7/30/2019 1976 German Grand Prix -- Niki Lauda injury

1/4

AUTOWEEKVOLUME 26

In one hand was a wet, cool, red garagerag, the one he had carried with himthroughout the third annualPurolator500NASCAR Winston Cup Grand Nationalrace. In the other was a tall, icy soft-drinkcup of Maalox. he smiled easily as he metthe press as a winner for the first timesince late February way down in theSandhills of North Carolina.Petty was the most surprised person atPIR when the checkered flag fell on him atthe end of the 500-mile race. With a shadeover five miles to go David Pearson had aseemingly safe 1.1 second lead in hi sPurolator No. 21Mercury out of the Woodbrothers magic shop in the hills ofVirginia. Buddy Baker was set for a goodthird-place run and Benny Parsons waslocked into fourth.Then, as has happened to Petty so manyContinued On Page 20

Ford AnnouncesNew VariableCarburetor

Ford Motor Company ha s announcedthat it is working on a new variableventuri carburetor for use on it s 2.8-literV6 and 302cid V8 engines.The new carburetor, said to be"a com-pletely new concept as far as Americancars are concerned," is a Ford conceptthat will be targeted for use only inCalifornia for the time being, and only onengines coupled to automatic trans-missions.The main feature, said a Ford spokes-man, is that the new carburetor signifi-cantly improves drivability because itallows better atomization of the ai r andfuel mixture and because it providesbetter fuel metering accuracy than moststandard carburetors can.Though the new Ford carburetor is saidto be similar in conceptto the well-knownSU , a carburetor of British make that ha sbeen used on legions of imported carsover the years, there is no real functionalsimilarity, according to a Ford spokes-man. The Ford unit uses a pair of squareventuris, a sliding vane and no chokeplate. The sliding vane acts as he fuel/ ai rmetering mechanism and also as thechoke plate. The new carburetor will beused on cars for the 1977model year.

"And they're off in a cloud of dust-" The phrase fits the start of the Purolator 50 0 rather well, as DavidPearson, le" ~ n dale Yarborough jump out to the front of the pack. Norman bu s t

LATE NEWSBob Tullius is in the midst of tests with hi s Jaguar XJS race carand if those tests ar e successful,he plans to run the car for the firsttime at Brairrerd August 7 and 8.The United Rubber Workers' strike continues (see news story)and while supplies of street tires ar e becoming tight, a spokesmanfor one of the struck firms says, "nobody's out of tires yet. Thingsaren't so rosy on the racing tire front,however, with some types oftires, sprint ca r tires for instance, becoming downright hard tofind.A1Holbert ha s entered the August 15Camel GT race atPoconoin hi s Monza, passing up the conflicting Brainerd TransAm date.His TurboCarrera will remain vacant for the race.After nine of 15races, two of IMSA's Camel GTmanufacturers

Continued On Page 3

in a high-speed crash in the GermanGrand Prix August 1, still was listed a sbeing in critical condition a t presstime.Doctors said that the way his bodyresponds to treatment in the next 10 dayswiIl determine whether or not Lauda willsurvive.Lauda's most serious injury appears tobe a pair of badly seared lungs frominhaling flame and hot gasses. He alsosuffered major burns to the top and rightside of hi s head, a broken collarbone andtwo broken ribs. Lauda was on a resusita-tor al l day Aug. 2 but was taken off themachine Aug. 3. He is awake at intervalsand is lucid; although he is unable tospeak, he can communicate by noddinghi s head.the circuit, the officials after dithering awhile had declared it an officially "WetRace." All around him on the grid driversswapped to rain tires, but Jochen, sittingon the fifth row, decided to gamble on aspreading patch of blue sk y to windward.

i Alone of the 26 starters. he staved with-S1g:gas fourth into the' first comer and

mc~iiren'saresr rormula une m a c ~ i n eS dubbea m e mrb. In e car weights in at IJUU IDS.

