Anglo American Racers

Anglo American Racers was a Formula One and Champ Car constructor from the USA owned by Dan Gurney and run from the Weslake factory at Rye. They participated in 25 Grands Prix, entering a total of 34 cars. The team was the Formula One arm of All American Racers, an organisation established in Santa Ana, California in 1964, by Dan Gurney, to run sportscars for him to drive in the United States between his Formula 1 commitments with the Brabham team. In that same year, Carroll Shelby, who was running Goodyear tires on his Cobra sportscars, introduced Gurney to the tiremaker because Goodyear wanted to take on Firestone at the Indianapolis 500. Gurney, responsible for bringing Colin Chapman and Lotus to Indianapolis, fielded an AAR Lotus 38 in the 1965 Indianapolis 500. A deal was struck and work began on an IndyCar for 1966. Gurney hired Len Terry, the designer of the Indianapolis-winning Lotus in 1965 and he laid out a mid-engined chassis, baptized Eagle, which would serve for both Formula 1 and Indycar racing. The result was the Eagle-Ford T2G for the US and the Eagle T1G for Formula 1.

Formula 1

In order to run the Formula 1 operations, Gurney established Anglo American Racers. The Eagle T1G, powered by an obsolete Coventry Climax engine, debuted at the 1966 Belgian Grand Prix and scored its first points with a fifth place three weeks later at the French Grand Prix. In 1967 Richie Ginther was signed as a second driver. The Climax engine was replaced by a new 3-liter Weslake V12 designed by Aubrey Woods and built in Great Britain by Harry Weslake. At Spa-Francorchamps in June of that same year Gurney got a victory, the first "all-American" victory in a Grand Prix since Jimmy Murphy in 1921.

The Eagle-Weslake was a beautiful and efficient car, one example of which was constructed in titanium and exotic alloys. More than this, the Eagle was designed to make the tall Gurney fit comfortable at the wheel. Their efforts produced a V12 that was smooth and powerful. At Monza, an insight into the future of engine design was seen for the first time. The engine had four valves per cylinder at a narrow included angle (thirty degrees) that allowed a single cover to enclose both the close-spaced camshafts on each bank. The sixty-degree-vee layout. had a larger bore than stroke (72.8 X 60mm). Gurney's program ran out of money in 1968 and by the end of the year he returned to the United States to concentrate his efforts on the more successful Indycar program, in which Bobby Unser had won the Indianapolis 500 and the 1968 Indycar Championship.

The 1967 Eagle-Weslake is still being 'used' virtually: a detailed, driveable replica is one of the most popular cars in the racing simulation Grand Prix Legends, although not because of performance - rather because most of the players are American and want to drive an 'American' car.Fact|date=February 2008 The less-powerful 1966 Eagle-Climax version is part of the 1966 'Mod' for this x86 pc-based software.

Complete Formula One results

(Note: grands prix in bold denote points scoring races.)

USAC & CART Champ Car

During the USAC years, the Eagle chassis was very successful in the late 1960's and 1970's, especially with driver Bobby Unser. Eagles won 51 Champ Car races, including the 1968 and 1975 Indy 500's won by Unser and the 1973 race won by Gordon Johncock. The All American Racers team was inactive in single seaters from 1987 to 1995 and returned in 1996 again building their own chassis and using new Toyota engines. However, this new effort, a combination of new and untested equipment, did not prove to be successful, never winning a race and collecting only occasional top-tens. The team ceased active racing after the 1999 CART season.

CART drivers

*Alex Barron (1998-1999)
*Raul Boesel (1999)
*Geoff Brabham (1981)
*Mike Chandler (1982, 1984)
*Kevin Cogan (1984-1985)
*Juan Manuel Fangio II (1996-1997)
*Pete Halsmer (1984)
*P. J. Jones (1996-1998)
*Jan Lammers (1986)
*Andrea Montermini (1999)
*Rocky Moran (1981)
*Mike Mosley (1979-1981)
*Ed Pimm (1984-1985)
*Gualter Salles (1999)
*Vincenzo Sospiri (1998)

External links

* [http://www.allamericanracers.com/ Official Website]