Special Invitation

June 25, 2001 – The last Saturday of June Kent Lambert is holding an open house at his  new building in Odell, OR near Hood River, OR.  The building is two stories tall.  The ground floor is configured as single and double car garage/storage areas.  The upper floor is the new home of the Weaving groups that Judy was so active with.  The open house will run from 1:30-4:00 PM but Kent said anyone driving up from the Healey Club may come early and grab a good parking sport.  The address of the building in Odell (south of Hood River) is: 3399 – Odell Highway.  The new building is located directly behind Gehrig’s Chevron, 3387 – Odell Highway.

Healey Racing Report from Doug Escriva

The Sonoma Historic Motorsports Festival attracts some of the most prestigious vintage race cars from all of North American with 400 entered for the 2011 enent. My race group included ’55-’62 production GT cars of all makes and models: http://www.generalracing.com/attachments/193_SatGrps4Web.pdf The warm California weather I was expecting didn’t materialized as it rained all 4 days of the event. Racing in this field with some of best vintage drivers in the game I felt some what at home on the wet Sears Point track qualifying 2nd out of 30 cars. On Sunday’s main our group was the first out as it start to rain once again. As the green flag dropped and I climbed the hill entering the very technical sweeping off-camber turn # 2 I was passed by an incredibility fast ’59 Morgan (the eventual race winner) and the ’59 Sebring Sprite of Seattle billionaire Bruce McCaw. I re-passed McCaw in the Sprite on the following lap and started to settle in on making consistent laps while holding down solid 3rd place. With one lap to go while over taking 3 slower cars I moved off the dry race line and started to brake to set-up my turn-in for the up coming hairpin turn. My car suddenly hydroplaned and at that point I was merely a passenger as my car and I were no longer racing that day.

Video of Saturdays Qualifing race: http://youtube/wwP7UyjvUMY

Editor’s Note: Be sure you check out the website pdf file Doug identifies in the first sentence above.  It includes some great dshots of race machinery including Doug’sd Healey, # 414.  Then check out the youtube video of the rainey conditions at Sonoma.  Once you get on the youtube site it should also provide you with a string of other clips of racing activities.  Sone are with Doug and others are just cool racing videos and sounds.  If you are a gearhead it will be well worth the time spent to watch a few of the videos.  If the gearhead title is you, turn up you speakers.

Activities

June 27th – July 1st: Healey Rendezvous 2011.   Rockin 50′s & 60′spresented by Cascade Austin Healey Club of Washington.  Headquarters for the Rendezvous is the Heathman Lodge in Vancover, WA.  See the Cascade Club website for details and registration form.

http://cascadeahc.homestead.com/Rendezvous.html.

July 8-11th:

Portland HIstoric Races – Registration for the event includes a corral parking pass, two packets of admission tickets for the three eays.  AHCO point of contact is Nikk White.  (503) 936-5313.  You can check out details for the weekend at the Historic Race website at: http://www.portlandhistorics.com/

July 2nd – 8th

Colorado Springs, CO – The Austin-Healey Club of Americaa Conclave, portions of which will be held at the Air Force Academy.  Marilynne and I are going to attend so we will be leaving the Rendezvous early Thursday evening after the Rendezvous banquette.  I will report on the results of the Conclave in my Jusy Mark’sMemo and in the Austin-Healey Club USA magazine.  At last count I hear that the America Club has 270 registrations.  Should be a fantastic show.

July 17th

Forest Grove Concours d’Elegance – The Austin-Healey Club of Oregon has received a very interesting request.  The organizers of this prestigious charitable event have asked our Club to organize a special showing of the Austin-Healey marque at the July 17, 2011 event. These Healeys will not be judged in the concours competition but will be there for static display and viewing only.  Fourteen Healey owners, most of them AHCO members volunteered to show their cars.  The goal in arranging this show has been to display as wide a variety of Healey models as possible.  Final notification, registration form and directions to the volunteers went out earlier this week.   If you would like more information please call Mark Schneider at 503-643-7208.  You may also find information at: http://www.forestgroveconcours.org/

August 13 – 15, 2011

Joint meeting with the Cascade Club in Wesport, WA

The August meeting and tour with the Cascade Club.  This is an overnighter. To make your reservations call The Chateau Westport – (360)268-9101, mention the Austin Healey Club to receive a rate of $107.00 per night. Try to get the top floor for a better view.