New McLaren F-l RacerCOLNBROOK, England-McLarenRacing has introduced it s McLaren M26,the car that will replace the M23 FormulaOne machine.The new car, shown to the press incompletedform for the first time July 19,uses a sophisticated aircraft-like mono-coque sandwich chassis, ha s considera-

bly less frontal area than the M23 and is

said to be lighter, weighing in at 1300 lbs.The minimum weight in Formula One is1265 lbs .One of the points being specificallytouted by McLaren is hat the ca r is said tocarry substantially improved driver pro-tection. The forward part of the cockpit,for instance, carries an additional mono-Continued On Page 3

third out of it. He fell back a few places inthe next few miles, and at Breitscheid hewas fifth and at the Karrussel he wassixth. But as the pack wound it s way onaround the Eiffel mountains, up to theContinued On Page 8I ANNIVERSARY MGB AWARDED IThe one-millionth Abingdon-built car, a green MGB, grandprize in he Bi-Centennial Rally of the 13 Colonial Capitals, was

won by Brad Wladis and George Cookson,drivinga 1949 MGTC.2nd in heevent, sponsored by Br~tish eylandandorganizedbythe MGTRegister. were Dave Rothand Len Renkenberger na 53MG TO. 3rd were Lou Zuger and Al Moss in a '49 TC.Road Atlanta, July 18GP 1st Ransom Meade SpitfireHP 1st Ray Stone SpriteFP 1st Jack May SpitfireBS 1st Rick Cline TR VitesseGrattan. Mich. Aug. 1stEP 1st Terry Jesk MGBFP 1st Ed Amonsen SpitfireMid-America, Aug. 1stDP 2nd Dennis Wilson TR6FP 1st Bob Hubbard MG MidgetGP 1st Chris Strong SpitfireHP 1st Max Herrera SpriteCS 1st John Ericson Mini

CONGRATULATIONSBRITISH LEYLAND COMPETITION DEPARTMENTA

7/30/2019 1976 German Grand Prix -- Niki Lauda injury

2/4

PAGE 8 AUTOWEEK AUGUST 7, 1976More On:German GPContinued From Pag e 1Karrussel and down to the Schwal-benschwanz, the other 25 runne rs had toface the fact that the track was more drythan it was wet. Even at the pits it hadstopped sprinkling, the track was dry ingout rapidly, and the mechanics weregetting into wheel changing order. Thefirst few cars screamed up the r ise out ofthe piergarten and went straight intotheir pits.Of the leaders, only Ronnie Petersonhung onto his knobbies, and he lead Mass

GRAND PRlX OF GERMANY. FORMULA ONE DRIVINGCHAMPIONSHIP. A DENAU.CERM ANY, NURBURGR ING. AUGUST 1,1976. ENTRY 8 QUALIFYING1-James Hunt. McLaren-Ford M23.7:06 .5: 2 -Niki Lauda, Ferrari312 T2.7:07.4; 3-Patrick Depail ler, Elf-Tyrrell P34,7:08.8 : 4-HansStuck, March. 7:09.1; 5-Clay R egazzoni, Ferrari 312 T2.7:09.3: 6-Jacques bffite. Ligier-Matra. 7:11.13: 7-Carlos Pace. Brabham-Alfa Romeo. 7:12.0: 8-Jody Scheckter. Elf-Tyrrell . 7:12.2; 9-Jochen Mass. Mclaren-Ford. 7:13.0: 10-Carlos Reutemann.7:14.9; 11-Ronnie Peterson. March-Ford. 7:14.9: 12-MarioAndretti . JPS-Ford. 7:15.1; 13-Vittorio Brambilla. March-Ford.7:17.7: 14-Alan Jones. Surtees-Ford. 7:19.9: 15-Rolf Stommelen,Martini-Brabham, 7:21.6: 1 6-Gunnar Nilsson, JPS-Ford. 7:23.0:17-Chris Amon. Ensign. 7:23.1: 18-Tom P ryce. Shadow-Ford,7:23.3: 1 9-John Watson. Penske-Ford, 7:23.5: 20-EmersonFittipaldi. Copersucar FD04.7:28.0: 21-Arturo Merzdrio. Will iams-Ford. 7:28.8: 22-Harald Ertl . Hesketh. 7:30.0: 23-John-PierreJarier. Shadow-Ford. 7:30.9: 24-Brett Lunger. Surtees. 7:32.7: 2 5-Guy Edwards. Hesketh-Ford, 7:38.6: 26-A.P. Rossi, Elf-Tyrre11007.7r48.5: 27-(Reserve) Henri Pescarolo. Surtees TS19. 8104.2.RESULTS1-Hunt. 14 laps in 1:14.42.7 for an average speed of117.112mph: 2-Scheckter. 14; 3-Mass. 14: 4-Pace. 14: 5-Nilsson.14: 6-Stommelen. 14: 7-Watson. 14: 8-Pryce. 1 4: 9-Regazzoni. 14:10-Jones. 14: 11-Jarier, 14: 12-Andretti . 14: 13-Fittipaldi. 14. 14-Rossi. 13: 15-Edwards. 13.DNF: 16-Merzario. 3. no brakes: 17-Brambilla. 0. crashed: 18-Depail ler. 0, crash with Regazzoni: 19-Reuttemann. 0, enginefailure: 20-Peterson. 0, crash.DNS: 21-Lauda. 0, crash: 22-Lunger. 0, crash; 23-E rtl , 0. crash:24-Stuck. 0. clutch failure: 25-Laffite, 0, gearbox failure: 26-Amon, 0. driver withdrew; Henri Pescarolo and Lella Lombardi. 0.Both R.A.M. c an were impounded by the police upon courtinjunction awarded to driver Loris Kessel-alleged breach ofcontract.

