Page 93 - Yanks reviews

Porsche Road & Race, June 22, 2020 / page 12
one of his cars that was the first to drop out. Hershel McGriff’s Dodge lasted barely two laps before pulling off the Mulsanne – again, a holed piston. Gregg’s co-driver Redman lasted scarcely longer in the turbo BMW, but dueled spectacularly for third place before trailing ominous blue smoke on the second lap. Redman was in the next time around, with a major oil leak.
“They had put one of the damaged engines back in for the race,” Brian Redman recalled, “and Neerpasch said, ‘Brian, I vish you to start ze race and drive as fast as possible. It vill not last.’ It didn’t.”
Peter Gregg did get some laps in, but clearly, the engine problem was terminal and the car was retired officially in the fourth hour.
Greenwood and Keyser went at it hammer and tongs early on, giving no quarter to the prototypes, and each in turn running as high as sixth overall.
“John went out fast,” Burt Greenwood remembered, “faster than the pace we discussed. He was hounding Derek Bell in the Mirage. After two laps, he dropped to a suitable race pace.” At that point, Keyser went by in the Monza.
Darniche, red helmet, still in shock from his high-speed blowout and violent spins. “I remember, I was flat out and suddenly felt something wrong at the back. The car immediately spun and spun – several times, 360 degrees, without hitting anything before it stopped! I guess I lost consciousness because I woke up on a stretcher. I must have gotten back in the car, but I don’t even remember driving it back to the pits!” – Bernard Darniche LAT
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1976 E Twice Around the Clock
The Yanks at Le Mans E 1976
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1978
As of 1977, American drivers and teams were once again back in the game at Le Mans. In the year that followed, the French classic and the Nürburgring 1000K and longer IMSA races were made part of a new FIA World Challenge for Endurance Drivers Championship, so even more Yanks were participating in and gaining experience at the top level of sports car racing. Eighteen Americans, the most in a decade and twelve of them first-timers, would contest the 1978 24 Hours of Le Mans. The U.S. contingent was both strong and interesting.
Once again driving for Porsche would be ‘77 winner Hurley Haywood, this year teamed with Peter Gregg and Reinhold Joest in one of the Group 6 cars from the previous year. Two newer, slightly more powerful 936/78s would be driven by Jacky Ickx, Henri Pescarolo and Jochen Mass, and Jürgen Barth and Bob Wollek. As before, Porsche would face a determined effort from Renault, humbled by consecutive defeats in 1976 and ‘77 and this year fielding four up-rated Group 6 cars. Back for his tenth Le Mans was Sam Posey, again paired with Michel Leclère in one of Harley Cluxton’s Group 6 Mirage- Renaults, the other being driven by Vern Schuppan and French F1 hotshoe Jacques Laffite. The new M9 Mirage had a narrower cockpit for improved aero, and of course, the turbocharged V6 Renault engine.
“With Renault power, it should have been a good car,” Posey remembered, “but it wasn’t.”
Nagging problems with the Motorola-supplied electrics (they were a sponsor) and Renault gearbox would allow only one car to make it to the finish, and that, only after more than four hours in the pits. Posey did briefly get in that car, but even after stopping for a seat adjustment, was so uncomfortable he completed only nine laps. Sadly, what would turn out to be Sam Posey’s last Le Mans was another frustrating experience with the Mirage.
RIGHT: In the back room of the Martini-sponsored Porsche
team garage, mechanics work on the No. 7 936 to be driven by 1977-winner Haywood, Peter Gregg and Reinhold Joest.
THE KLEMANTASKI COLLECTION
PREVIOUS TWO PAGES: Peter Gregg, teamed with his protégé and frequent co-driver Hurley Haywood and Reinhold Joest, would take this year-old works-entered Porsche 936/77 to third place in 1978. THE KLEMANTASKI COLLECTION
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