Fittipaldi’s Indycar stuns Sywell

PENSKE PC23

Although traditionally focused on drag-racing, muscle cars and glorious howling grids of classic GP motorcycles, the undoubted star of this year’s Sywell Classic was a very different piece of Americana – albeit one that originally hailed from Poole in Dorset.

‘It’s just come out of a four-year restoration,’ said Patrick Morris, son of Ilmor founder Paul, whose firm originally built the engine of his Penske PC23 Indycar.

‘It had been used as a static show car for many years before we got it,’ Patrick continued. ‘Emerson Fittipaldi raced it in the 1994 CART series – winning the Phoenix Grand Prix – before Penske sold the car to Gary Bettenhausen, who last raced it in 1996.

‘When we found it, it had three millimetres of paint on it after multiple resprays in different promotional liveries – and the bodywork was full of water and the suspension corroded after being left outside. We had to source or remanufacture several parts including a new rear wing, which was done by the man who made them when new. We sourced a new engine through Ilmor.

‘It only has three test miles on it – this will actually be the first time I’ve driven it properly. Unfortunately there are no series in which to race it in the UK, but I’m hoping to take it to the Monterey Motorsports Reunion or – maybe – the Goodwood Festival of Speed.’

LOLA T760

‘They only made one, and this is it!’ said Martyn Dodd of his Lola Formula Atlantic car. ‘It was built for Irish racer Alo Lawler to drive in the 1979 Aurora series. He did quite well, winning his first race at Mallory Park and taking a podium finish at Thruxton, before going to race in Formula Two. Oddly, it’s never had a livery, even though Lawler had a major sponsor – Hitachi – at the time.

‘The T760 was Lola’s first attempt at a groundeffect car. It ran with side-skirts in period, and under the sidepods the floor slopes upwards aft of the radiators. I’ve no idea why Lola only built one. Lola would develop a tub for multiple uses, but all the cars related to this one were F3s and had different number designations. Ground effect was banned after Gilles Villeneuve was killed.

‘The car ended up as a series of boxes of bits, which I found eight years ago. The restoration was completed three years ago. All the body panels are original apart from the rear wing, which I had to get remade through Lola Heritage.’