Pete in the GT 40

The other day I mentioned the time that Peter got to sit in that GT 40 that’s now on the market, but I didn’t have any good pictures with me at the time. I finally got a chance to dig through my old pictures for one.

Here he is.

Isn’t that a great smile? I hope that the car’s next owner is as nice to kids as its current one is. That was a real treat.

When I was the age Pete is in that picture, my bedroom walls were covered with posters of the GT40’s epic battles with the Ferraris at Le Mans. Several of them are going to be back there this summer for the Classic.

I really like this view too.

Notice the Gurney bump over the driver’s seat. That was added to some of these cars because at just 40” tall, it was too cramped for tall drivers like Dan Gurney, who was one of my heroes at the time. His name is also associated with the Gurney Flap, which is an interesting bit of aerodynamics trickery which I did wind tunnel studies on when I was in college. As part of that work, I got to meet Dan in Gasoline Alley. At the time, I was probably grinning as hard as Pete is in that picture above.