Tuesday, June 21st was a classic hot, summer day; 90 degrees and sunny in Perrysburg, Ohio. Phil Crutchfield, Ellie and I, and a college friend from the Toledo area joined thousands of people gathered downtown to see The Great Race participants complete the day’s driving stage.
More than 150 cars arrived over two hours. We luckily found a great viewing spot – on a shaded porch at the city library building where we could set up our chairs and view the checkpoint where the cars’ times were recorded, and hear the race announcer’s voice as he announced the driver and navigator’s names, their car description and other interesting anecdotes about the teams’ history in the race.
Most of the teams had been in multiple Great Races over the years. As we wandered through the rally cars parked along Louisiana Street, we were drawn to this 1964 E-Type and met its owner/driver, Ed Overmyer, from Tennessee. Ed’s car is beautifully restored, and he loves driving the car, even in this 9-day, 2300-mile rally. He has some roots in Michigan, having lived here at one time, and allowed for the possibility of joining us at a JAGM event in the future.
Other British cars in the field included a 1937 Lagonda LG6, a ’73 Jensen Interceptor, a ‘66 Aston Martin DB6, a ’67 Austin Healey BJ8, a ’53 Sunbeam Alpine, a ’64 Morris Mini Cooper S, and a ’48 MG TC.
A few days later I looked up the final results of the race. The overall champion (taking home the $50,000 first prize) was the team of Josh Hull and Trevor Stahl, driving a 1932 Ford Speedster. All the race results and many, many pictures can be seen on the race website: HTTP:// www.greatrace.com/.
The 2023 Great Race route has recently been announced. It starts in St. Augustine, FL, and ends in Colorado Springs, CO. So it won’t pass near us in Michigan, but we can highly recommend that the next time you get a chance to view a stop on this event, it makes for a most interesting time.
Gary Hillebrand
