What Race Cars Would You Include On Your Fantasy Starting Grid?

A couple of weeks ago, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway photographed perhaps the most impressive starting grid in the history of auto racing. Arrayed along the Brickyard were 33 Indy 500-winning race cars. Most came from the Speedway’s own Hall of Fame Museum, though the grid was filled with a few privately owned cars, including one from The Henry Ford.

Seeing photographs and video of those cars got me to thinking: What race cars would I include on the grid for my personal fantasy race?

By the way, on my fantasy track, I’m not restricted to any one aspect of auto racing. I can mix and match at will to my personal whim.

Thus my grid includes Bruce McLaren’s butterscotch-colored Can-Am car from the late 1960s along side the midget raced a few years earlier by Henry Pens, whose name probably means nothing to you but who was one of my first racing heroes, and then a friend who, sadly, also became a murder victim.

Also on my grid would be the USAC sprint car driven by Sam Sessions, and one of the Archer Brothers’ SCCA sport truck Jeeps – in which they introduced the concept of bump drafting.

Speaking of drafting, I’d have a Woods Brothers’ Purolator-liveried NASCAR stock car, Jody Scheckter’s Formula 5000 racer, and a couple of STP-sponsored cars – the Brawner/Hawk that Mario Andretti drove to victory at Indy in 1969 and the Pat Patrick-owned Wildcat in which Gordon Johncock beat Rick Mears in 1982 in one of the most exciting finishes ever at Indy.

I’d have a Bud Moore Mustang Trans-Am car, the Ford Thunderbird owned by Harry Melling and raced to an historic million-dollar bonus by Bill Elliott, one of Jim Hall’s high-winged Chaparrals, several Le Mans winners – including one of Tom Walkinshaw’s Silk Cut Jaguars -- the turbocharged Peugeot 405 that won the race to the top of Pikes Peak, and one of those AA/Gas dragsters I used to enjoy at Martin Dragway.

I’d save some room for such historic cars such as Henry Ford’s Sweepstakes and those amazing Mercedes and Auto Union racers from the 1930s.

There would be more, but that’s enough for the moment. Now, what I’d like is for you to take a moment and share your fantasy grid with the rest of us.

Read more from Larry Edsall at iZoom

Photo Credit: Jay Vonbouloir