If there were a "Motorsports Olympics", which drivers would you select?

[Joe Fan]

Lets suppose that there were a "Motorsports Olympics" and a time machine available at your disposal that would allow you to bring back any driver in their prime. Which drivers would you choose in each of the following categories to best represent your country. Think of the Olympic spirit and which driver you would want to represent your country, not just on talent alone.

1) Open Wheel Road Course Racing (select up to two drivers)

2) Open Wheel Oval Racing (select up to two drivers)

3) Stock Car Oval Racing (select up to two drivers)

4) Sports Car Road Racing (select up to two drivers)

5) Rally Racing (select up to two drivers)


Note: Drivers can only compete in one category of racing.



[This message has been edited by Joe Fan (edited 25 May 2000).]

[marcus]

OOOHHH nice topic Joe fan

Team Australia

open wheel road course racing
1. Jack Brabham
2. Mark webber

open wheel oval racing
hard one this as we havent (yet had to many sucesses in this
1. Jason Bright
2. ?????...I have no idea

adding another catergory
open wheel oval dirt racing

1. Skip Jackson
2. Brooke Tatnell

Stock car oval racing
1.Kim Jane
2.Jim Richards (from Nz but we claim him as ours)

sports car road racing

1.David Brabham
2. Geoff Brabham

Rallying

1. Neal Bates
2. Greg Carr

other Aussies may have other ideas but I reckon thats not far from it..allthough another oval racer is needed in openwheels...

great topic should have some good responses

[KC]

My American team would consist of:

Open Wheel Road Course Racers:
1. Dan Gurney
2. Phil Hill

Open Wheel Oval Racers:
1. Rick Mears
2. A.J. Foyt

Open Wheel Dirt Oval Racers
1. Steve Kinser
2. Sammy Swindell

Stock Car Oval Racing
1. Dale Earnhardt Sr.
2. Mark Martin

Sports Car Road Racing
1. Parnelli Jones
2. Carroll Shelby

Rally racing
1. John Buffum
2. Dan Sprongl

[Heeltoe6]

1) Open Wheel Road Course Racing
Mario Andretti
Al Unser Jr.

2) Open Wheel Oval Racing
AJ Foyt
Rick Mears

3) Stock Car Oval Racing
Tim Richmond
David Pearson

4) Sports Car Road Racing (this is a dream team here, would falt out dominate):
Mark Donohue
Tommy Kendall

5) Rally Racing (select up to two drivers)
Hmm, kinda ignorant on this one, don't know of any American drivers in int'l rally, and not up to speed on SCCA rallying

[Joe Fan]

Team USA

Open Wheel Road Course Racing
1) Dan Gurney
2) Masten Gregory

Open Wheel Oval Racing
1) A.J. Foyt
2) Mario Andretti

Open Wheel Dirt Oval Racing
1) Steve Kinser
2) Sammy Swindell

Stock Car Oval Racing
1) Richard Petty
2) David Pearson

Sports Car Road Racing
1) Phil Hill
2) Mark Donahue

Rally Racing
1) Curtis Turner (NASCAR driver)
2) Ivan Stewart



[This message has been edited by Joe Fan (edited 25 May 2000).]

[KC]

Everyone has great picks so far. Awesome drivers in chosen field.

[Crash Test]

I can see so many possibilities with the olympic flame...

Oh well, my team Oz.

1) Open Wheel Road Course Racing
Jack Brabham
I really dont know...a skinny, non whinging Alan Jones?
2) Open Wheel Oval Racing
What about Geoff Brbaham?
??
3) Stock Car Oval Racing
Jim Richards
Kim Jane
4) Sports Car Road Racing
Mark Webber
David Brabham
5) Rally Racing
Neil Bates
Hmmm
How about tin top circuit racers? They exist ya'll know?
Peter Brock
Hmmmm, Dick Johnson, Moffat?

Could have picked Richards and Geoff Brabham in more than one class...

[Gerard]

The Netherlands doesn't have so many great racing drivers and we can't compete in every categorie, but here goes:

Open Wheel Road Course Racing:
Jos Verstappen
Tom Coronel

Open Wheel Oval Racing:
Arie Luyendyk
---

Stock Car Oval Racing:
---
---

Sports Car Road Racing:
Jan Lammers
Gijs van Lennep

Rally Racing:
Maus Gatsonides
Jan van de Marel

[This message has been edited by Gerard (edited 27 May 2000).]

[Lee]

1. Open-wheel road-racing

No intrest, no idea, have not, and do not follow it.

2. Open-wheel oval track

a. A.J. Foyt
b. Johnny Rutherford
(two names I remember hearing while growing up, saw them race in stock cars.)

3. Stock car ovals, is there anything other than stock cars on ovals (except for one or two rare departures, which I wish they would dump, and add a couple of dirt tracks)? Stock cars are oval track animals.

cannot name the two best, amoung those I'd consider, Richard Petty, David Pearson, Ned Jarrett, Junior Johnson, many more, both present day and past, but can't honestly pick any two.