NW Meet – Squamish BC, Canada

September 21 – 24th

We will leave Portland on Sept. 21st and tour north on Hwy. 101 on the West side of the Olympic Mountains to Port Angeles. We will ferry to Victoria BC then drive to Nanaimo and ferry to Vancouver. We will be staying at the

Executive Suites Garibaldi Springs Resort, 40900 Tantalous Road, Squamish, BC. Phone number is 1-877-815-0048. You will need to call to make your reservations for Thursday Sept. 22, 23 & 24th. Room rates are $119 per night for a studio and $129 for a one bedroom.  Ferry information and lodging for the 21st has not been finalized yet.

October 8th

Overnight Trip to Yachats

We will meet at the McDonalds in Philomath at 10:00 A.M. We will be staying at the Adobe Resort, 1555 Hwy. 101, Yachats, OR. Call to make your own reservations at 1-800-522-3623. You will need to mention the AHCO to receive a special rate of $92.40 plus tax. John and Joan Wilson are planning this event and they have a short tour of the area planned for Saturday afternoon. For those of us going from the Portland area we will plan to leave from the old G.I. Joes parking lot in Sherwood at 8:00 a.m. Our monthly meeting will be at the Resort after breakfast on Sunday morning.

PLEASE REVIEW all of the AHCO upcoming Activities and make you reservations for any you are planning to attend. Any questions on upcoming activities call George Koeber @ 503-244-3731 or John Carter @ 503-579-6599.

Kip Nienaber has been a member for many, many years and only moved to Texas (for his job) 4 years ago. I know folks will be happy to see him and his beautiful car at one of their Club events, which was a trip to a collector airplane museum near Dallas, Texas.

Skip

Earl Yarnal
40143 Deerhorn Rd.
Springfield, Or. 97478

541-741-3834

Earl has a 1968 Sprite MK IV

Don and Sharon Slaybaugh

9400 SW 130th Av.

Beaverton, Or. 97008

The Slaybaughs own a 1965 Mk 3

The day started out very brisk-read “cold”. A new member, John Meyer, had agreed to put his life in my hands and accompany me on the tour. Not knowing how John would feel about the cold, I put my top up but didn’t install the side curtains (wouldn’t want to spoil him). We arrived at the starting point at 9:00 A.M. to be greeted by an empty parking lot. Hmmm, maybe no one would show, what an easy deal that would be! However, five minutes later, the Clemensons, Maguires, Carol Trenko and friend, Bob Wallace and sister, Glen Enright with gracious wife Jan arrived. Off we went at full tilt over Cornelius Pass and onto Hwy 30, straight through to the Longview bridge and into Washington.

Tom's Healey with the top up!

Brave healey owners with the tops down

Cornelius Pass road

After lunch we headed west along the beautiful Willapa Bay and then South onto Hwy 101. Staying within the speed limit for a change, we were met by Chuck Gowan and navigator, Jerry Baron – coming up from the south. After they pulled in behind, we took off to continue our journey. We went past the Longbeach Peninsula, thru Chinook, across the Astoria bridge and onto Hwy 202. From Astoria we led the group to Seaside on the back curvy roads that you can only find after looking for many years. Bob Wallace, right behind me, did a great job of staying close to my tail end. He almost caught me a few times. I had to slow it down a bit when I noticed my passenger trying to rip the grab handle out of my dash.

Lunch break

Tom Monaco

Carol Trenko

Upon arriving at our beach house in Seaside, we were greeted by all those folks who wished they had driven their Healeys on such a tour as this. I won’t mention any names but you know who you are! The great cooking of Skip Monaco and Iva Curry made for a great dinner. Spicy pasta, great Italian salad and dessert; wow, what a meal!

The Jag made it.

Healey's at Tom and Skip's house in Seaside

All the Healeys made it home with no issues ( over 300 miles). If you couldn’t make it, I’m sorry. You missed the last great tour of the year. My co-pilot and I braved the trip home on Sunday night after a great day of fishing. It was about 38 degrees in the Coast Range at seven that night. You just don’t know cold until you try that trip. T.M.

Jim and Gail Smalley

P.O. Box 848

Wauna, WA 98395

The Smalleys are proud owners of a 1956 100-M

Nikk White

25285 SW Rainbow Ln.

Hillsboro, OR 97123

Nikk has a 1960 Sprite MK 1

click photos to enlarge

Friday morning, August 28, found four Healeys and their people ready to leave for the LeMay tour in Tacoma. John and Judy Carter led Jan and Gary Jackson, Jan Whittlesey and Glen Enright and Allan and Mary Gross on a very relaxing trip on mostly back roads and with great weather. We stopped for lunch at the Bean Tree in Morton, then headed for Tacoma.

