The 79 Atlantic series here was regarded as a bit of a damp squib, but mid-season there were some damn good races. It wasn't an 'International' series of any sort, but as a National formula there were some decent cars and drivers racing : Mallock, Jim C again, Dowsett, Smith, Gorne, Jeffrey, Barton, Wainwright, May, Rackham, Hunter, Lawler,Briggs.' With hindsight, not bad at all !

Didn't Lawler run away with it a bit in the new Lola? I seem to recall it was plain white with little signwriting. There was a plan to put Trevor van Rooyen in one with SDC builders backing but it did not fit in with his Team Gunston committments in South African Atlantic therefore did not happen.

Anyone remember a Scottish Atlantic championship in 1979? Looking at my 79 chart I have points scored at 4 races at Ingliston. 56 drivers in total incl;
Hitachi British
International Triple Crown
Duckhams Mondello
All Ireland

There was an All-Irish series in 1979 and also a Northern Irish series; both won by Gary Gibson. The Triple Crown was Mondello, Donington and Ingliston; won by Crawford.

I don't know anything about the other three Ingliston races. Do you have note of the dates?

Allen

The first race, yes, but Mallock dominated the series.

Ingliston dates;
8th April 1st Graham Hamilton,2nd Dave Muter, NS Gary Gibson
6th May ? cancelled as no drivers identified as taking part!
+ 3 more I did not record dates but
August or later
Results;1st Andy Barton,2nd Andrew Jeffrey,3rd,Bryce Wison
1st Berard Hunter,2nd Alo Lawler,3d Lawrence Jacobson
1st Andy Barton,2nd Gary Gibson,3rd Jeffrey,4th Jacobson
Guess thats all Autosport/MN published?

The Hitachi round was 22 July and was Crawford - Jeffrey - Candy.

6 May was the date of a Glasgow Herald libre race won by Jeffrey. 21 Aug, 16 Sep and 14 Oct were Scottish libre series races but were all won by Dickson's F2 March.

I'm not sure about the results you quote but I'm wondering if the Scottish libre series ran an Atlantic category in 1979 and announced an Atlantic champion.

Allen

Agree with Allen, Rob. I don't recall anything re a Scottish FA series at all that year, or any other year ! Trevor van R in a T760, that would have been interesting.

I've always wondered why that Lola didn't sell into the States at all, given the Haas dealership, the fact that it was touted as a full GE car, and the late deliveries of the Ralts. Of course we knew it turned out to be a dog, but that wasn't known at the time, and IIRC Lola were keen to get it developed, taking it to Ricard for winter testing, which was unusual for an FA car at that time. Maybe Haas knew it was gonna be rough, and put his clients off it !!

Looks like it must have been a sub-class of the Libre series-maybe not a championship as such which may account for the fact that I do not have a name for it.
Maybe of interest that Atlantic still exists as a sub-class of Historic Euro F2 currently lead by one of my favouite drivers-Amanda Whitaker.

Brilliant pics!

Perhaps the most interesting one is the Ted Wentz in unfamiliar livery - because this is the works development car
[HU18] rather than his regular T360-HU7 which had just been pureed by Roy James. Trimmer would run this car
in the early 76 rounds, then to Mike King and by 1978 Carl Leibich in USA.
Car is now back in UK and being restored.

Divi did do Atlantic, but in the US and Canada, in 1978 with Opert and Olympus backing, and did quite well...

In the pics from the Race of Champions meeting is another real rarity.
The #10 green and yellow car should, from its number, be Ray Mallock in the 1974 Ensign FB car.
I've never seen a picture of this car before.

In the Mallory hairpin picture of Brise, Nilsson, Mallock, whose is the red Chevron B29 that's right inside Brise's gearbox?
I presume it has to be Derek Cook, and if it's the first lap on Aug 24 both Cook and Brise must have made blinding starts as they
qualified well down [9th and 10th respectively.

I think you'll find it is Stan Matthews in a March whatever number he was running!

This one?



Any chance that's 18? That was Stan Matthews' old car in the hands of Chris Oats but didn't appear at that race. Or did it...

Allen

It does look like Stan's old car but not him - he stopped driving in '73.

It rained in practice as well as in the race. Any chance these pics are from practice and that Oats was present?

I did take the R of C support photographs in practice rather than the race.

David

I agree it might be 18 rather than 10, which might explain why I thought it had bodywork rather like a March 733.

The programme that I have for the RoC support has a grid of 22 cars on it, without Oates, so I had to assume him as a DNA
[he was entered]. This would suggest that he DNQ/DNS'd rather than failed to show.

