Bob Tullius in the Group 44 Jaguar V12 XKE at the June 1976 SCCA National Championship Races at Summit Point Raceway in West Virginia. In 1975 Tullius had won 12 of 17 races in SCCA B Production and the national championship in this car. Tullius is legendary as a driver, race team owner and motorsports marketing innovator for Triumph, British Leyland and Jaguar. He ran one of the most successful road racing teams from the 1960s through the ’80s. During his Group 44 Inc.’s 25-year run, they celebrated nearly 300 overall victories while competing in three of the toughest road racing series in America: SCCA Club Racing, IMSA GTP endurance events and SCCA Trans-Am pro contests.
Alain de Cadenet, who found success as a sports car racer and went on to fame as a television host in several series about great old race cars, has passed away at 77 on July 2, 2022, of cancer in California. Here de Cadenet is in his British Post Office sponsored Mirage GR7 Ford in the May 27,1978 Can-Am race held at Charlotte Motor Speedway the day before the NASCAR World 600. He would finish 10th in the race. That weekend he let me take a photo of NASCAR star Cale Yarborough sitting in his car wearing a cowboy hat which ran in Autoweek.
Tim Richmond in the uphill Esses at Watkins Glen driving the S&M Electric Lightning/Offy at the CART Kent Oil 150 in August 1979. This was Richmond's second Indy Car start of the nine he would run before switching to Winston Cup in 1980. His eighth-place finish was his best in Indy Car races, one above the ninth place in the 1980 Indianapolis 500 where he was named Rookie of the Year. "I busted up a few Indy cars right after that," he said. "Milwaukee, Mid-Ohio, at Michigan I cut one in two. I was afraid my racing career would come to a halt. So, when I got an offer to drive stock cars, I took it, and it turned out I liked driving them better."
