Yesterday's Amtrak crash in North Carolina north of Rocky Mount and south of Roanoke Rapids was on the old Seaboard track that used to carry the famed "Race Train" from Washington to Rockingham and which I rode several times from Richmond.
Paul won the first superspeedway race I attended - at Rockingham in March 1966 - the first, last, and only Peach Blossom 500. Of course, Richard sat out with his hand injury from touch football.
Guessing that Scott Baker purchased this issue of Sports Illustrated while TMC Chase walked right past the airport news stand looking the other way, lol!
I was at this event but have absolutely no recollection of the race. I see that our local Richmond driver, Sonny Hutchins, who raced modifieds for Junie Donlavey, made one of his eight 1969 GN starts for Junie in this race.
Everyone in my Richmond racing group displayed a huge grimace when David left the Cotton Owens Dodge for Holman-Moody.
Did you ever imagine Ken Squier & Mike Joy announcing a Superbike race? In 1990, Ralph Sanchez staged the Motorcycle Grand Prix of Miami and got CBS to broadcast it, with, of course, Dave DeSpain as the resident expert.
The clip is well worth the watch just to see the explanation of 1990 motorcycle safety gear:
I first met Homestead track builder, Ralph Sanchez when he was promoting his second Grand Prix of Miami IMSA sports car weekend at the Bayfront Park city street course in February 1984.
I would much rather have been in Richmond that same weekend to see Ricky Rudd score his first win for Bud Moore, but we were debuting the new 7-Eleven Zakspeed/Roush #7 Ford Probe Mustang at the February 26, 1984 Miami race.
It was an interesting weekend. Our brand new hotel right at the park course had already fallen into bankruptcy before opening and had no food service. We were also warned not to venture more than two blocks from the hotel on foot after dark.
Of course, we ignored the warning and the first night had about ten years scared off our lives when a drunk stumbled right out of a dark alleyway right into me. I was sure I was getting mugged, but the fellow could hardly stand up.
I'm sure Perry knows broadcaster, Paul Page from his many trips to Indy. Well, Ford's motorsports marketing department hired him, funded by me, to produce a documentary about the 7-Eleven Ford Probe Mustang debut. A flat fee was negotiated for Page. After the race, I got bills from the hotel where the weasel had charged his room and all expenses to me. He was never used again and every single time I see him I say the word W-E-A-S-E-L out loud.
Sanchez's Miami Bayfront Park course was a pretty little place, but the race course was too narrow to pass. For 1986 the event was moved to Centennial Park. The best thing about being in Miami vs. Richmond on that February date was the temperature difference.
In this 6 minute clip showing the race start, you can see how the 7-Eleven Zakspeed/Roush Ford Probe Mustang, starting on the front row and co-driven by Klaus Ludwig and Bobby Rahal, was painted in the exact same scheme as the Kyle Petty 7-Eleven stock cars for 1984 and 1985.
The race had some real heavy hitters, including Emerson Fittapaldi, AJ Foyt, and Doc Bundy, as well as two of the Whittington brothers before the dirt hit the fan and uncovered the IMSA Camel GT drug smuggling scandal they were involved in along with the father/son duo of John Paul, Sr. and John Paul, Jr.
Here's the link to the 6 minute YouTube Video from the 1984 Miami Grand Prix:
Ralph Sanchez, a Cuban-born businessman who brought auto racing to the streets of Miami in the 1980s and later built a major speedway in a city devastated by Hurricane Andrew, died on Monday at his home in Coral Gables, Fla. He was 64.
His death, after a series of illnesses, was confirmed by officials of the track he founded, Homestead-Miami Speedway.
In 1983, Mr. Sanchez, a real estate developer who had done some racing himself, decided that Miami, particularly its Latin American immigrants, would be receptive to an international sports car race. He persuaded city officials to let him organize the Grand Prix of Miami, which sent high-powered Porsches, Jaguars and Corvettes screaming along Biscayne Boulevard and other public streets.
