KR's Quiz 8

[Killarney Racer]

I don't trust you. You probably stole another one of my pics

[henryk]

Driver is not Love nor Tingle


Could it be Tony Maggs?

[ant]

Believe it to be:

1. Trevor Blokdyk
2. Cooper Maserati
3. Kyalami
4. 1963

[Fairlane 500]

That is the Cooper T79 of John Love but it is not him driving it, therefore he must have already got his Brabham. This must be early 1968, because the pipes on the nose he had in the Grand Prix of 1967 when he came second . They were for extra cooling.

I would say it's Basil Van Rooyen at East London. It was him who drove the Love Cooper in the 1968 Grand Prix.

[Killarney Racer]

Sorry chaps you didn't do too well. Go back to start and do not collect R200

Driver is Alan Harris
Car is Cooper T79 (Tasman 2.7lt Climax motor)
Track is Killarney
Year is 1968

The story behind this is as follows.

Alan Harris was a Rhodesian who raced Matchless, Greeves, Manx Norton and Velocette motor cycles in the early 60's both locally, England and Isle of Man TT with some good results. Following a crash in 1964 he was out of racing for 3 years before making a comeback on a Yamaha. In this period he made his four wheeled debut racing an Anglia.

In 1967 Love asked him to run in the Cooper at the Kumalo circuit and in doing so he posted times within 2sec of Love's times. Love entered Harris for the 1968 SAGP in his T79 but because he did not have an international licence, the car was raced by Basil van Rooyen, who retired from overheating. This necessitated another rebuild and again Harris ran the car in at Kyalami.

Love entered Harris for the Cape Southeaster in 1968 and he was lying 3rd before spinning off due to a "loss of concentration". This was the only F1 race he drove in and Love sold the Cooper shortly afterwards.

Love drove several Coopers, T53, T55, T79.

Killarney used to have a grass verge between the pit road and the track. This used to be a problem with Le Mans type starts in the 3hr races and eventually they resorted to normal grid starts.




.

[Hi-Fi]

Interestingly Alan Harris did a demo run at Zwartkops on Feb 3 riding a Velocette Thruxton 350 in the company of Paddy Driver and Jim Redman as part of the Piper Day event.

[Dougie]

Hi KR, I found that quiz interesting as Love's Cooper brought back a lot of good memories. I also remember going to Grand Central with my brothers as a kid and seeing Love in action with his D type Jag. Do you know the history of his D type or what happened to it? I remember his rival was a Porsche Spider I think driven by Sid van der Vyfer.

Dougie.

[Killarney Racer]

Dougie I have asertained this about Loves d-Type

1954 - entered as 3rd car in Le Mans 24hr - reistration 1 OA
1959 - sold to Love
1960 - sold to Neville Austin
1961 - accident in 9hr Kyalami event
1961 - sold to Rondalia Touring Club who restored the car
1966 - sold to Paul Hawkins

After this there were several owners, several crashes and several rebuilds

The last owner I could trace was David Morris in the UK who raced it in 1990.

There was a second D-Type in Rhodesia owned variously by Jimmy de Villiers, Bruce Huntly and George Pffaf

[Killarney Racer]

btw - the event that Harris raced in was won by Jean-Pierre Beltoise in a F2 Matra. He whipped the local guys including Love in his newish F1 Brabham by half a lap!!.

[Dougie]

Thanks a million KR, you have given me the answer that I have been looking for for a long time.