When Jaguar conquered NASCAR
A Jaguar win in NASCAR’S premier division? Yes, it really happened – 65 years ago
The circuit comprising the runways and taxiways of Linden Airport, a few miles southwest of Manhattan and just off the New Jersey Turnpike, was flat. But – in NASCAR terms at least – it was far from featureless: one of its turns was right-handed. Its International 100 of 13 June 1954 – midpoint of the 37-round Grand National Series – broke new ground, therefore, and so provided a slew of firsts, as well as lasts. And not just for Jaguar.
‘Big Bill’ France’s racing empire was in its seventh year and threatened on its borders by the seaboards’ thriving sportscar scenes. Not yet sure of defeating them, he invited them instead.
This wasn’t the first time that ‘foreign jobs’ had gone wingto-fender with NASCAR’S Detroit heavy iron. The grid for the International 200 of June 1953 had been dotted with Jags – Toronto’s Lloyd Shaw put his XK120 on pole (a NASCAR premier division first and so far last for a Canadian driver) – and also included Porsches, an Aston Martin and even a Beetle. But that race had been at Pennsylvania’s Langhorne, a rough, tough, oiled-dirt oval – and 200 passes through its notorious Puke Hollow left the imported exotica feeling somewhat sick. Dick Rathmann’s somewhat sturdier Hudson shot into the lead from the outside of the front row and was never challenged, winning by four laps; the best Jaguar was sixth; the best Porsche eighth.
The switch to Linden – NASCAR’S first road course, where ‘four on the floor’ was of benefit rather than an extravagance – had been predicted to even things up second time around: 21 interlopers – 13 Jaguars, five MGS and one apiece of Austin-healey, Morgan and Porsche – were ranged against 22 regulars. The sportscar brigade received a shock, however, when Buck Baker’s Oldsmobile – on pole at 80.54mph – and Herb Thomas, reigning champion in Smokey Yunick’s ‘Fabulous Hudson Hornet’, locked out the front row.
Seventh on the grid was the red-and-white XK120 Fixed Head Coupe entered by Paul Whiteman – a famous pre-war bandleader recently reinvented as TV host of the Goodyear Revue – and driven by Florida-based journeyman Alvah ‘Al’ Keller. Born in Alexander,
New York, on 11 April 1920, Keller had migrated south in 1948 and mechanicked at a speedshop while earning a reputation aboard Midgets and Modifieds. His distinctly non-pc nickname – especially for a deputy sheriff! – was said to be indicative of his native lineage, fiery temper and the lengths that he was willing to go to: ‘The Dirty Indian’.
Single-seaters were his preference, but he had dabbled in NASCAR since 1949, and landed a full–time seat in George
Miller’s Hudson for 1954. Regularly at the sharp end in qualifying, he had won at Savannah’s Oglethorpe Speedway and finished second at Langhorne and Wilson, North Carolina. But Linden offered him an opportunity that he was very keen to take.
Baker and Thomas disputed the early lead of this 50-lapper, and were joined by the XK120 of Hershel Mcgriff, winner of the inaugural Carrera Panamericana of 1950 – and still racing, at 90, as of 2018. “The Jaguars that Keller and I drove were actually owned by Bill France,” says Mcgriff. “We didn’t have much practice and for some reason they didn’t handle well, didn’t fit that track well.
“I was surprised by how well the stock cars handled it. I was pretty good on road courses – I won that Carrera, 2135miles, by 76 seconds when I was just 22 – and had been racing since
“WE DIDN’T HAVE MUCH PRACTICE AND THEY DIDN’T HANDLE WELL, DIDN’T FIT THAT TRACK WELL”
I was 17. But guys like Baker and Thomas were quick on dirt, and if you are quick on dirt you can handle anything.”
Mcgriff came off worst from an unequal tangle with Baker – and eventually crashed out on lap 37 – and Thomas was able to edge away. Keller, however, was coming on strongly, having nursed brakes and tyres. He took the lead around mid-distance – Thomas would fade to seventh – and held it to the end, averaging 77.57mph to win by a half-mile from Joe Eubanks’ Hudson. Baker, brakes faded, was a lapped third, and Jaguars finished fourth through sixth: Bill Claren, Bob Grossman and Harry Lavois.
This remains the only NASCAR Grand National win for a foreign-built car – despite the best efforts of a couple of Citroens, a Renault and a Goliath(!) at Riverside in June 1958, plus those of several MGS, Healeys and Sprites in the annual invitational at Bowman Gray Stadium, Winston-salem, from 1960-63.
Keller’s victory made him the first NASCAR driver to win on an oval and a road course in the same season. It earned him $1000 – plus a shot at his dream. He immediately announced his retirement from stockers – though he would contest four more Grand National races in a self-prepared Chevy in 1956
– and embarked on a rocky road to the Brickyard. He obtained just a single Champ Car ride in the remainder of the season but was not easily deterred and would be big news at the
Indy 500 of 1955 – for all the wrong reasons.
Having qualified Sam Traylor’s Kurtis-offenhauser 22nd, he was running conservatively at quarter-distance when runaway leader Bill Vukovich, gunning for a hat-trick, loomed in his mirrors, for a second time. Suddenly Rodger Ward’s Kuzma suffered a broken axle exiting Turn 2 and crashed. Keller swerved and braked – a handbrake to the rears – when faced by a stationary car, and slid towards the abutment of the golf course’s bridge. Snapping the other way, he punted Johnny
Boyd into poor Vukovich’s path: a deadly sequence that shocked a motorsporting community soon to suffer the ‘Le Mans Disaster’.
Keller, who lost a thumb to the Langhorne crash that curtailed his 1955 season in June, renewed his association with Traylor for 1956 and was denied a victory at Atlanta in July by a signalling error that caused him to wave Eddie Sachs through to victory. (Some reports have the race running a lap longer than it ought.) Opportunity missed, driver and car owner parted company before the year’s end.
There would be very slim pickings thereafter. Keller started