The Shelby American (Fall 2021)

oday, Ken Miles is something of an enigma. His fingerprints are all over Shelby American, from the early Cobra competi- tion roadsters to the Daytona Coupe; the 427 Cobra to the prototype GT350s; the Tiger and the GT40 MK Is and MK IIs. The sad story of his being cheated out of the 1966 Triple Crown – FIA victories at Daytona, Se- bring and LeMans – is now well known, thanks to “Ford v Ferrari.” But do we really know Ken Miles? The answer is “No.” His death on August 17, 1966 at the wheel of a Ford J-Car at Riverside Raceway put him into a freeze-frame. There would be no more racing victories, no association with other cars or projects. Think of the missed opportunity to win a 1967 FIA Triple Crown and a LeMans vic- tory. To race in the Can-Am and Trans- Am. What he would have accom- plished before retirement; the articles about him, the interviews, the retro- spects and recounts of his exploits; reading about his take on things. All of this became impossible when he died. They would never happen. The result is our fascination with someone we would never have a chance to get to know. Think of Dan Gurney, Phil Hill, Bob Bondurant, Peter Brock and Carroll Shelby. Celebrity vintage race appear- ances, guest driver in cars he had pre- viously raced, Grand Marshall at race weekends and car shows. All things that would never happen and because of that, would limit our knowledge of him. We are, of course, all the poorer for not having known him. So when something like a lost interview with Ken Miles from 1965 falls into our hands it is gold. Steve Smith was the editor of Car and Driver between November 1966 and late 1968. Before that he was on the magazine’s staff. In 1965, a week after Ken Miles won the Daytona 24- Hours in a Shelby American Ford GT40 MK I, Smith visited Shelby American at the LAX airport and con- ducted an interview with Miles which was never transcribed and printed in its entirety. Instead, it was used as background for a comprehensive arti- cle on the Ford GT40 Smith wrote in the June 1965 issue of Car and Driver titled “The Ford in Carroll Shelby’s The SHELBY AMERICAN Fall 2021 41 – Steve Smith T