39 / 150
open track car and a second car be-
came a SCCA road racer. He showed
dozens of pictures of his cars, depicting
the series of modifications as well as
the numerous color changes, some fol-
lowing off-road excursions when he
was street racing. All were accompa-
nied by humorous comments which
many audience members could relate
to. His remarks were well received.
The second portion of the program
was dedicated to Hertz. We started off
with SAAC’s Hertz Registrar, Greg
Kolasa, who shared some of the details
he has uncovered while researching
these cars. He served as something of
a “Mythbuster” to debunk some of the
“beliefs” that have grown up around
these cars. Probably the one that hit
home with most Hertz owners was the
invalidation of the “Rent-A-Racer”
designation. It was never used by
Shelby or Hertz when the cars were
new and he traced its use to beginning
in the early-1970s and the rise of or-
ganized Shelby enthusiasm. It turned
out that the stories of 1966 Hertz cars
rented for a weekend and in which roll
bars were installed so they could be
road raced, were not able to be proven.
They are the automotive equivalent of
“urban legends.” Likewise, Hertz cars
which “donated” 289 Hi-Po engines to
race cars and then after the race were
re-installed into the rental unit before
it was returned. Pure hokum.
SAAC racer Tom Yeager provided
a more modest Hertz story that was,
no doubt, true. He was campaigning a
‘66 Mustang notchback in a Trans-Am
event when he experienced a mystify-
ing carburetor problem. He spied a
GT350 Hertz car parked in the pad-
dock and before anyone knew what
was happening, he and a crew member
“borrowed” the carburetor from the
car, whose owner was nowhere to be
found. It turned out the car belonged
to SCCA official John Bishop. The car-
buretor was returned after the race.
Yeager decided to come forward only
because the statute of limitations had
expired.
Kopec couldn’t keep from jumping
in with one of his Hertz memories. To
make a long story short, basically he
and Mel Wentzel rented a Hertz
GT350 in Los Angeles and used it as a
tow car for Wentzel’s Cobra comp car
the weekend of the ARRC at Riverside
Raceway. A Sears trailer hitch was in-
stalled, the speedometer cable was
neutered, and they used the car for al-
most a week before returning it with
about 100 miles on it and running up
a rental tab of less than $100. That’s
his story and he is sticking to it.
No batch of Hertz stories would be
complete without hearing from Chuck
Cantwell. When GT350H rentals
started leaving the Hertz lots and
rear-ending cars in traffic with some
regularity, Cantwell was given the job
of coming up with a fix for the problem
and had to explain it to the DC DMV.
The third portion of the program
was the most exciting and that’s why
it was saved for last. Patrick Kriwanek
has written the screenplay for a movie
about Carroll Shelby, Phil Remington
and Ken Miles, the way they con-
tributed to the Cobra’s competition
success and how that led to LeMans
and Ford’s victory in the 1966 event.
He had a power-point presentation
which showed pictures of some of the
actors and actresses who were being
considered for roles.
This is not a documentary but a
serious drama about the interactions
of these people and the rest of the in-
dividuals who played a part in the
story; drivers and mechanics on the
Cobra Team as well as movers and
shakers at FoMoCo, from Henry Ford
II to Lee Iacocca and Jacques Passino.
Production is moving along and looks
to be finding its way to a major studio.
Shooting has not yet begun but an es-
timated completion date is about two
years from now. If the timing is right,
we’ve been promised a special preview
at the SAAC convention just prior to
its release.
As a special treat, Kriwanek read
the first six pages of the script to give
everyone an idea of what to expect.
One of the takeaways from the film
was that Ken Miles was robbed of the
victory at LeMans due to a public re-
lations decision by Ford’s top manage-
ment and an apparent error in the
official lap charts. There have been a
half-dozen other movie project about
this period in time and these players
but none has made it into production.
This one was approved by Shelby prior
to his passing. We’re looking forward
to it and will be providing SAAC mem-
bers with updates on its progress.
The SHELBY AMERICAN
Summer 2016 39