Yes, Mike the car was originally white and the color stripes were painted
onto that white by Daver Kent who also designed the scheme. When this
"opportunity" first came to mind we had a sponsor that felt he just had to
get into the 2 litre trans-am racing. Who am I to doubt a big bucks guy that
wants to go racing? So we had to figure out a loop-hole that just might
give an advantage. The Vitesse was really a small car and thus could be a
bullet down the chute. It was that too. Unfortunately we never got the
money from the big bucks guy and thus my interest waned instantly. I don't
remember that Rockett raced his car in the Trans-am but I remember he built
it up after we did the "Candy Box". I remember his car as being a dark green
or blue. I have always wondered about the Newman 2.5 also. It was being
constructed up in Conn. somewhere by the "rounyrounders" who were really
good guys and after we looked at the rules and the layout it should have
been a real killer. Another mystery, unsolved.
----- Original Message -----
From: michael l. cook <mlcooknj@bellatlantic.net>
To: <Herald948@aol.com>
Cc: <kaskas@earthlink.net>; <fot@autox.team.net>
Sent: Saturday, August 19, 2000 5:32 PM
Subject: Re: racing Vitesses
>
>
> Herald948@aol.com wrote:
>
> > In a message dated 8/20/00 9:47:51 PM EDT, kaskas@earthlink.net writes:
> >
> > > Vitesse...Built by my company Kastner Brophy Racing in 1971. Factory
> > > sent me a stock Vitesse and we then did the build for the then
Trans-am
> > > racing.
> >
> > I admit that I've always been curious as to WHY this all happened when
it
> > did. Presumably the Vitesse 2L was the only Triumph product that might
even
> > have come close to fitting neatly into a Trams-Am racing class. But it
> > couldn't have had much to do with the classic "Race on Sunday, sell on
> > Monday" advertising philosophy. After all, fewer than 700 "Vitesses"
were
> > ever officially sold in the US, and that had happened about 7-8 years
> > earlier. And even the Herald had been gone from the US for several years
when
> > these two Vitesses hit the Trans-Am circuit!
> >
> > So Kas, or Mike Cook, or anyone else in the know -- why did Triumph or
BLMC
> > wish to see this happen?
> >
> > --Andy
> >
> > Andrew Mace, President, The Vintage Triumph Register
>
> All of us back at headquarters just assumed that Kas built the Vitesse
because he
> could! And because he had a crazy driver named Carl Swanson who did great
in
> Triumphs with little screaming sixes in them - witness the GT-6 at Road
Atlanta.
> However, if Kas builds a race car, there is always a GOOD reason behind
it. Just
> a bit hard to get to it sometimes.
>
> And by the way, Kas, although the car had candy apple and red stripes, it
was
> actually white, wasn't it?? An I remember Mike Rockett's car being white
with
> blue stripes - must have been a re-paint.
>
> Now we need to find Paul Newman's 2.5 PI.
>
> Mike
>
>
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