CS [T332 HU45] (John Macaluso): See full history: Lola T332 HU45.

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.