SCCA Regional (Mohawk Hudson Region)

Lime Rock, 30 Jul 1977

All cars are 1.6-litre FB unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. Chevron B27 (Paul Corazzo): Paul Corazzo (Wethersfield, CT) raced a Chevron B27 in Formula B in 1976, dominating the New England Region NERRC championship. The car was blue and yellow in 1976, and typically entered by Sherry Cup, Inc. New England Region records show that it was registered to Corazzo with a NER number in May 1976, indicating that it had not raced with the SCCA before that time. Corazzo won the New England Region FB title in 1976 with five wins and maximum points. He retained the car for 1977 and 1978, by which time it was red and yellow, with International Automobile Enterprises Inc signwriting. It was bought from Corazzo by James Deady, who remembers changing the red and yellow livery to "black and white with a red slash". Deady ws originally planning to share the car with Peter Portante of ERA Cars, but Portante crashed at Bridgehampton and after than just ran the car for Deady. Raced by Deady until he upgraded to a newer B29. He recalls that the B27 "went to guy in Penn who painted it brown and tried driving it at Pocono without the rear wing - it did not go well!". Subsequent history unknown.
2. Lotus 59/69 [59-FB-15] (Walter Nelson): In 1970, John F. Sirmons (Weston, CT) and Vincent Dileo (Greenwich, CT) shared a Lotus 59C, Sirmons driving it in rounds of the SCCA Continental Championship, and Dileo competing in SCCA Nationals and in Area 1 Regional Championship races. This is almost certainly the car used by Ian Ashley to win a libre race at Brands Hatch in November 1969, as the car was said to be for an American customer, and Sirmons' car was later said to be a former Ashley car. Dileo won two Area 1 races at Thompson Raceway in July and August, but Sirmons had little success in Pro events. Sirmons and Dileo acquired a Lola T240 for 1971, and the Lotus is likely to have gone to Lola agent Carl Haas in trade. The car is unknown in 1971, but may have remained in stock with Carl Haas, because at some point in 1972 it was acquired from Haas by Phil Raeder (Delmar, NY), his Formula C Lotus 35 being traded in the other direction. Raeder fitted a Renault Alpine Gordini engine and ran the car in Formula C, qualifying for the Runoffs in 1973 where he finished in an impressive fourth place. He was entered during this time by Terri Novotny. Raeder then updated the car with Lotus 69 bodywork and other modifications and ran it as the PRD in 1974 and 1975, still with its Gordini engine. Pearce Raeder recals that the car was then sold to Walter Nelson (No. Haledon, NY/Great Neck, NY). Nelson raced a Lotus in Northeast Division Formula C in 1976, 1977 and 1978. Photographs show that it had Lotus 69 bodywork but Lotus 59 front suspension mounts, consistent with it being the ex-Raeder car. The car was later acquired by Chuck Sieber (McLean, VA), who used it in Solo II events from 1981 to 1989. He had bought the car less engine, and used a 1760 Ford twin cam, followed by an 1840cc BDA. Sieber sold the car to Ian Giles (Didcot, Oxfordshire) at the end of 1990. Its history over the next six years is unknown, but by 1996 it had been acquired by Peter Studer in Switzerland, and he restored it to F2 specification, using the Gold Leaf Team Lotus livery that was used in Formula 3. The car was still owned by Studer when he died in May 2018.
3. Brabham BT38 (Walter Binger): For 1974, Donald Wirth (Laurel, NY) bought a Brabham BT38 from Fred Opert Racing in 1974 fitted with a new 1100cc Hart BDA engine for Northeast Division Formula C. The car had previously been used in F3 in Europe, so would have been a BT38C. It was sold to Wally Binger (W. Hempstead, NY) for 1975, and raced again in NEDiv FC but after Binger's first daughter was born in September 1977 he sold the car back to Wirth. Wirth crashed the car at Bridgehampton in 1978 or 1979, and the engine bay was badly damaged. The car was sold to someone in the New England area, but was still unrepaired when last seen.
4. Brabham BT29 [46] (Paul Thomas): 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).

Sources

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' original 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 77-R-91P. Mohawk-Hudson Region newsletter "Knock Out" September 1977 (pages unnumbered).