HAJEK MOTORSPORTS MUSEUM OF NASCAR AND DRAG RACING HISTORY

Posted on May 14, 2025May 14, 2025 by MartynL

Some of the most significant competition cars have been carefully preserved and are on display in the HAJEK MOTORSPORTS MUSEUM OF NASCAR AND DRAG RACING HISTORY in Ames, OK. When I was writing FORD TOTAL PERFORMANCE in 2015 for Motorbooks, I had the pleasure of communicating with consummate carguy, Brent Hajek. There were several drag racing cars, as well as at least one land speed record Bonneville Mustang, that I was featuring, and needed some background and timeline information. These we...

CHEVY 427 MARK II MYSTERY MOTOR

Posted on October 20, 2024October 20, 2024 by MartynL

Unlike the Z11, the CHEVY 427 MARK II MYSTERY MOTOR was not available in a car, or to the public. You had to have serious NASCAR cred to get one of the 20 built. In the 1960s, Semon “Bunkie” Knudsen always seemed to be one step ahead of GM Chairman Fred Donner’s anti-racing missives. While running Pontiac, he had supported the Super-Duty Group that later, after he left, managed to get 421 Catalina Lightweights to drag racers before the axe fell. Then he moved on to Chevrolet in 1961 and...

PONTIAC TEMPEST MONTE CARLO

Posted on April 13, 2023April 13, 2023 by MartynL

Built on a shortened prototype ’62 Pontiac Tempest convertible, the PONTIAC TEMPEST MONTE CARLO was a hit at auto shows and major road racing events. It shared the spotlight with GM design chief, William Mitchell’s Corvair Sebring Spyder. One thing was a given at GM in the 1960s. Chevy’s Corvette was a sacred cow and no other division could bring a two-seat sports car to market. The only way Buick, Pontiac, Oldsmobile or Cadillac could reveal branded two-seat, high-performance sporty ve...

ICONIC CORVETTE RACECARS

Posted on October 5, 2022 by MartynL

Hagerty’s Cameron Neveu blogs about eight ICONIC CORVETTE RACECARS you should know, including Zora-Arkus Duntov’s legendary ’63 Grand Sports, above. In celebration of our first drive review of the rip-roaring new Corvette Z06, we got to cooking on a list of the coolest - and most unique - Corvettes to ever cross a finish line. After all, the package began as a low-profile effort to put competition parts in the hands of SCCA’s A-Production racers. This was back in the 1960s when GM elected to...

MARK II – CHEVY’S MYSTERIOUS 427!

Posted on January 4, 2019 by MartynL

The real 427 Mystery Motor, unlike the Z11, was not available in a car or to the public. You had to have serious NASCAR cred to get one of the 20 built. In the 1960s, Semon “Bunkie” Knudsen always seemed to be one step ahead of GM Chairman Fred Donner’s missives disallowing factory involvement in racing. While running Pontiac, Knudsen had supported the Super-Duty Group that, after he left, managed to get 421 Catalina Lightweights to drag racers before the axe fell. In 1961 he moved on to Chevro...

PONTIAC FLASHBACK: TEMPEST MONTE CARLO!

Posted on September 18, 2018 by MartynL

Built on a shortened ’62 Pontiac Tempest convertible, the Monte Carlo was a hit at auto shows and major road racing events. It shared the spotlight with GM design chief, William Mitchell’s Corvair Sebring Spyder show car. One thing was a given at GM in the 1960s: Chevy’s Corvette was a sacred cow and no other division could bring a two-seat sports car to market. The only way Buick, Pontiac, Oldsmobile or Cadillac could reveal branded two-seat, high-performance sporty vehicles was to have Mitche...

’63 PONTIAC SD-421: SWISS CHEESE LITE!

Posted on June 27, 2017 by MartynL

Production of lightweight ’63 Super-Duty Pontiacs was extremely limited, but high-profile racer Mickey Thompson got the first two. One of those featured here is in the Factory Lightweight Collection. Roger Huntington writing in Hi-Performance CARS is often credited with first using “Swiss Cheese” to describe lightened Super-Duty Pontiacs. It came to him after he counted 120 holes drilled in the perimeter frame of Royal Pontiac’s Catalina, driven by Jim Wangers. A total of 18 aluminum body parts...