It was a dreamy step started by California British Chrispoke and started with a deviant sequence of dreams, starting from the pits after the pack of Formula 5000 cars came to life around 1:15pm on Friday, September 26, 1975, as they erupted from the pits and embarked on an 80-second, 90-mile route on the streets of Downtown Long Beach.
These 302cu.in Chevy (and a few poor) groans rattled the glass of pawn shops and (somewhat disguised) porn shops, and by the end of Sunday, the main claims of fame were holding 40 years old Ocean Liners, and the brand’s brand Airla Liners also had self-racing. According to the media, this noisy faction was not under McDonnell Douglas’ flight, and not under McDonnell Douglas’ flight. And this was just a curtain raster. In six months, the same temporary track will host the third round of the 1976 Formula 1 World Championship.
Pook moved to Southern California in 1963 and by ’73 he became an on-flight travel agency along with accounts for the San Diego Chargers, California (now LA) Angels, Oakland Athletics and the LA Sharks Sports franchise. And when he landed the Long Beach Convention and Visitors Bureau (LBCVB) account, he quickly learned that the city needed a significant boost.
“Long Beach was in trouble in the late ’60s and early ’70s,” Pook says. (On top of that). “We lost our oil revenues so we decided to become a destination for tourists and conventions. The problem was that there were no decent high quality hotels. There was a motel for the navy and the shipbuilding boys, and that was the case.
“I told the guys at LBCVB, ‘It’s going to take years to establish this as an exhibition or a convention area. You’re a hidden destination.’ They agreed, asked what they could do, and I said, ‘You need to do something outrageous for Monte Carlo to compete with Nice and Cannes. They came up with the Monaco Grand Prix. And other than that, that’s the outcome of the race.”
If that was a wild idea, then Pook was also a realist. To get people vaguely interested, they need support from people with credibility and status to listen to skeptics. There he approached Dan Gurney, but recently retired from the team’s ownership driving and neck depth, overseeing engineering in his All-American Racer outfit. Pook could not pick a better number. Of course, the adventurous Dan was intrigued by the idea of SoCal Street Race.
The chapter in Gurney’s yet-unreleased autobiography, The Passion of Adry Days, is written as his wife Evi and is dedicated to the Grand Prix of Long Beach’s origins. The late legend says, “It’s bold, dangerous, it’s probably never going to happen, but I like it, I love it so much. Let’s go to the full steam, like in the pioneer era!”
He continued: “I sought legal opinions from lawyers… They outlined the pros and cons and wrote a letter that concluded with the statement, “I cannot consider all the facts and recommend your involvement.” Evi reminded me over the years that I tore it apart after reading this letter to her in my office…while lamenting the lack of courage, vision and pioneering spirit of our nation.
“For me, racing through the city wasn’t the crazy idea that some people characterized it, but it was precise and innovative that rocked the establishment of racing fans around the world and captured the imagination.
Gurney was so enthusiastic that at his first meeting with the LBCVB he designed the course.
Gurney writes: “It was very important in my view to make Ocean Boulevard, considering the city layout. It’s a long main straight on the circuit. It also descents the track through two short sections of the uphill Linden and Pine Street. Memories as an unforgettable experience.”
Gurney recruited former Rams linebacker Les Richter, who ran Riverside International Raceway since 1959, providing advice and driving force when working on city councillors who were initially among skeptics. However, Pook began to believe that an event would happen when Gurney was equipped with Tom Binford.
“Tom was the chairman of Accus,” Pook says. “And they were liaisons between the FIA and the US racing scene. He came here with Dr. Nino Bacchiagaruppi, the operational director of Monza and the safety committee’s operations director. When we were excited, the project really gained momentum. The people on the right by our side.”
One of those hurdles was that the new F1 truck had to be at least 2.5 miles long, and the Long Beach layout at Gurney’s Long Beach was 2.02 miles long, but Monaco was also over 2 miles long, so we cooled down potential hot potatoes.
