Some old Reno pics

[BellCobraIV]

Damn, I keep getting distracted by Bearcat photos. Sorry...

Neal,
quite alright! I don't tire of looking at Bearcat pictures...any of them really. I just came up with a picture this last week of Walt Ohlrich in Tonapah Queen Lyle shot from the Cockpit of Tonapah Miss on their way from Tonapah to Reno.


Also came across the actual signed Artwork for the Bear on the tail in all of it's variations from Bill Lardner ("Brush") the artist.


John

[wingman]

I loved the Bear on the tail. Do you have any artwork with blue trim on the Mustang?

[BellCobraIV]

I loved the Bear on the tail. Do you have any artwork with blue trim on the Mustang?

Neal,

See that is why it so interesting to swap stories with you....You know so much of the backstories. 99.9% of the people just think that is a Mustang the Bear is crushing, Never having been privvy to the stupid rule that John Crocker proposed over the phone to Lyle regarding formation flying and being able to demonstrate XX.XX hours of formation training in order to be able to start in an air race. Lyle was fuming when he came back to the hangar. Bill Lardner (Brush) was sitting there and cartooned up a Bear crushing the Mustang with Crocker's blue stripe on it. Lyle looked at that the drawing and said Make the numbers smaller and put that Bear on the tail! I'm gonna crush that guy! When the paint job came to being finished Greg Shaw who loved Crocker's airplane because Greg had shared a conceptual model of the airplane with Kenny Bernstine at the Skytrails restaurant before the airplane was actually built Refused to let Brush paint the Blue Stripe on the airplane.

Sometime in the last five years I have seen the original artwork with the blue stripe. LOL good o you for remembering that!

[Sparrow]

Somewhere in one of the books I have, there is a pic of the Bear with that 3 blader under race power. There was a stripe on the airplane which began on the cowling and ran down the sides which was displaced the full width of the stripe. The stripe appeared to be a couple inches wide....little bit of torque there---- Way back when one was allowed to stand on the ramp leaning up against the fuel truck during the races, when that Bear Cat came down the deadline runway and was running good and right, the ground beneath your feet would shake. The concussion/shock waves off that thing was something else...

[Sparrow]

Hey Neal--- What year were the races in MooseJaw?? Have any pics from there?

[wingman]

Hey Neal--- What year were the races in MooseJaw?? Have any pics from there?

It was 1984, and it was flat. That's why Skip won -- there were no landmarks and nobody could consistently find the pylons out there, and Skip ended up with the fewest pylon cuts.

I have lots of photos, but right now I want to continue to look at the 1970s...

[wingman]

So this was my first Unlimited pylon photo -- the beginning of the first race I ever did from a pylon. This is when I discovered that Pylon 1 was not necessarily the best place to do starts from. I was quite green at this point -- knew nobody except Tegler and I had only spoken on the phone with him before arriving at Stead. I didn't know anybody in the press corps to ask anything -- it really was winging it.

Half the racers here are running serious Zeuschel racing engines. It's interesting that the bottom airplane years later proudly carried the Race number of the rearmost airplane here, and the pilot of the former later did quite well in the latter.






Here is the second Friday heat race. It looks like I figured out that Pylon 2 might work better. This was Darryl's first race in the RB-51. Again half the visible racers are powered by Zeuschel.

[wingman]

And this is the start of the Championship Race on Sunday. Clay Klabo at airline altitude (he is the only airline pilot here). Clay was actually the top qualifier. Bottom left is Mac McClain, next to Cliff Cummins in Miss Candace and Don Whittington in the lovely Precious Metal. The Red Baron is probably out of the frame to the left, and Putman and Lefty to the right.







There were seven Racers in the 1977 Championship Race. Five of the top six were powered by Zeuschel engines. The three fastest were over 424 mph. The Red Baron set a new race record speed. All five of the Zeuschel engines ran over 380 mph. This was a really fast race by 1970s standards.

It seems incredible that one shop could do this many engines (plus spares) of this caliber in a year. How many people worked for Zeuschel Racing Engines during this period -- say 1975 to 1980? Did Dave give all 5 teams personal support during the race week? Did he ever get accused of favouritism or conflict of interest?

