By now everyone should be familiar with YouTube as a source for long-lost films from the old days, and these two new links take you back in time to a position trackside at two of America’s favorite racing grounds, Watkins Glen (not Kent, Washington as suggested) and Riverside.
The first clip, from 1962, takes you to upstate New York to stand just up from The Esses and watch strings of Chaparral, Cobra, Corvette, Lotus, Porsche, Cooper, Genie and Marcos machinery fly by. Then a helicopter arrives and gives our intrepid camera operator a lift, but the overhead footage is both bumpy and brief. What one does see is that there was a distinct lack of “runoff” areas in those days, an indication drivers were actually expected to stay on the road.
The second clip is a Dick Wallen film from Riverside 1964 capturing the USRRC rounds for manufacturers and drivers. In the first part we see Ken Miles and the Shelby American Cobra squad at their best, although the film also includes some spins and wrecks—and even some saves. Don’t be fooled by the false ending in the middle, as footage of Parnelli Jones taking one of Carroll Shelby’s King Cobras to victory in the drivers race over a star-studded field led by Bruce McLaren in a McLaren M1A follows. Not to be missed.
