Video of 1968 Champ Car race at Hanford

A 10-minute "Car and Track" video of the Fall 1968 Champ Car race at Hanford has surfaced, and it provides some nice insight in to the track. 

I've been on the lookout for the long-rumored video of Champ Cars at Hanford, so it was thrilling for me to stumble across this footage on YouTube. 

The graphic on this episode of "Car and Track" hosted by Bud Lindemann says the footage is from 1970, but it's in fact from the November 1968 "California 250" race at the track, as an astute YouTube watcher pointed out. ABC originally broadcast the race, paying $3,750 for the rights. 

One thing you'll notice quickly is the sandy surface, which was among Bobby Unser's main recollections of the track. 

"We had good races there but I distinctly remember sand when we raced there," Unser told me in a 2011 telephone interview from his home in New Mexico. "It was a "big slide for life" type of deal, that's what Hanford was."

At the 1:30 mark, the video shows several cars sliding in the dusty conditions and leaving heavy rooster tails behind, and it's clear from watching the entire race that few cars dared to venture outside a very narrow racing line along the apron on what was a wide track. That line kept cars from drifting up very far into the high-banked Turn 1. 

And while the racing line was narrow, the video captures quite a few passes. 

Here are a few specific things to watch for:

• At 5:20, you see new vs. old as Mario Andretti's rear-engine Brawner-Offy blows by the front-engine Lesovsky-Offy dirt car driven by Greg Weld.  
• At 5:30, you see the crash involving Mel Kenyon and Johnny Rutherford unfold, and Rutherford's wheel come loose and roll down the track. 
• A panoramic shot at the beginning of the race shows the mostly barren infield, which doubled as a drag-boat lake. At 9:57, you can see water from that lake near Turn 1, and not too far from the track surface. 

Table of contents

I've posted several dozen different "chapters" on the history of Marchbanks Speedway, aka Marchbanks Stadium and Hanford Motor Speedway, so have decided to put together a Table of Contents to help readers find topics of interest, particularly the interviews with racers who knew the track first-hand, including legends like Andretti, Unser and Kenyon.

These are listed in the order I originally posted them (some, particularly the main history, have been updated multiple times). 

1. History of Marchbanks Speedway, aka Hanford Motor Speedway
2. 1967 Champ Car race program
3. More photos from the 1967 Champ Car race
4. 1970 stock plan tried to keep Hanford Motor Speedway alive
5. March 1968 Champ Car race program
6. Second death at Marchbanks/Hanford speedway
7. November 1968 Champ Car race program
8. April 1969 Champ Car race program
9. Additions to Marchbanks Speedway history
10. "The Fabulous Mr. Marchbanks"
11. Cool photos of the Marchbanks road course
12. Reader: Hanford 250 "the best auto race I have ever seen"
13. My interview with Gary Marchbanks
14. My interview with Tommy Trader
15. Details of 1957 death at Marchbanks
16. Updates to Marchbanks history
17. Readers share recollections of racing at Marchbanks, Hanford
18. My chat with racing legend Mel Kenyon
19. My chat with Bobby Unser
20. My interview with George Benson
21. My interview with Mario Andretti
22. Hanford through the lens of a teenager
23. More great photos from 1968-69 Champ Car races
24. Fresh updates to Marchbanks Speedway/Hanford Motor Speedway history 
25. 1967 George Snider feature story
26. Marchbanks inducted into West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame

Marchbanks inducted into West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame

The West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame has announced B.L. Marchbanks will be part of its 2012 class of inductees. 

Marchbanks will be included as part of the Phoenix hall's "historic division" governing people from 1930-1970. 

Hall of Fame Chairman Ken Clapp said of the nominees, "In some cases these gentlemen are nearly forgotten ..." 

Indeed. 

Kudos to the hall for recognizing Marchbanks later rather than never. 

1967 George Snider feature story

Click to open PDF of storyMike Griffith, the longtime motorsports reporter at The Bakersfield Californian, passed along a story I hadn't seen in my Hanford Motor Speedway research. 

It's a Californian feature story from October 1967, on hometown racer George Snider and previewing the first Champ Car race at Hanford. 

I've tried twice without luck to interview Snider for my history. So here's a 45-year-old story that fills in some of the blanks on Snider's experience at Hanford, Indy, Kearney Bowl and elsewhere.