[Jan]

A clean Mustang with Jim Larsen mods... Had a Hovey motor... Borrowed a Zeuschel spinner.

[Jan]

"Half the racers here are running serious Zeuschel racing engines. It's interesting that the bottom airplane years later proudly carried the Race number of the rearmost airplane here, and the pilot of the former later did quite well in the latter."

McClain went from "Escape I" to "Jeannie" two years later.

[BellCobraIV]

It seems incredible that one shop could do this many engines (plus spares) of this caliber in a year. How many people worked for Zeuschel Racing Engines during this period -- say 1975 to 1980? Did Dave give all 5 teams personal support during the race week? Did he ever get accused of favouritism or conflict of interest?

As incredible as it seems, perhaps the rearview mirror of history will make things clearer...As explained to me by several of the main characters each with his own slant, which I will filter.

Dave had an innovative and quite successful drag racing career as a West Coast racer. However it was a "Z" motor with Frank Cannon in a Woody Gilmore chassis in December of 1964 that the first backed up 1/4 mile pass to break the 200 MPH barrier occurred. (Note there are East Coast guys that previously "claimed" the time slip, however the timing units that were used are highly in doubt.)
Dave had built Merlins for Bob Nordskogg in Unlimited Hydroplane racing. Dave went on one of the first drag racing tours with his Cadillac and TV. Tommy Ivo all over the country. So Dave had the reputation to attract talent. Randy Scoville and Mike Nixon both worked for "Z" at the beginning of this time frame.

So the talent in the shop (and the egos) was very high. They could each handle their own projects and Dave could feel free to go out and get new work. So they had the ability to do the work and get the work. Mike Nixon would ultimately be given the opportunity by Don Whittington to leave and start his own shop out at Chino after a Zeuschel motor in the ME-109 had metal in the screens on the way to Reno. Randy Scoville would later take over the Griffon project on the Red Baron and Dave continued on. I think that Ricky was coming in the door around the time a lot of this was going on.

Hope that offered you answers.

[BellCobraIV]

A clean Mustang with Jim Larsen mods... Had a Hovey motor... Borrowed a Zeuschel spinner.

Jan,
NO doubt that Jim Larsen did the actual design of the modifications that ultimately turned into multiple clones of Foxy Lady. Greg Shaw had a very detailed 1/24 scale model that he shared with Kenny at the Sky trails restaurant before Reno in 1973. That model was surprising similar to Larsen's ultimate airplane. Rooster or the egg, or just natural progression.

I still have two of the Hebrew Hornets from the tail that never got used. As the Planes of Fame Museum gets closer to opening in their new location I've decided to donate a good deal of the "Treasures" in the chest to their air racing section.

[BellCobraIV]

Somewhere in one of the books I have, there is a pic of the Bear with that 3 blader under race power. There was a stripe on the airplane which began on the cowling and ran down the sides which was displaced the full width of the stripe. The stripe appeared to be a couple inches wide....little bit of torque there---- Way back when one was allowed to stand on the ramp leaning up against the fuel truck during the races, when that Bear Cat came down the deadline runway and was running good and right, the ground beneath your feet would shake. The concussion/shock waves off that thing was something else...

The rotary offset at full tilt was around 1 3/4" so pretty close. An experience I had was when we did a test flight profile with the 3 blade where Lyle was to make a pass down the runway with the Nitrous on at about 300' above the ground level. I was quite used to the Nitrous Oxide passes from the 3KM run standing at the end of the runway with a radio reminding Lyle, Nitrous on, Nitrous off, to preserve as much Nitrous as possible. This was in preparation for the case of another airplane beating the 3KM and us having to re-establish the record. Standing on the end of the runway with the Bear at speed with the 3 blade, it literally sucked the air out of my lungs. It was such a high. Impossible to really describe, maybe the same as swimming with Great White Sharks in a giant seal suit.

[wingman]

I quite agree with Greg Shaw about the blue stripe. This airplane was beautiful.

[wingman]

Mac McClain -- Reno 1980