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Baja Bobsled Team
I already have one vintage Raceco and thus I needed a second one like I need a gun shot wound. I was working hard to get my OTHER car: a two-seat, mid-80's Raceco rebuilt to fit into the Challenger class for NORRA 2018. Progress on the two seater continues and Jamie Campbell at Raceco-USA is doing much of the heavy lifting. Lots of effort is going into making the two seater into a reliable, comfortable and safe peninsula runner. A link to that build is here... Rock'n Raceco Redux
So with all kinds of effort going on my other car, Jamie called and said some dude from Ohio contacted him claiming to own the Raceco that Mickey Thompson and Terry Smith drove to the overall car/truck victory at the 1982 Baja 1000. Yeah right! This was Mickey's only Baja 1000 win and some say his greatest victory. The car, a single seat Raceco was supposedly lost. So somebody claiming to have it seemed like a big, steaming pile of horse 'output.' But I got the guys number and we started communicating. The guy was adamant that 'this' was the car, but I wasn't convinced and more importantly most people don't need one vintage off road race car, and certainly I didn't need two. Strike two was the guy and the car were in Ohio. Strike three was that he was 'proud of it' price wise. Ok...I am out.
But somehow I was intrigued. If in fact this was the actual car, it would be a great find and this might be the first Raceco ever built. So I started doing research, which led me to a bunch of really great people.
The guy from Ohio bought the car from a woman that he worked with at Ohio University. She inherited the car from her brother, Bob Crawford after he died in Idaho and she brought this car and bunch of other stuff back to Ohio where it sat. I have paperwork on the car with Bob Crawford's name on it. So that is the 'back to Bob Crawford' part of my investigation. So I called Greg at Fat who supposedly use to own it after Jack Motley. He confirmed that he did and helped me a lot. He pretty much confirmed that it was the car and said it ended up being owned by a guy named Bob Crawford from Idaho. He suggested I contact Dave at Kartek who use to drive the car after him. Dave said the same thing and gave me more confidence that it was in fact Mickey's winner. Dave had me call Hank at Youth Theory and this was amazing. Hank not only prepped the car, but he actually helped build it. He confirmed a lot of stuff.
Ohio guy bought the car from Bob Crawford's sister eight years ago and put a type 1 in it (it was raced with a type iv at the '82 B1K) and painted it white and green. I think he raced it once at an east coast short course race, but other than that it just sat. The car had been modified some over the years but not destroyed. The four original Bilstein shocks per corner in the rear, were removed and replaced with a single Fox plus a secondary torsion suspension controlled with a single Bilstein. The front now only has one Bilstein per corner where it once had two. The original fuel cell was removed and replaced with a short course 14 gallon aluminum 'tank' (no bladder). But other than that and some other minor stuff, the car it pretty much intact.
I really, really didn't want to buy the car. But Ohio guy was persistent and the price went from stupid to merely crazy. I still didn't bite. Ohio guy saw the Beer Hauler and how I brought that old girl back from the dead and now he really wanted me to buy it. He really felt an obligation to get Mickey's winner into the hands of a person who would appreciate it and bring it back to life. But, I REALLY didn't want a second vintage, off road, race car despite the cool history. But we continued to talk.
I told him I wasn't interested in the 2180cc-ish type 1 which threw him off as he was proud of it, along with the lime green fan shroud. I investigated what it would cost for me to drive to Ohio and drive it back. Ok...that is a chit ton of gas/money when getting 10 mpg. So I looked at transport companies. This might work, but I told Ohio guy that the transport cost was coming out of the price. Ohio guy, was getting grumpy but I really didn't want to buy the car. Sooooo....he called with a last ditch price, bottom dollar, not going any lower. I said, he should sell it to someone else. He wasn't happy and claimed that he would just 'cut it up.' I was horrified, but not also not into extortion. Cut away. He kept calling and claimed I wanted this 'famous car for free.' Finally he asked what I would pay for it and I told him. I didn't hear from him for a while but he agreed and he said he was happy it was going back home. So after five weeks of waiting for the stupid transport company to get their chit together, it finally showed. Actually I feel really good with what I bought. I am going to 'restore' this car myself, in my shop and it will be a long slow process. If you are interested...follow along.
Prologue:
Mickey tried desperately to win the Baja 1000 in a car of his own design for nearly a decade, but he supposedly 'over drove' his cars a broke before victory. The 1982 deal was a last minute, and a year after he 'retired' from Baja racing where he agreed to drive someone else's car. Here is a quick synopsis from the FB vintage page....
"Here is a shot of Mickey Thompson next to the Jack Motley Raceco at the 1982 Baja 1000. Mickey was suppose to race with Jack but turns out Jack had some business that week so he had a last minute substitution with Terry Smith. It was so last minute that Mickey and Terry never got a chance to meet up in Ensenada to hammer down the details of the driver swap but both knew it would be somewhere near El Arco. Mickey started and had a VERY eventful first half including a great race with Larry Ragland and then drowning out the electrical in a water hole in Gonzaga Bay, which he had the great idea of drying out the ignition spraying fuel on it and lighting it on fire.....which it DID! He then jumped in and got up to 100mph as fast as he could to put out the flames....which it did.