Number two Ferrari driver Clay Regazzoni tel ls a group of European journal ists what i t 's l ike out there.

PRACTICE AND QUALIFYINGF5000 SPEEDSTER 80 Miles

on around the South and North curves and

I 1 A & B Sports - 0 Miles Gold Cup- 0 Miles I I

Bergwerk. A story circulated t hat one ofhis just recently changed wheels cameloose, other people say th at definitely didnot happen; anyway the 312T2 went off th e

GENERALADM PADDOCK PRIVILEGEIncludes Gen AdmRegular Advance Regular AdvancePr~ce Less 5% Pr~ce Less 10%

away into the country again. But Jochen's edge of th e road on the ou tside at v eryMcLaren went ahead of the March some- near maximu m speed. It whippedwhere on the climb up to the Karruss el. through a m ass of catch fen cing andThe crowd a t the st art/ finish sent up a slammed into the sloping hillside behind,great cheer when they heard that,and instantly blew up in a huge ball of flame,when Jochen popped up into sight again and then came spinning back across thehe was greeted by a wave of sheer German road tr ailin g pieces and burn ing fuel. Sojoy. He was 29 seconds ahead of anybody violent was the crash that a completeelse then, they all (almost)were in and out rubber fuel cell was ripped out of theof the pits behind him, and a s he dropped monocoque cha ssis and spun along thedown into Hatzenbach to sta rt the third road entirely separate from the rest of thelap he seemed to have the race as soundly wreckage.won as f it were already the 14th and last. The pack of cars behind were presentedUnfortunately for everybody, it wasn't with a track th at was the next thing toeven lap Zero. blocked. Guy Edwards found a wayMiles behind him, s till on hi s second through to the left of the burning Ferr arilap, first on slicks , Niki Lauda somehow without being damaged himself, but as helost control of his Ferrari on what should was stopping hi s Hesketh the Surtees ofhave been a flat-out bit of road. Brett Lunger had no where to go at all. HisIt was after th e Adenau crossing , a front wheels skidding helplessl y on fuel-downhill, left-hand kink approaching the muddied dir t, Brett T-boned Lauda's ca r

Friday, August 27 . . . . . . . 2.00 1.90 4.00 3.60Saturday, August 28 . . . . . 6.00 5.70 11OO 9.90Sunday, August 29 . . . . . . 8.00 7.60 14.00 12.60