David, do you have any more pics from that meeting that might enable me to reduce the DNAs still further?

Chris

As elsewhere, Jim Crawford was very popular at Oulton Park as this picture from the Atlantic race in October '74 demonstrates - note the banner displayed at Old Hall!






And mention of Gunnar Nilsson - here he is comparing practice times with Danny Sullivan, Rupert Keegan and Alex Ribeiro in the Oulton paddock. OK, not at a Formula Atlantic race but at the F3 meeting in July '75.







Peter McFadyen

I had forgotten that Bobby Brown ever did Atlantic races in England.

Why did Ted Wentz never really take off in Europe. I know he was the Lola test driver, then he sorta just disappeared.

I'm not sure, I'm away for a week or so but will have a look when I get back home.

David

Great to see your photos appearing here, Peter. Welcome, and I look forward to what you might have in store.........

I've been in touch with Graham Gauld - it's hard to think of anyone more likely to know than Graham - and he can't recall there being a separate series for Atlantics in Scotland and reckons they'd have been classed in with the libre cars. He's kindly offered to look out the relevant programme for us from his collection.

Allen

I saw Cook make a couple of bliding starts the year after in his B27 then Chris, so it may well have been him. However are we sure Brise was leading in that pic, IIRC Jim C lead from the start to the end.

The attached pic was taken in the paddock area at Silverstone in the aftermath of a Formula Atlantic race on the GP circuit.
From memory, it is the aforementioned Derek Cook's Chevron. As you can deduce, it has undergone a fairly sizeable impact with something solid.

It's definitely Cook. According to Autosport he was very fast down the straights and hogged the line through the corners, causing problems for everybody who wanted to get past...

2F-001,

That's a March in your photo - not a Chevron.

Derek Cook did have a March [a 73B] at that race and crashed in practice. He raced Peter Munro's Chevron B27 on loan.

But I wonder if that could be Musetti's March, crashed in practice and replaced with "his old tub" for the race?

Maybe Drifty or Simon H can tell us what sort of March that is. The front of the tub isn't quite what I would have expected.

Allen

No, I'm not trying to be Mr Clever Clogs (and forgive me if it seems that way!), but wasn't this the race that Muir led until his engine let go?

I'm not sure what made me suggest that pic (post 66*) was of a Chevron; I can't even be sure which meeting it was at - the print has been sitting on my desk for ages separated from others of the same meeting and the negs (which would probably fix the event); it was supporting something big - such as the International Trophy or the Grand Prix (which would, perhaps, make it 75). I just recalled it having something to do with Derek Cook, but maybe I got that wrong too! I don't recall seeing the accident itself, but I doubt I would have been to both practice and race, and this was still there after the race.
From those vague details, can anyone pin it down further?

(* sorry, no Chaparral content! )

Allen,

It is a 73 or 74 series March , however any Atlantic car would normally be expected to have vented front discs and 4 pot calipers , while this has what appears to be F3 brakes albeit with F/Atlantic wheels etc.
so maybe a car upgraded from a 733 to a 73B or 74B spec.

Bryan.

Bryan , not all Formula Atlantic cars had vented front brakes & 4 spot calipers, mine did not & still has not, they were not required in my instance, when it was experimented with the 2 litre BDG , things changed................. Peter N..................................................

Somewhat OT, but looking at that March tub, it's amazing to think how that basic chassis design, with a few minor variations, managed to serve March successfully in F2, F3 and Atalantic, and even into F1 (721G and hence evolution to 731-771) from 1971 through 1978. Herd's wonderfully simple concept can't have been half bad!

Mark, wasn't it the June meeting that Muir lead most of the way? I think the pic above shows the August Bankie meet, tho' you may well be right about Muir leading that one too! Wonder why he went so well at Mallory; he and the car didn't seem so quick elsewhere. Though do you remember he put a privateer B35 BDX on the front row of a full F2 race the year after somewhere in France IIRC, up against the Martinis, Marches, Elf 2s etc.

Yes, indeed, Dan. Very well remembered

Nogaro - look here... http://www.formula2.net/F276_19.htm

Begs the question, how good was he?!

Perhaps our Antipodean friends would like to comment?

Like almost all my other pics from the 1970s, these below - taken between 1972 & 1975 - were captured on my cacky Kodak Instamatic camera. Therefore, as always, my usual apologies apply...













































I've altered the thread title slightly, purely in order to reflect the way this thread - which covers one of the most popular formulae ever - has evolved.

Great days!

Not just great days but fantastic photos!



Who, what, where & when?

I guess its BT36-1, 1972 but I can't answer the rest. Is the driver Howlings?

