We asked regular historic-Corvette racing front-runner Eric Dolson what his advice would be to an enthusiast thinking about going vintage or historic racing with a Corvette. His anwer, "Don't!" He then went on to explain, "a period Corvette is a handful at the best of times, and is way too powerful and way too fast to be anyone's first race car. At 160 mph, a lot can happen very quickly. The way to approach vintage or historic racing would be to start off with an MG Midget or something similar with no real power at all, and to learn to race before going anywhere near a track with a Corvette." He has a very good point.

The Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) Memorial Scholarship Fund was founded in 1984 to foster leadership opportunities in the specialty equipment marketplace and support educational goals for students. Over the past two decades, SEMA Scholarships have supported over 500 students with more than $1,000,000 in scholarship awards.

The Rolex Vintage Festival at Lime Rock Park was a magnificent feast for car buffs and proved far more diverse than most auto events. Sunday's car show featured 200 vintage and historic racers, including several generations of racing Corvettes, from a C2 Grand Sport to wide-body C3s to Paul Newman's modern-day pavement scorcher. Attendees could inspect the cars up-front and personal because every ticket allowed entry into the open paddock. They could see small details such as how Smokey Yunick trimmed the rain gutters to reduce drag on the Camaro he prepared for the Trans-Am Series.

Why it took 12 years for the L88 to emerge as the dominant force at the Pure Stock Drags is anybody's guess. In years past, Dan Jensen and Bob Boden, the race's founders and organizers, would survey the state of things and speculate about what kind of car could beat the 440 Six-Pack Mopars, Stage 1 Buicks, and big-block Camaros and Novas that had a lock on the top ranks. They concluded that it would take an L88, probably with an automatic transmission. Plenty of Corvettes participated in the unique drag race and ran competitively, but not L88s, and not at the top of the food chain.

Gavin And Beretta Win Gt1 In Salt Lake City Alms....
Oliver Gavin and Olivier Beretta scored their fourth win in five starts this season, taking the GT1 class honors in the American Le Mans Series Utah Grand Prix at Miller Motorsports Park. The two Ollies completed 61 laps of the 4.5-mile circuit in their No. 4 Compuware Corvette C6.R, finishing 26.550 seconds ahead of Jan Magnussen and Johnny O'Connell in the No. 3 Compuware Corvette C6.R. The two Corvettes finished eighth and ninth overall.

GT racing in Europe can be very confusing for us humble Corvette owners, who are really more interested in our Corvettes than the subtleties of the various classes where our cars can be seen racing. the Le Mans Series, FIA GT1, FIA GT3, the Citation Cup, British GTs, and the Belgian Belcar series have or have had Corvette C5s, C6s, and/or their R-suffix variants competing, and that is truly wonderful for us all. Until the advent of the C5R, there were virtually no Corvettes racing in nonhistoric events in Europe, and their entry to the fields has improved them all, and added to our European circuits that awesome deep bass rumbling exhaust crackle that is unique to the LS engine.

This year marks the 26th year for Corvettes at Carlisle, and for almost as long there's been a Corvette auction held there yearly. The Corvette auction has always been a popular feature of the annual three-day event. The auction attracts lots of people interested in what choice Corvettes are currently fetching dollar-wise, and it's the place to be if you're interested in buying or selling a Corvette. Over the years, the Corvettes at Carlisle management team enlisted Bob Gold and then Dana Mecum to handle the auctions, but this year there's a new twist.

Corvette Racing posts Fifth GT1 Class Victory in 24 Hours of Le MansCorvette and Aston Martin went toe-to-toe in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, trading blows through a grueling day and night of racing. When the battle finally ended, Corvette Racing had won the GT1 class in the world's greatest sports car race for the fifth time in six years.

Supply and demand: the fiscal model that outlines the microeconomic theory defined as exponential cost growth dictated by product quantity, composed by Alfred Marshal in 1890 in an attempt to predict competitive marketplace price changes. What it means to the normal layman is the rarity of a desired product or item boosts the cost in the marketplace-gasoline, for example. Without delving into the political economics of the matter, it is widely accepted that as more nations modernize and become dependant on gasoline power, the demand for the combustible fuel will continue to rise, especially if production remains at a constant level or, worse yet, declines. With China, the South American nations, South Africa, and Eastern Europe jumping in with North America, Western and Northern Europe, and Japan, the world's thirst for oil and gasoline has caused pump prices to soar worldwide. This is the functioning example of a world economy, and due to the limited resources that this planet produces versus the consumption of those goods by its inhabitants, the various cultures, nations, and countries need to learn to deal accordingly.