Tom Pryce, left, and Vittorio Bramb il la have a bit of a dice d uring the early going, and before the crash of NikiLauda, which stopped the race.and shoved it aro und in the beginning of apirouette. Harald Ertl's Hesketh stoppedthat and bounced the Ferrar i back into theSurtees. That second impact was hardenough to s et off Brett's fire extinguishersystem.Lunger found himself standing in a seaof flames alongside Lauda's cockpit,tryin g to pull th e World Champion fromhis car. Niki was concious and trying toescape, but he hadn't been able to unbuck-le his shoulder harness. Apparently he'dbeen trying to get his helmet off so that hecould get his chin down far enough to seethe problem, for as B rett worked over himthe helmet cam e tumbling off Niki's head.Brett finally got enough leverage byjumping atop the burning car and strad-dling the cockpit. Arturo Merzario, whohad braked to a halt, got the belts unbuck-led and Lauda came free. Brett and herolled to the ground together.Niki st ill was awa re of goings-on, andclimbed to his feet and took a dozen steps,but by th is time the re was quite a crowd offellow drivers g athering and they persu-aded him to lie down while they strippedoff his cha rred drivin g suit and feltaround for broken bones. The maininjury, though, seemed to be to his facewhich was severely eno ugh burned that itI -ADVANCE SALE DEA DLINE: AUGUST 21 1 was bleeding.

from his burning car and poisonousgasses given off from his burning plasticseat and steering-wheel cover. As Auto-week went to press doctors in Mannheim,where Lauda remains hospitalized, said itcould be as much a s 10 days before theyknow if Niki will survive.The elaborate Nurburgring safety ap-paratus apparently worked a s planned,for the drivers said there were twoniars halls on foot with fire bottles on thescene within seconds, and the Porsche 911carryin g the doctor arrived shortly ther-eafter. It did take something like five ormore minu tes to get an ambulance to thescene, it was reported, and the Ferrarikept burning for a similar time.The race, of cou rse, had been redflagged immediately. The remainder ofthe 12 cars that had stopped at the scene,plus the other 14 that had gone throughbefore, eventually cycled through t he pitsfor a goin g over, a change to fresh slickrubber, refueling, and more than twohours after the original start were sentback to the g rid for a new race to go thefull 14 laps.The day's second German Grand Prixstarted just 20 cars. James Hunt was allalone in his Pole position, Lauda's placealongside being left vacant. Lunger andErtl %f course were absent, as the rulesallowed no spare cars to be used-evenhad there been any sp are cars available.Additionally Jacques Laffite and.HansStuck were non compos with trans-mission troubles, and Chris Amon threwsometh ing of a qu iet wobbly and decidedContinued On Next Page

7/30/2019 1976 German Grand Prix -- Niki Lauda injury

3/4

AUGUST 7, 1976 AUTOWEEK PAGE 9More On:ermanContinued From Preceding Pa gehe wanted no part of racing at he Nurbur-gring.James Hunt doesn't make very goodsta rts from the front of a grid-he's muchmore impressive when he's back in thepack and can jump the flag withoutanybody noticing somuch!-but giv e hima second chance in one day and he usuallydoes better. That was true at BrandsHatch and i t was true now ,at the Nurbur-gring. This time with no Lauda alongsidehe got into the South curve ahead ofeverybody, keeping Clay Regazzoni safe-ly behind, Patrick Depailler from thirdspot on the grid had hi s six-wheel Tyrrellthird, but up from eighth and in factalongside his teammate as they went inwas Jody Scheckter. Carlos Pace'sBrabham-Alfa, up from seventh, wa s fifthand Mass was sixth this time.Ronnie Peterson, his March once againpainted up in First National City BankTraveler's Check colors, plunged awaythrough the forest in seventh place, but

