Canadian Bill Brack was running a Lotus 41 in 1968, as well as the “Hot Wheels” Mini Cooper, and I acted as his sponsor-hunter and team manager. The toy company Hot Wheels was our sponsor. We did displays introducing the new products all across Canada, in fact we basically introduced the Hot Wheels line of miniature cars in Canada. All we had was a couple of college students working for us and a station wagon. The college students would set up the Hot Wheels display. None of this would have happened without the support of the then-president of Mattel who was an English guy and a car nut. There were Hot Wheels contests where we would set up ramps and have races toward a championship. After all these events, we declared a champion and had the champion come to the Canadian F1 GP at St. Jovite, courtesy of Mattel and Bill’s Lotus Canada operation and dealership, Sports Cars Unlimited, to meet the winner’s heroes.
Phil Lamont