Also, the new tracks on the F1 calendar had to prove they could be run by running another professional race beforehand. Again, there’s no problem. Both SCCA and USAC are supportive and their headline act, the F5000, proves ideal as a headliner in ’75. Then, in the second half of 74, Gurney passed the decibel test by driving one of the F5000 Eagles on a closed coastline drive. Everything is good.
The pieces I needed looked like I was clicking. Even if his relationship with Richter deteriorated and he quit his role as race director, Gurney managed to replace him with the 1961 F1 World Champion and three-time Le Mans winner Phil Hill!
“That being said, I was honest and went until around July 1975 when the Coastal Commission was allowed to advance the race,” Pook said. This is why, in the last few months before the first race, the Grand Prix Association of Long Beach was still rushing to get everything ready. But gradually and/or suddenly, the grandstands, concrete blocks, catch fences and tire walls were installed. A little over three hours after the schedule, Gurney’s gorgeous Jorgensen Eagle Vernschuppan got the F5000 field back on track for practice that historic Friday afternoon.
On Saturday, Mario Andretti took the pole before Bell’s Panelli Jones teammate Al Ansser, and Theodore Race put Tony Brise third ahead of Jackie Oliver and Tom Price’s Shadow Dodge. Given that 44 cars came in, a heat race was needed to determine the 28 starters for Sunday’s main event. In Heat 1, Brides’ Laura led home Andretti’s similar car and Price, while Unzer led Brian Redman’s Carl Haaslan Rola and Hogan Racing duo Jodie Schector and David Hobbs in Heat 2.
The next day, Gurney, Phil Hill, Graham Hill and Bob Bondant Randant ran a demonstration lap at Toyota Seikas before serious business began. Al Unser, Andretti and Brise all led the F5000 race, but each fell on the roadside and opened the door for Redman to win 30 minutes from Schuppan.
Meanwhile, Puk was able to sigh in Relief. Long Beach’s first Grand Prix was in the book, but he learned a few lessons. The most important of them is, “I never ran such an event from my radio! In general, it’s not a headache-causing race.
In that case, Pook gave him some more headaches as the “area things” were decorated and decorated the following March. He had to make a big first impression at the Formula 1 Circus. On a Tuesday before the first US Grand Prix West (to distinguish it from Watkins Glenn’s US Grand Prix), the car was parked on Pine Avenue like a competition display, accompanied by the public interacting with the car and team members posing with its drivers. We came over the weekend and there were Parastist, Drag Boat Display, Toyota Celebrity Race, Motorcycle Stamp Team, and Flypast. And the historic Formula One race featured Juan Manuel Fungio, Gurney, Sir Sterling Moss, Sir Jack Brabham, Phil Hill, Denny Halm, Richie Ginther, Innes Ireland, Rene Dreyfuss and Carol Shelby. Dan won with BRM.
It was hardly a problem after such a weekend that Clay Regazzoni’s Ferrari put everyone in and dominated the headline F1 race and led home defending world champion Niki Lauda in Ferrari 1-2. Early on in the event, the vision and sound of the powerful open-wheel race cars that showed the streets of Los Angeles County’s slightly tattered port city may have still seemed incongruous, but it was spectacular.
And by then – in fact, after the 1975 F5000 race, Pook had a Bernie Ecclestone signing contract in his pocket for at least three editions of the US Grand Prix West. In 1977, the first year of the event was sponsored by Toyota, with Mario Andretti won, and in Pook’s words, “the event took away its own life.”
There has been a change in the circuit layout. There was a switch from F1 to Cart Indy Cars, then a switch from Cart/Champion’s car to Indycar. Former CFO Jim Michael took over from Pook as CEO of GPALB. Toyota retreated more than 40 years later and was replaced by Acura. And in 2020, we saw sabbaticals implemented for the event due to restrictions around the Covid-19 pandemic. But half a century after the first edition, Long Beach’s Grand Prix remains the largest and largest street race in North America.
As a gurney (On top of that) In 2016, he wrote: “It’s a great pleasure to hear many young people say they’ve become obsessed with motor racing for Long Beach. Now looking out the window from the Hyatt Hotel, the changing scenery of the city, skyscrapers and aquariums, the white sails of the marina have appeared in Minna. Taker.”
And we are still grateful.
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