only as far as the Flugplatz where heplunged straight off the road. As hedescribed it, the jump itself went ok but asthe car landed it "started bouncing" andtore itself from his grasp. This is highspeed stuff and the r esulti ng shu nt off theoutside of the following right-handertotally wr ote off the car , but left Ronniewithout a mark.That put Mario Andretti up to seventhat that point, and his JPS wa s still theremiles later as the report flashed backfrom the Karrusse l, but from there on thelong, twisting run back to the start/ inishseveral things went wrong. First Reggaapparently spun, and Depailler couldn'tavoid bouncing off the F errari, which putthe Ty rrell into the fence at Brunnchen.Again, no driver damage, and Reggacarried on. Pace slipped ahead of Scheck-ter durin g his excitement, while Andrettimade it by Mass when the McLaren wentwide onto some grass. Gunnar Nilsson i nthe other JPS followed through closely, sothat when M ario in his tur n "fell out of thelittle Karrussel," that is he concrete half-bowl at the Schqalbenschwanz, Gunnarslipped by him too.So a s Hunt screamed along the long,long main straight in h is sixth gear, andeventually popped up in front of the pits,Alan Jones steams his Surtees TS19along at the head of a pair of eager Fl runners. Jones ultimately f~nish edin 10th spot.he had a gap of clear air behind him just son and Depailler from their shunt s,over nine seconds long. Then it was Carlos Reutemann from his Brabham-Pace's red Brabham sec&d with Scheck- Alfa "just stopping" a t the roadside, andLauda On The 'Ring: 'I Simply ter's blue Tyrrell all over him behind. Guy Edwards who stopped to visit his pitThen another gap until Regazzoni's for several m~ nu te s efore rejoining, aFer rari came screaming up the rise, very distant 17th and last.fourth but with Nilsson's JPS , Vittorio One lap or the Nurburgring: as always,Brambilla's March. Andretti's JPS, and full of enough action to make half adozenDon' T I 's Worth e isk' Alan Jon es Surtees nose to tailbehind -in somewhere else.

Niki Lauda's serious crash during theaborted first attempted runnin g of theGerma n GP wa s d'ouble ironic because ofhis own personal views about running onthe Nurburgring at all. "1 simple don'tthink it's worth the risk," he had gone onrecord as saying; in fact he as WorldChampion had been leade r of a faction ofdrivers who want to at least alter andperhaps abandon the famous, classicmountain circuit.Several months ago the five driverswho are all tha t is eft of the GPDA-thesefive, Lauda, Fittipaldi, Hunt, Scheckterand Jarie r now form the Safety Commit-tee of the FICA-had a tense meeting todecide whether to go or not to the 'Ringthis year. It was a narrow vote finally.three to two, in favor of abiding by anearlier agreement with the organizers.But they were adamant: the German GPwill not take place next year unless thecircuit is substantially changed.The fact is, a gre at many of their fellowdrivers are not in agreement, and severalof them s ay they were neve r consultedand never saw the pape r that the SafetyCommittee apparantly circulatedamong st some of their like-minded col-leagues. So the actual fate of the Nurbur-gring a s we know it is at this point farfrom sealed.But what effect will Niki Lauda's veryunfortunate crash have on the picture?Certainly many will point a finger andclaim, See! He was right! bu t the kind ofcrash i t was and the severity of theoutcome could easily have happened atmany other tracks. From first reports,anyway, the safety ge ar on the side of thetrack-catch fencing-was torn away by

the careening Ferr ari and it went beyondinto an earthern embankment. But it cameback onto the road, and did not overturn offly into any ravines-one of the specialhorrors that admittedly could happen atseveral points around the 'Ring. The veryheavy damage of the ca r, which soruptured its fuel tankage as to cause afire, was apparantly caused at leastpartly by the catch fencing poles. Thesame objects could well have given thedriver his head injuries, as they havedone to several drivers in recent seasons.So this wa s the kind of accident thatcould have happened at many othertracks, it would seem, and it m ight well beunfair to use i t as a nail in the coffin of theNurburgring.As for another potentialcriticism of the14.2 mile circuit, thechance of an accidenthappening far from any rescue teams, itis agreed by most drivers on the scenethat marshalls on foot had arrived withfire bottles "within seconds" and that aPorsche carying a doctor was therealmost immediately afterward. Therewas to be su re criti cism of the length oftime it took to get an ambulance to thespot-something between five and sevenminutes, according to vari ous accounts-and similarly the burning car, afterLauda was got out ot it, burned on forsevera l minutes.Lauda's fears of a seri ous accidentremain valid for many places at theNurburgring, but it would be well to becareful about using this particular acci-dent to illustrate his points. As was thecase with the Stommelen crash a t Barce-lona last year, it really was somethingsepa rate and independant of the core ofthe controversy beforehand.-Pete Lyons