In preparation for this auction issue, we asked Dana Mecum, CEO of Mecum Auctions, to answer a few questions about the current trends in the Corvette hobby. He has a widely varied automotive background and can give an inside view to the current state of Corvette affairs nationwide.

London, England is centrally placed for many fine motoring activities, and one of the best has to be long-distance classic rallying. These events leave for a variety of destinations each year; the simplest are weeklong culinary tours to France or Italy or maybe a tour of Ireland sampling malt whiskies. Others go to Morocco and North Africa, or Eastern Europe, and even these more exotic destinations can fit into a two-week vacation, or a holiday fortnight, as we Brits call it.

The highlight of the fall classic racing scene is the Goodwood Revival held at the old Goodwood Motor Circuit (www.goodwood.co.uk) each September in Sussex. The original circuit was adapted from part of the RAF Tangmere WWII fighter aerodrome in 1948. Along with Silverstone, it became the premier British motor racing circuit until closing in 1966 due to poor road access and noise complaints from neighbouring villages.

24th Annual Event Sets Record With More Than 2,500 CorvettesThis year's Corvettes at Carlisle extravaganza brought a record 2,586 Corvettes and 54,932 guests to the Carlisle Fairgrounds in Pennsylvania over August 26-28. The 24th annual show saw 1,305 vendors selling all sorts of Corvette-related items.

An Estimated 50,000 Enthusiasts and 12,000 Corvettes Gather at Corvette Funfest 2005, Breaking Attendance Records

'69 L88 cuts 10.99 on FAST Times Terror
One of the generally accepted facts of our hobby is cars just don't run fast on bias-ply tires. They also don't like breathing through cast-iron exhaust manifolds, stock intake manifolds, or factory air-cleaner assemblies. Everyone knows the first step to make your car faster is installing headers, adding a performance intake and carb, and mounting wider tires.

The Ace Caf lies on London's North Circular road, an authentic recreation of the original that closed in 1969. During the sixties, it was a legendary meeting point for the "ton-up boys," who would race their Triumphs, Nortons and BSA's on the inner ring road which cuts an arc through north London's inner suburbs, rarely more than five miles from Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square.

Corvette Racing Reigns With 1-2 Finish At Rainy Mid-OhioFellows And O'Connell Win Again In Wet And Wild RaceCorvette Racing drivers Ron Fellows and Johnny O'Connell scored their second consecutive victory with the new Corvette C6.R in the American Le Mans at Mid-Ohio, but the win was anything but routine. Fellows' No. 3 Compuware Corvette was Second in the GT1 Class at the finish, but a 20-second penalty levied on the leading No. 4 Compuware Corvette driven by Oliver Gavin and Olivier Beretta elevated Fellows and O'Connell to the top step of the podium. O'Connell and Fellows tallied their 23rd ALMS victory, setting the series record for career wins. The result was the 24th 1-2 finish for Corvette Racing.

The 10th Annual Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance held March 13 on the grounds of The Ritz-Carlton in Amelia Island, Florida, saw perfect 70-degree sunshine, an array of vintage autos from seldom-seen collections nationwide, and a record crowd.

C6 fever has struck. For many, the '05 will be the hottest Corvette yet. But not for all in Corvetteland.

It was somewhere between Springfield and St. Louis, Missouri, when it all started to make sense. The hotel rooms, blistering asphalt, greasy food, and sunburn all faded away on a curvy stretch of highway in the foothills of the Ozark Mountains. Steering the '90 Corvette convertible through the esses, something that required little effort, at highway speeds on a perfect summer day made the whole trip worthwhile.

These Half-Dozen Represent The Cream Of The Corvette CropA half-dozen of the best Corvettes around were inducted into the Bloomington Gold Hall of Fame in June. This year's crop of inductees features a cross-section of vehicles representative of high standards of excellence within the Corvette hobby.

Imagine a competition where you not only have to turn in the best average speed over three runs down the dragstrip, but also travel 15 miles to the track through Memphis and run on fuel you purchased at the local gas station. If you were to create such a competition, what would you call it? How about the Pump Gas Drags?

Jim Roberts made the trek south to Knoxville and Corvette Expo again this year. His first trip was 21 years ago.