Ford vs. Ferrari
 

Looking forward to the opening Friday night. I will be seeing it at Carroll Shelby’s home town so I expect it to be crowded. Can’t wait!

The movie Lemans in the early seventies was the same subject. I might try to watch it first.

I think the movie world should discover Briggs Cunningham. That’s a racing story that really has interest. Shelby stood on Cunningham’s shoulders, wasn’t half as interesting.

I went through the Briggs Cunningham museum in the late seventies. I got the idea that it served as a source of vintage cars for movies.

Most of the cars are now in the Collier collection, in Florida. He was much more than a collector.



In 1950, he set out on a quest to win Le Mans for the US. Came very close to doing it, too. It's really quite a story. For the purpose of this discussion, the cars he built were the direct inspiration for the Shelby Cobra. Small, aluminum bodied cars with huge American V8's.

Cunningham is indeed a giant and interesting man. He was born to wealth and used it to compete in the America cup yacht racing and to race cars.

I first learned about the Cunningham Caddilacs from the road tester Tom McCahill from mechanics illustrated magazine. He mentioned them in his road test of the 64 caddy with the new more powerful 429 Caddy which he compared to the early fifties Caddys which he described as "fast cars".

Cunningham appeared at LeMans with two cadillacs in 1950. One was a nearly stock model 60 (the lightest) two door hard top,painted grey, which the french nicknamed Petite Patuatad (baby elephant). The other was the same car but with the body removed and replaced with a low sleek but not pretty body which the french nickamed Le Monstre (the monster).

The cars as raced had multiple carburetors the sedan two two barrels, the special five two barrels, but little else. I had the chance to look at them very closely about 20 years ago when I was active in Cadillac hobby cars. I was allowed to crawl under the sedan and take pictures.

The only modifications I could find was an adjustment device in the angle of the driver's seat back and a couple extra leafs in the rear spring. The non stock two two barrel carb setup it raced with had been replaced with a four barrel carb as would come to be offered in Caddys in 1952. The car was equipped with extra driving lights which featured a small block of wood to help aim the lights on the curved Caddy bumper. The sedan also had a trailer hitch on the bumper. It was used to tow other smaller race cars after its LeMans appearance.

The LeMonstre was very interesting. It has this magnificent low and sleek aluminum body which was built by people from the Grumman company and featured rivet heads everywhere. The interior was pure race car with a turned aluminum dash with proper race car gauges everywhere and a racy looking bucket seat. But if you looked down at the pedals it was pure Cadillac and the shifter was three on the tree.;) This car was used as a camera car in the movie Grand Prix, I believe.

In the race the aluminum body car was running well early until it was put in a sand trap and lost about an hour and a half while the driver dug it out with a little spade. Running against all manner of more racy cars including Ferraris and Aston Martins etc. the sedan finished tenth and the special 11th after losing all gears except third in trying to get out of the sand. Loss of gears was a massive disadvantage at LeMans with its long straights and tight corners.

The cars are still (AFIK) on display in the Collier Museum in Collier county Florida near Naples. I believe most of the cars Cunningham raced he kept. He as noted by the previous post built Cunningham cars for five or six years running Hemi engines, then raced Corvettes and Jaguars among others at LeMans.

Cunningham had an extensive collection of cars which were sold off to Collier and IIRC the Harrah collection in Reno.

When I searched for a picture I found this excellent website for the Collier museum now called "revs"

https://revsinstitute.org/the-collection/cadillac-1950-series-61-le-mans/

Briggs Cunningham - American Racing Tradition - Cunningham Replica 1950 Cadillac

cunningham+cadillac&tbm=isch&tbs=rimg:CRsKp35GqabMImClz4CkXF3xVC2GdqXkV0FdtTXYBz00FNDBR1sIHQygC47qsH cGQmnm3islR91fdmjPGd1lt-66HGSu1khxdruvJen8a94prgQl0q0PcHoETpRpi-_1GxvO2LbdatXiScvcqEgmlz4CkXF3xVBEs91vIT3BgkioSCS2GdqXkV0FdEbTFh1iGsctXKhIJtTXYBz00FNARnRIFVcXHZg4qE gnBR1sIHQygCxFL85CbhMwnryoSCY7qsHcGQmnmEbTFh1iGsctXKhIJ3islR91fdmgRgoSnEu9N2IUqEgnPGd1lt-66HBHyzXk8nAyNESoSCWSu1khxdruvEVoLFtS-z6xAKhIJJen8a94prgQR5dHRUdw6auUqEgkl0q0PcHoEThHah0TILeg2RioSCZRpi-_1GxvO2Eeu8Akl5FWlwKhIJLbdatXiScvcRwQo_188PEtho&tbo=u&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjU1a7yqezlAhUQEawKHaeABZMQuIIB egQIARAw&biw=911&bih=426&dpr=1.5

I have included my favorite picture of the two caddys running at Lemans back in 1950.

Did you go Larry ? Any good ?

The wife and I attended the 2018 Le Mans Classic and the 2016 Le Mans 24 hours.
The Classic should be on every hard core car-person's bucket list.
Seeing and hearing, at speed on the track, original GT-40s, 917s, D-types, Bugattis,...….
If you go be sure to get a paddock pass.

We are seeing the movie at five today. I expect the audience to be as interesting as the movie. A few life long friends of his said they would be there.

The 1950 run was just a taste. He subsequently cut a deal with Chrysler for engines and started his own car company, since Le Mans rules only allowed homologated makers entries. He made ultra expensive street versions of his race cars to meet the numbers requirements. Then he built a team of the best US drivers, including Hansgen (who was killed later on running a Ford), John Fitch, Bob Grossman, Augy Pabst, and others. Dan Gurney’s first Le Mans start was for Cunningham. And then went to race. Came very close to winning with a US car and driver. After six brilliant seasons, the IRS shut down his company because it had failed to make a profit. After that, he became the US distributor fo Jaguar, and his team raced Jags at Le Mans until 1963. And that was the inspiration for the Shelby and Ford efforts. It was really quite a story.

I’ve ridden as passenger in a Cunningham C4, and I’ll tell you it was gut ripping fast. If they had had disk brakes, they could have easily beaten Jaguar and Mercedes.

Yes, thanks for the further info!

I'm hoping to go see the movie tonight or tomorrow sometime.

Saw it tonight. It was nothing short of FABULOUS! I have three additional words for you; DON’T MISS IT! The politics with FoMoCo was as you would expect if you’ve ever dealt with company internal politics.

Matt Damon did a great job depicting the calm, cool headed manner of Carroll Shelby.

Just got back. A lot of details wrong. A lot of good details too. Racing action not overly convincing to me. Many details of the Ford interaction with Ferrari and then Shelby I have never heard before so I wonder if it is true.

The most glaring error is showing Ferrari at the Lemans race. He never attended the races. Included no doubt to add interest.

I did enjoy it very much. Definitely worth seeing though.

I did very much appreciate that the movie made Miles the central character.

I also liked the fact that Henry 2 even though a hardened dictator could be smart enough to change his mind.

Thanks Larry - I might invest a few bucks at the noon time showing

To some degree your comments remind me of my Dads reaction to a movie in his older years. The movie was “The Painted House.” This was John Grisham’s story about his youth growing up on a cotton Farm on the Mississippi. It was a wonderful movie and my a Dad was thoroughly enjoying it until he saw the footage of them picking cotton. He was completely turned away when he saw it saying “they sure never picked cotton before.”

I learned a long time ago that if you want accurate true stories, they won’t come from Hollywood.

I’m glad you went on and enjoyed the movie even though it was a typical Hollywood truth bending production.