touch with this was Mass, and then came Some miles into the second lap Bram-Tom Pryce's Shadow 10th. After ano ther billa evidently had something happen togap came another close string: Arturo his b rakes and went flying off a t Breits-Men ario in the ex-Jacky Ickx Williams, cheid, writin g off his car. Th is w asthe other Shadow with Jean-Pierre Jarier, announced together with the news that heJohn Watson in the Penske PC4, Rolf was all right, and the crowd broke intoStornrnelen who had done a deal for the laughter. You see, it was Vittorio's thirdthird Brabham-Alfa for thi s ra ce, a nd major shunt of the weekend. He'd crashe dEmerson Fittipaldi str ugglin g along in his regular car at the Pflanzgarten jumphis silver Copersucar. Another long gap on Friday, getting the c ar cocked side-and then the last ru nning c ar a t the ways just before Liftoff and failing tomoment, one of the obsolete 007 Tyrrells catch it as t landed so t veered diagonal-driven by newcomer Alessandro Pesenti- ly into the guardrail. The damage wasRossi. surprisingly light and he was driving itMissing therefore were four men: Peter- Continued On Next Page

I It all starts in the pits, where that wealth of knowledge I

EARLIER THIS SEASONWE'RE PROUD O F OUR ASSOCIATION

MITCOM, INC.5160 VENICE BLVD.LOS ANGELES, CA 90019(213) 937-2330

BRUMOS PORSCHE AUDI10211 ATLANTIC BLVD.JACKSONVILLE, FLA. 32211(904) 725-9155

about engines, suspensions, transmissions, and every intricatepart of your machine comes together. What it really boils downto is, i f you can't get it together in the pits, then you"ll neverbe successful on the track.

Our one-week (40 solid hours) school starts from thebottom end of an engine to team racing and "putting it alltogether" a t the track for a winning season.

We'll teach you the basics (and a lot more) of tweaking aracing machine so you'll be able to get the edge when the flagdrops. Write for a freebrochure and enroll-ment dates today.

1101 G u d e D r i v e Rockv i l l e , Md. 20850(301 340-2700

7/30/2019 1976 German Grand Prix -- Niki Lauda injury

4/4

PAGE 10 AUTOWEEK AUGUST 7, 1976

Continued From Preceding Pageagain the next day- That was Saturday,when it rainedmost of the day, wd ha lestit again going around the little loop at hetop of th e pits. "Thi s time she finished!"he told his suffering mechnics with ashmpbh smile; it's $he smile *at saveshim meay-. bewbritintotheracewiththe ex-Memm=io'car ( w m aviag heenswapped over fo WfiBams for t he resb ofthe yew in some obscure backroom dealthat oustsIckx rmy the $erun),andprettyshabby it looked witfitbe bottom half st illsponso ring "Ovoro" and the top selling"Beta". But not so shabby as whenVittorio walked back from it thisWtime. .Partway round that second lap Ssqueezed by Other Carlos, and &"3;alone in m n d hce to see-whatcouldbedone abouttheHunt lead. It was up to 10.3seconds by the end of that lag , and Jameshad done the lap at 7 minutes24 .1 &econdsr,which wss quickest. Pace came alongstill third a t the end of that,but the gap tothe next lot had vanished fm &gga wasclose behind ilsd so was Nilsson: Mmchad olo8ed up and overtaken Andre%again, the JPS engine having begun tolose power on this second lap. Johes'impressive run had dissolved in a spinback to 14th-place at the Adenau bridge.