Twin Window,

Just fabulous keep them coming,

Andrew Fellowes got all excited when I rang and advised that BT36-1 was there in it's Tate of Leeds colours, the Triplex March 73B is Colin Vandervells car 73B-8 .

Re Bob Muir , yes he was very good , and is still playing with racing cars , now running a Formula Brabham/Holden Reynard , he was also very good in F5000's .

Bryan.

Twin Window:

It's amazing what you can do with those little cameras! First you have a natural eye. Please buy a proper camera for the future you'reselling yourself short! You're a god snapper!

Aussie Bobbie Muir/Birrana

Interestingly, as can be seen, Bob Muir wasn't exactly a young man (compared to the tyros against whom he was competing) when he hit your shores.

He began racing about ten years earlier in FVee, progressed to ANF2 and then got a Rennmax and went ANF1 with a Climax. Which was pretty optimistic at that time.

Next he put a Waggott engine into his car, making it similar to Max Stewart's mount of the time, and I wondered about him timing Max at the Farm's short circuit. "Surely Bob Muir doesn't hope to match Max Stewart?" I thought.

But that was his aim, and he bought the Mildren 'Yellow Submarine' as he progressed. By this time he was really shining, and when he got into F5000 in the wake of Niel Allen's crash in the T300 he was right on the pace.

But it was a pace that required funds not everyone can match. When Bob and Marj Brown decided to back him (I think that happened when they lost faith in Enno Buesselman, wasn't it?), he was in a better position to succeed.

I had no idea he was still racing today... is Judy still there?

Formula Atlantic had a fairly strong following over here on the West Coast. I recall Villeneuve at Westwood in 1977(?) and Kiki Roseberg thrilling the crowd with his panache at the Westwood hairpin. I was on the crew of a F/Atlantic team briefly in the late seventies and recall an event at Westwood when we were pitted next to Danny Sullivan. At one point Danny's crew started to get a bit pushy with us, since we were a no-name team, and , just as the jack handles were starting to come out Sullivan returned and quietened everyone down
There doesn't seem to be anything comparible now.

I think there's a Buford post somewhere around where he mentions he raced against Villeneuve in FAt and Gilles was doing it tough...

Not in this forum however, so I'll quote it here:

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Andrew Fellowes
[B]Not just great days but fantastic photos Andrew, they were very good years, but never to be repeated, unfortunately Regards Peter N

I have some issues with the above

Gilles was on his own, without a team but rarely without Joanne and the kids and Gillles never had Canadian Tire sponorship unless you count the tools he liberated.

Brother Jacques did have some Canadian Tire money when he did Atlantic and the under 2 litre Can Am and had fully sponsorship with Dave Billies in the Frisbee in the Can Am and March in CART.

THe First Atlantic race shown in Old racing cars is 1978. That might have been Jacques.

Help me out please

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Ray Bell
[B]


Aussie Bobbie Muir/Birrana Ray, for your info, i am now the owner of this Birrana, chassis # 273---009 ,it is only a roller at this stage, but at some point in the future we may see it complete...........................

Twinney

In the photos you have in post 77 I am most interested in the , all great BTW, can you identify the last in the STP car?

Is is possible that it is Ray Wardell who went on to be Gilles Villeneuve in 1976 and 77 when he was dominate?

Thanks

Great variety of pics, Twinny. Some of guys and cars who rarely featured in reports at the time.

Peter Wardle in a Surtees ( TS 15 ? )

I haven't a clue about the chassis number, but I took it at Mallory in 1972 when they were supporting the F5000s. I think it is Bobby Howlings...I did eventually get a better camera - one that had an adjustable focus! - which I used in th '80s. Unfortunately, though, it was only a Zenit E... Philippe is corect (above). Pic taken on the grid for the 1974 International Trophy support race, IIRC.I'd completely forgotten about Brian Robinson's Ensign myself until I found the trannie!

This is real "wallow down memory lane" stuff, isn't it?

The Tate BT36 was, I'm fairly sure, also driven by Chris Meek in some Libre races up North in 1972 . Wasn't there supposed to be a Tate-sponsored Atlantic team using Taydec mk5's that year, only the cars didn't work all that well and they used the Brabham and that ugly March?

As has already been said, it's great to see some of the lesser-known cars and drivers. But who the hell was Roy Folland, driver of the blue March?

Giles raced in Canadian Atlantic in 1975 and those results are on OldRacingCars.com (Canadian/US Atlantic). He may have raced in 1974 but we don't have full data for 1971 to 1974 yet. Maybe the CMHF Archives can help us with that and then we'd be able to see the full picture?

Allen