At the conclusion of the first-annual Sonoma Historic Motorsports Festival, organizer General Racing, Ltd. announced that McLaren will be the event’s featured marque for the event’s second edition in 2011. The legendary name has graced the halls of motorsports since its famed founder Bruce McLaren of New Zealand founded the McLaren racing team in 1963.
To Finish First: My Years Inside Formula One, Can-Am & Indy 500
By Phil Kerr
Published by Random House New Zealand
My lifelong passion for motor racing started in North Branford, Connecticut when I was ten. It was the early sixties, when auto racing meant hot rods, drag racing, and the Indianapolis 500. Our neighbour’s teenage son, Freddie, was converting a 1934 Ford Pickup Truck into a hot rod, complete with chopped and channeled body and flat head V8 engine. I spent countless hours in the car while Freddie worked, reading his collection of Hot Rod Magazines, inadvertently expanding my rural Connecticut world.
Early in the sixties, Ford Motor Company became involved in motor racing at multiple levels. Ford partnered with Lotus and invaded the Indianapolis Speedway. The company’s activities were well covered in Hot Rod magazine, and I spent Memorial Day listening to the Indy 500 on the radio. As Ford’s activities expanded into sports prototype racing, my world expanded too, and I soon became aware of places like Sebring, Nurbürgring, and Le Mans.