In El Arco, Mickey's wife Trudy ran into Terry just in time to hear MT screaming down the course to them. Terry got in, took off, MT and Trudy jumped in the chase truck to follow only to have the chase truck break down. MT would get it going again and pull into La Paz to find out they had won OVERALL at the greatest off road race in the world! Sal Fish said MT must have worn that race suit for 2 days after the race he wasso proud!"
More to come!
So with all kinds of effort going on my other car, Jamie called and said some dude from Ohio contacted him claiming to own the Raceco that Mickey Thompson and Terry Smith drove to the overall car/truck victory at the 1982 Baja 1000. Yeah right! This was Mickey's only Baja 1000 win and some say his greatest victory. The car, a single seat Raceco was supposedly lost. So somebody claiming to have it seemed like a big, steaming pile of horse 'output.' But I got the guys number and we started communicating. The guy was adamant that 'this' was the car, but I wasn't convinced and more importantly most people don't need one vintage off road race car, and certainly I didn't need two. Strike two was the guy and the car were in Ohio. Strike three was that he was 'proud of it' price wise. Ok...I am out.
But somehow I was intrigued. If in fact this was the actual car, it would be a great find and this might be the first Raceco ever built. So I started doing research, which led me to a bunch of really great people.
The guy from Ohio bought the car from a woman that he worked with at Ohio University. She inherited the car from her brother, Bob Crawford after he died in Idaho and she brought this car and bunch of other stuff back to Ohio where it sat. I have paperwork on the car with Bob Crawford's name on it. So that is the 'back to Bob Crawford' part of my investigation. So I called Greg at Fat who supposedly use to own it after Jack Motley. He confirmed that he did and helped me a lot. He pretty much confirmed that it was the car and said it ended up being owned by a guy named Bob Crawford from Idaho. He suggested I contact Dave at Kartek who use to drive the car after him. Dave said the same thing and gave me more confidence that it was in fact Mickey's winner. Dave had me call Hank at Youth Theory and this was amazing. Hank not only prepped the car, but he actually helped build it. He confirmed a lot of stuff.
Ohio guy bought the car from Bob Crawford's sister eight years ago and put a type 1 in it (it was raced with a type iv at the '82 B1K) and painted it white and green. I think he raced it once at an east coast short course race, but other than that it just sat. The car had been modified some over the years but not destroyed. The four original Bilstein shocks per corner in the rear, were removed and replaced with a single Fox plus a secondary torsion suspension controlled with a single Bilstein. The front now only has one Bilstein per corner where it once had two. The original fuel cell was removed and replaced with a short course 14 gallon aluminum 'tank' (no bladder). But other than that and some other minor stuff, the car it pretty much intact.
I really, really didn't want to buy the car. But Ohio guy was persistent and the price went from stupid to merely crazy. I still didn't bite. Ohio guy saw the Beer Hauler and how I brought that old girl back from the dead and now he really wanted me to buy it. He really felt an obligation to get Mickey's winner into the hands of a person who would appreciate it and bring it back to life. But, I REALLY didn't want a second vintage, off road, race car despite the cool history. But we continued to talk.
I told him I wasn't interested in the 2180cc-ish type 1 which threw him off as he was proud of it, along with the lime green fan shroud. I investigated what it would cost for me to drive to Ohio and drive it back. Ok...that is a chit ton of gas/money when getting 10 mpg. So I looked at transport companies. This might work, but I told Ohio guy that the transport cost was coming out of the price. Ohio guy, was getting grumpy but I really didn't want to buy the car. Sooooo....he called with a last ditch price, bottom dollar, not going any lower. I said, he should sell it to someone else. He wasn't happy and claimed that he would just 'cut it up.' I was horrified, but not also not into extortion. Cut away. He kept calling and claimed I wanted this 'famous car for free.' Finally he asked what I would pay for it and I told him. I didn't hear from him for a while but he agreed and he said he was happy it was going back home. So after five weeks of waiting for the stupid transport company to get their chit together, it finally showed. Actually I feel really good with what I bought. I am going to 'restore' this car myself, in my shop and it will be a long slow process. If you are interested...follow along.
Prologue:
Mickey tried desperately to win the Baja 1000 in a car of his own design for nearly a decade, but he supposedly 'over drove' his cars a broke before victory. The 1982 deal was a last minute, and a year after he 'retired' from Baja racing where he agreed to drive someone else's car. Here is a quick synopsis from the FB vintage page....
"Here is a shot of Mickey Thompson next to the Jack Motley Raceco at the 1982 Baja 1000. Mickey was suppose to race with Jack but turns out Jack had some business that week so he had a last minute substitution with Terry Smith. It was so last minute that Mickey and Terry never got a chance to meet up in Ensenada to hammer down the details of the driver swap but both knew it would be somewhere near El Arco. Mickey started and had a VERY eventful first half including a great race with Larry Ragland and then drowning out the electrical in a water hole in Gonzaga Bay, which he had the great idea of drying out the ignition spraying fuel on it and lighting it on fire.....which it DID! He then jumped in and got up to 100mph as fast as he could to put out the flames....which it did.
In El Arco, Mickey's wife Trudy ran into Terry just in time to hear MT screaming down the course to them. Terry got in, took off, MT and Trudy jumped in the chase truck to follow only to have the chase truck break down. MT would get it going again and pull into La Paz to find out they had won OVERALL at the greatest off road race in the world! Sal Fish said MT must have worn that race suit for 2 days after the race he wasso proud!"
More to come!