Mr. Sanchez was forced to relocate the race several times, and eventually began a frustrating search for a permanent home for his racing events. That changed after Hurricane Andrew struck Homestead, near the Florida Keys, in 1992, destroying 47,000 homes about 90 percent of its housing and 8,000 businesses.
The city, which the Cleveland Indians had abandoned as a spring training site because of the hurricane, welcomed the speedway project. And the proximity of what was then Homestead Air Force Base meant that complaints about racecar noise would be negligible.
Ground was broken for the 65,000-seat Homestead-Miami Speedway a year after the hurricane, and the track opened in November 1995 with a successful Nascar race. Soon it was a site for IndyCar races and sports car events. With its tropical pastel colors, a row of palms along the backstretch, and amenities not seen at most automobile racetracks (like tile in the restrooms), the track was a showpiece in itself.
Today it hosts more than 280 events a year, including concerts. Nascar ends its season there in November with a weekend of races that can determine as many as three champions.
Although Mr. Sanchez and his investor partners provided the impetus to build the track, the facility is municipally owned. Mr. Sanchez owned a share of the land as well as the lease. He sold his interest to two publicly traded companies in the track-owning business in the late 1990s. One of them, International Speedway Corporation, controlled by the France family, which runs Nascar, is now the tracks sole operator.
As a child, Mr. Sanchez came to the United States alone as part of the Operation Pedro Pan airlift, in which more than 14,000 unaccompanied children, some as young as 6, were flown out of Cuba from December 1960 to October 1962 after the countrys Communist takeover. In the United States, he spent time in an orphanage until his parents arrived and were reunited with him.
He is survived by his wife, Lourdes; a son, Rafael; and a daughter, Patricia Sanchez Abril.
The track was not Mr. Sanchezs only major contribution to auto racing. Believing that he needed a marquee driver to help promote one of his first races, he persuaded Emerson Fittipaldi, a former world champion from Brazil, to come out of retirement.
Mr. Fittipaldi had quit racing in disgust after trying unsuccessfully to run his own Formula One team, but the Grand Prix of Miami rekindled his interest in racing in the United States. He went on to win the Indianapolis 500 in 1989 and 1993.
All of us long winded RR folk ought to be safe!
They sure can bite, Johnny!
Perry, I had to laugh seeing the Homestead / Miami-Dade photos. The inaugural NASCAR race there in 1995, a Busch Series event, was an absolute disaster. The hotels and motels gouged the fans and teams with unreasonable rates and length of stay provisions AND a number of teams and photographers had their rooms buglarized and cameras and other equipment stolen. NASCAR threatened not to hold any more events and the local Chamber was devastated after what they'd endured with Hurricane Andrew and the closing of the Air Force Base.
At the time I was working at the Richmond track as Media Relations Director and we had the reputation of the best organized group of "Fan Friendly" Hotels/Motels on the circuit.
The Homestead track had been built by the late Ralph Sanchez and I had worked with him back in 1984-1986 when we were sponsoring multiple 7-Eleven cars at his Miami IMSA city circuit course races.
Sanchez contacted me in Richmond and asked if I'd address the hotel / motel operators at a Chamber of Commerce meeting. NASCAR actually bought my plane ticket and the Chamber of Commerce paid for my lodgings and meals. I met some really nice folks and the hotel / motel bunch seemed receptive to change. I do remember losing my prescription sunglasses when they fell out of my blazer pocket at the Miami Airport. I retraced my steps to no avail. They were gone for good. Welcome to Miami!
While I was there, Billy told Sanchez he'd never do a sanction for a Cup race until the turns, built for Indy car racing, were reconfigured with some banking, which Sanchez agreed to do. That's now been about 20 years ago, but seems like yesterday. I never did find the proper name for the little black biting bugs infesting my room at the Hampton Inn in Homestead!
