Ford GT European Road Trip -- LOndon to Maranello and Back


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autotronic

Member
Jun 18, 2007
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Ford GT European Road Trip -- London to Maranello and Back

Back in the summer of 2005, through a very chance set of circumstances, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to drive a Ford GT (and a Dodge Viper) from London to Maranello and back, stopping along the way at the Nürburgring and Le Mans. Different versions of the feature appeared in many magazines around the world and I've finally had a chance to update it a bit and post it on my website Automotive Traveler. I hope that some of you will take a look and let me know what you think, especially if you have never seen it previously.

Richard Truesdell
Editorial Director, Automotive Traveler

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Wow! Cool trip!
 
Come over here and drive in the Western US in a FGT from LA > San Francisco > Nevada > Utah > Colorado > Montana would be worth an article also!
 
I'd love to, just need to convince my friend Dennis Keck to let me do it in his FGT. There's no more FGTs in Ford's West Coast press fleet.

Rich
 
We can beat on Dennis for you, but his yellow GT is like a family member, so cranking on 2000 miles may not be on his schedule in the near future. There are some Sandy Point, Idaho FGT members, would be an excellent place to run the Western US roads in. Maybe they will see this thread.

I am trying to get DKeck to commit to our So Cal FGT rally on May 16th out to the So Cal deserts. I think he will cave and make the run.
 
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Fond Memories

What a great story. Dreams of a lifetime --and they came true.


Richard mentioned meeting Christophe Swartz and his effort to "open the doors" to the Bugatti race course. I first met Christophe at the 2006 24 Hours of Daytona. He attended the race with a friend of mine, Dick Peirson, who originally raced the "Oly Charger" as they say, In the day. I traveled to Le Mans for the Classic race this last summer. Crhisophe arranged for our Team Seattle race group to two entries. And coordinated our team renting a 1963 bb Corvette and a 2 liter Chevron and the requisite crew,etc.

BTW Dick and Christophe shared driving that same car in the 2006 and 2007 Le Mans Classic races. Last years race ended about 2 a.m. when the front drive shaft U-joint yoke broke. Tough to find a Nascar drive shaft at 2 a.m. in Le Mans, France. We found another Dodge Charger in town, woke up the cars owner, and he let us borrow his drive shaft. But it didn't quite fit. Day ended right then ---that's racing.

Christophe is truly gentleman, nice guy, very good racer and is well connected with the ACO, the sporting club that owns the Le Mans race track. He is very active in the Vintage American Muscle Car Road racing series. Which is kind of the European version of the Trans Am series. He normally races his Mustang. But his friend just bought the 1963-1/2 Holman-Moody 427 c.i.Ford that raced in the Le Mans 24 40+ years ago. And Christophe occasionally races it too.

It is pretty special to be able to drive both of the only two American Sedans that raced at Le Mans.
 
Will print out your web postings and look forward to reading.

We attempted last year to organize a trip and LeMans and it failed. Something I would still like to do next year for the Classic.
 
Great article - nice to see the Hotel de France featured with the GT, I came very close to buying that hotel and also went down there in my GT...
 
Neilda said:
Great article - nice to see the Hotel de France featured with the GT, I came very close to buying that hotel and also went down there in my GT...
Click to expand...

Neil, you need to tell me more about your attempt to buy the Hotel de France. Must be a great story. Even if you post here E-mail me direct too.

One of the coolest things I did on the trip was at the hotel. Christophe and I were thumbing through some of the albums when I saw a photo of Phil Hill's 1964 Ford GT parked in front of the hotel. I excused myself, went outside, moved the new Ford GT from the little lot in front of the hotel, and parked it in exactly the same spot in front of the hotel, two Ford GTs, same spot, 41 years apart. Both photos are in the blog.

The other cool part of the hotel, which you probably know, is that John Wyer used the hotel as a base of operations, going back to his Aston Martin days I'm told. The garage out in back is full of Ford GT memorabilia, including part of the nose cone that I was told was from Jackie Ickx's GT40. I'll paste in the image below. Maybe you know the story in more detail.

Richard Truesdell
Editorial Director, [URL="http://automotivetraveler.com/jump/214"]Automotive Traveler[/URL]

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Jackie Ickx, wow, people forget that he won the last Le Mans, 1969, I believe a Belgium, in Wyer GT40.

Icyk at a Deutsch Win

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and Dennis Hulme and Bruce McLaren in Gulf racing suits.

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Hi Richard....

Not too much of a story really (and not for publication) - I had a DBR2 (1959 Le Mans winner) and a Ford GT (Le Mans winner), so I was tempted to have the hotel too! It seemed a good idea at the time. :biggrin

The hotel was available (family moving on), and I along with a Le Mans 24 hour winner (he won several times, but I shan't say who) formed a group to buy it. Another of the group was involved in the filming of the Steve McQueen film 'Le Mans' and there was some memorabilia from that available - so it was a very enthusiastic little group of people - only 5 of us.

It would have been a hobby investment - ensuring that the hotel remained true to its history and some fun for my many motoring friends. I had planned to offer half price deals to any Ford GT owners (for example)! We would have kept prices low, but pushed quality up, so it was a probably loss - but that wasn't too important.

However some of the consortium got cold (legal) feet and the deal withered. Probably a good thing ultimately - but it was an exciting project whilst it lasted.
 
Thanks for sharing. Great story. Also, your side story Neil was also interesting.:cheers:cheers
 
Neil is always interesting especially the local camaraderie in Mayfair, Londontown
 
Ahhh - the "Bruce & Denny Show." They brought many thrills to a considerable number of people and fans during the CAN-AM days of the '60's and early '70's.

:cheers
 
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