The motel was easy to find as it was right next to the Tacoma Dome. Dennis Saxon met us there and we went to Famous Dave’s for dinner. We met people in the parking lot and on the trip back to the motel who all seemed to know about the LeMay event and who assumed we would be going. We had a reminder of Seattle area traffic on our way – no accident, just stop and go for the heck of it.

During the night on Friday we could hear the unmistakable sound of raindrops. It was still raining when we left to meet the group from the Washington Cascade Club and it kept raining for a good part of the morning. It is true if you go faster in the rain , it tends to blow over you. However, we never approached that speed so we were a little soggy when we arrived at Marymount, one of two sites for the show. Our group managed to arrive together and we were early enough that we all got to park in the second row of collector cars.

Still raining, most of us got on shuttle buses to go over to the LeMay Grounds where the LeMay’s house is. That isn’t all that is there. There was a whole tour set up to take you through a number of buildings, filled with cars and trucks and collections on both floors of the buildings. Mr. LeMay at one time had over 3100 cars in his collection- many fully restored, others sitting under the trees. Now the collection has about 2400 vehicles, 1000 on display and 1400 stored elsewhere. One of Mr. LeMay’s sons is carrying on buying more. It is hard to describe just what it was like. Everywhere you turned there were cars- almost all beautifully restored.

Some of the rooms were named after the cars in them like the Ford room. Amidst all the cars were car related toys, posters, gas pumps, wheels, parts and pictures. There were other collections of dolls, meat grinders, salt and pepper shakers, and brass hose nozzles, and an old general store, a soda fountain. There was an old schoolhouse, train cars, tractors- it went on and on.

After the tour at the house, a shuttle took us back to Marymount. Marymount was a boys Academy that Mr. LeMay bought. Here the buildings still look as they did on the outside, but inside they also are filled with cars. There were so many beautiful ones that it would be hard to pick a favorite. The featured car this year was the 1937 Chrysler Airflow. There were about 10 of these and a few beautifully restored and even one in the original state. One came all the way from Maryland.

Inside of the schools gym was a wide array of cars. Some were even mounted on the bleachers The focus was on four impeccably restored cars, a Cord, a Tucker, a Daimler and a Duesenberg. It was the most extensive collect of cars we have ever seen. I recommend it as a must see for any car enthusiast. Be warned however, be prepared for an overdose of cars. Check it out at www.lemaymuseum.org

This being a Healey trip, there were a few glitches. Gary Jackson’s car wouldn’t start after it was parked in the hotel garage. He needed a push out of the garage and down a small hill to get it going the next morning. Steve Day helped out on that one. Then, on the way home the Gross’ car stopped on the main street of Yelm. There we were, three Healeys, almost on the side of the road. We had a lot of help from the local people. One told us he thought he had seen water coming out under the car. Another told us about a mechanic he knew and another told us about a place where we could get off the road. The most helpful was a tow truck driver who pulled in behind us with his lights on so we wouldn’t get hit. He also followed us as we pushed the car to the vacant lot. Luckily for us, Gary had Steve Day’s phone number. He had the knowledge and we had the parts, but it was still two hours before we finally got it fixed. I think Steve must feel a little like a doctor at a party – ” I just have this little ache here.”  He and the Jacksons and the Carters were patient to say the least. Once the car was going, the rest of the trip was really pleasant.

Thanks to Dennis Saxon and the Carters for making the arrangements for the trip.

Submitted by Mary and Allan Gross

ORP held their first public opening on Saturday 9/28. Having neglected my ’65 BJ8 street car during the vintage racing season it was a nice opportunity to stretch it’s legs on the 2 1/2 hour drive to the Grass Valley track. I was impressed with the group that is behind this very ambitious endeavor, they appear to have a good long range plan for this wonderful new NW road race course. Though it’s a little out of the way, any die hard racer will have no problem camping on site for any event planned for this venue.  I enjoyed the 2 parade laps even if I couldn’t open her up too much.  http://www.oregonraceway.com/track_sched_news.php

This is a 7 minute  edited video of Richard Mayor racing in the rain at last years All British Field  Meet. Actually, it was the “Battle of Britain” handicap race put on by  the Canadians.

From Austin Colcord:

I’m looking for a 100-4 drivetrain for my bn2, and thought it would be best to start my search with club members.  You never know what someone might have in their garage!

If you can help him send him an email at austin.colcord at lifelock.com