4. Sports car road racing, like stock cars in above pick, do they race on anything other than road courses? Sports cars are road-racing animals.

same answer as for question number one.

5. Rally racing.

No idea how to even answer that one.

These are about the only picks that I can make . Sorry. Everyone have a good evening, or maybe I should say morning or day, for some of you, different time zones an all.

[John B]

Open wheel road: Gurney & Mario

Open wheel oval: Mears & Foyt

Rally: Choinere & Buffum

NASCAR: Pearson and Earnhardt

Sports cars: Holbert and Donahue

[Hyacinth]

More for Team USA -

Open Wheel Road Course - Mario Andretti and Dan Gurney

Open Wheel Ovals - Rick Mears and Al Unser Sr.

Stock Cars - Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt

Sports Cars - Mark Donohue and Peter Gregg

Rally (and Off-Road) - John Buffam and Walker Evans

[Joe Fan]

Hyacinth, Walker Evans is a great choice too and someone I forgot about.

The reason why I picked NASCAR Curtis Turner as a Rally driver is that he is supposedly internationally known to be the "master of the dirt track power slide." He was an original stock car driver. A moonshine runner in the 1940's who ran moonshine sorties at night (travelling at speeds of up to 120mph on dirt and gravel roads). He was so good that he never had a police record (unlike Junior Johnson) because the police were never able to catch him.

On another Non-Nascar forum a while back, I insulted some poster's intelligence for placing Turner "a NASCAR moonshine runner" who raced almost exclusively on ovals, on a list as one of the 100 greatest drivers of the century right next to many of the greats of F1. Then just a month ago I was reading a book and found this information. Turner and Bill France Sr. ran in the La Carrera Panamerica (the Mexican Road Race) in the early 1950's. This was a grueling 1000+ mile road race on some of the toughest terrain and conditions known to man. Even though they were disqualified late into the race for illegally switching to another car when the first one had problems, Turner's driving style was the talk of the race.

[Hyacinth]

Joe Fan-

Speaking of the Carrera, what's Herschel McGriff (sp?) been doing lately? I remember him running in a few of the Cup races on the West Coast a few years ago, but haven't heard his name mentioned lately. Didn't he drive a Lincoln in the original Carrera races?

[Lee]

Joe Fan,
While it is true that Junior Johnson did have a "police record" He was never caught while driving. He was caught at the still while the car was being loaded for a run. Like Turner, they could not catch him on the road. Turner, in that respect, was just a little luckier than Junior. Source, the man himself, Junior and my dad are friends.

[Crash Test]

Well Lee, are you sure you can say that then?

[TimD]

I just realised there are no British entries for the Motorsport Olympics.

This will never do, old boy.

Especially as before World War II, we had an oval superspeedway, and the drivers who took their chances on it were gods in their day, and will show a clean pair of wheels to all comers.

Open Wheel Road Racing
1 Graham Hill
2 Jackie Stewart

Open Wheel Oval Racing
1 Sir Henry "Tim" Birkin
2 John Cobb

Stock Car Oval Racing
1 Barry Lee
2 Derek Fiske

Sports car Road Racing
1 Stirling Moss
2 Derek Bell

Rallying
1 Roger Clark
2 Colin McRae

I appreciate that the British definition of Stock Cars is more akin to the US midgets or outlaws, but we have no NASCAR equivalent - yet. Besides, Lee and Fiske could be lightning quick whatever machine they were given.

[Lee]

Crash Test,
Yes, I can. There was a big deal about Junior a few years ago. They did kind of a documentery on his racing career. Several newspapers did articles on him, and also its been stated in several books. All said the same thing, the only reason they caught him was because he was at the still. A couple of intresting stories about Turner. He at one time or another, worked for both sides. Ran "shine" and tried to catch others that ran it. Also, at a race at the old Lakewood Fairgrounds in Atlanta, (where I happened to see my first race at the age of 6) Turner was running in a race and some federal agents showed up. They were there to arrest him for hauling moonshine. They didn't want him to get the idea that something was up, so they decided to let the race finish, and make a "quiet" arrest after the race. Turner was leading, somehow his crew chief got word to him that the feds were waiting for him. Well, Turner took the checkered flag and started his victory lap. Half way down the backstretch, which ran next to Lakewood Freeway, Turner crashed through the guardrail and was gone! They never caught him. Lakewood Speedway (1 mile dirt track at the old Southeastern Fairgrounds) was one of the original NASCAR tracks. The last race was run there in 1959. The next year, NASCAR racing moved to the newly completed Atlanta International (now Atlanta Motor) Speedway. They tried to revive the track for late model racing during the 70s, but it was unsuccessful. The track, and fairgrounds were used at the start and finish of the movie Smokey and the Bandit, and at the start of Smokey and the Bandit II.