Memario for the lead of it. JamesHun4 jumps his k l a r w i M23through the German forest anhis way to a win intheGermanGrand Prix. Chris k l b ~hotosAround the hird lapdody was quickest,at 7m 1% o James' 19.8, and the gap wasu n d e ~0 seconds between them. Hey, thi smight be quite a race after all, withsnother 11 laps to g a But Iluat had themessage, and stepped up just enough tohold the gap s tead2 EDurth time around,and after another lap the gap wrts justover 10 seqonds, and J-es had the la pspeed down to 7m 14.4. Tha t broke Jo dy'sresolve, he realized he 'was going to besecond, and from then on his deficiency

began to grow: 12.1 seconds, 12.9, then14.6, 17.5, md 21.7 after 10 lap s.So Hunt We d free and clear to hi sfourth GP trictary of the season, but with amap le of laps to go Scheckter's pitsignalled'him some new resolve. "Aw,they g&e me a bogus gap back to Regga,"he explained. "I thought he was closerthan he was, so I tried as hard a s X couldagain." It was noticable from the side-lines, a s Jody had the nimble six-wheelercocked sideways out of every on e of the. . be ca w we want you toI TracklestORMULAseewhvFORMULAisthe - I Ifastest growing racingpublication in theworld. Written by racingpeople for racing people.Full reparts of everymajor rackig event. ?heon& natlond publicdtioncavering ma teu r racing ona major scale.Ptys profiles,track tests, wc,ni$l

< features, dike; apinian,,-and any&insefse o finterest.We're so sure yw'll loveFORMULA that we'll sendyou your first wp y free. Justa n $ * 25 ceds to mverpostage and handlin g, andwe'll have the best lookingracin g mon thly you ever sawon its way to you the same day. But if you're convinced

already, a on e-year subscription is only $10. Don't miss outon the magazine the insiders are reading. Don't miss out on FORMULA.c - - - - 1 3 1 1 1 - I I II FOP-* 'LA America's International Racing Magazine. F O R M U L A E N T E R P R I S E S1 2020 South Susan, Suite LI Santa Ana, Ca. 92704I LET ME LOOK YOU OVER.0 nclosed is $ .25 to cower postage and hand lingfor a free sample copy of FORMULA.I I'M ALREADY CONVtNCED -ENTERMY SUBSCRIPT ON : h ~ yne "track test" per p e r m1 Year $10.00 Name(12 lssues)O2 ears $16.00 Address124 Issues)C h k k .orM o n e y Order Enclosed City , -

I Rolf St omme k, back tor his Ttrst GP of the year, chatswith car owner Bernie Ecdestone, Stommden broughtthe team's extra Brabham BT45/Alfa Romeo horn irl sixth place.174 corners aro und the circui t. On the 13thlap, one to go, e-did a la p at 7m 10.8s, oaoe James out of someth ing, at least. "AndI made a mistake on that one, too..."Regazia ni was aotually less of a threatthan he thoug ht anyway . At the end of the12th lap the surviving Ferrari was late,and eventually came into the pits with itsnose wing a ll curled up. Clay was well out

of the points by the time he got out againwith a new one.Andretti had lilr8wiare stopped in thepits, his engine's high-speed miss gettingso bad he decided to m k cure. TeamLotus strapped on a new battery and senthim back out, but the cure only lastedabout a lap, an d after that the miss cameback. "It's a damn shame , cause s he was

I ALAMO, W S T O N ,I L O N E S T A R ~ ~ A SII Regions S C C AI Registrar: SUEHERNDONII dqy (713)528-2908I eve 667-06624

really workin'. I wgs finally gettin' toknow the track a little, too." -So the final stage of the ace was just a

dice for third piace between Pace andMass. Carlos, who had been looking andfeeling prettx grey during practice with abad case of 'flu, was goin g like a champi-on during the raee and afteward, al- .though he was prettx tired , he denied he'dslacked off because of illness. It was th ecar that was going a little off, its handlinggetting unstable as the tanks emptiedandthe engine's all-too-famillr poor low-s p e d piekup worsening too.Mass finaJlycaught him up and passed, tofinish-thirdin the ful l scale re-run of the race he'd"won" the first time around.

A Nilmon came home fifth, a fine resultfcrr b o a him and the tea&, but even betterwas Stommelen's one point for Brabhamin his first GP this year. Considering thatafter legal difficultiestook way his firstride of the weekend (when the R A M .Brabhrtms were both impounded forbreach of contract on %he instigatio n ofdriver Loris Kessel) and he never.srat inthe Alfa car until he rain-soakedSatur-day he did well indsed