|
Briggs Swift Cunningham II (January 19, 1907 – July 2, 2003) was an American entrepreneur and sportsman, who raced automobiles and yachts. Born into a wealthy family, he became a racing car constructor, driver, and team owner as well as a sports car manufacturer and automobile collector. He skippered the first victorious 12-Metre yacht Columbia in the 1958 America's Cup race, and invented the eponymous device, the Cunningham, to increase the speed of racing sailboats. He was featured on the April 26, 1954 cover of Time magazine, with three of his Cunningham racing cars. The caption reads: ''Road Racer Briggs Cunningham: Horsepower, Endurance, Sportsmanship''. He became an early member of the Road Racing Drivers Club (RRDC), an invitation-only club formed to honor notable road racing drivers. The October 2003 ''Road & Track'' magazine article, "Briggs Swift Cunningham—A Life Well Spent", states that "by building and sailing his own ships, and building and racing his own cars, Briggs Cunningham epitomized the definition of the American sportsman." He was inducted into the America's Cup Hall of Fame in 1993, the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 1997, and named to the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2003. Cunningham died in Las Vegas, of complications from Alzheimer's Disease, at the age of 96. == Automobile manufacture and competition == Introduced to motorsports as a youngster when his uncle took him to road races just after the first world war, Cunningham began international racing in 1930 with his college friends Miles and Samuel Collier, who in 1933 founded the Automobile Racing Club of America (renamed the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) in 1944). He continued in competition for 36 years. By 1940 he was building sports cars for others to race. His first race as a driver was with his Bu-Merc, a modified Buick chassis with Buick engine, and Mercedes-Benz SSK body, at Watkins Glen shortly after World War Two. Some of his other hybrids involved Cadillacs, Chryslers, and Fords. Cunningham was one of the first to purchase a Ferrari barchetta, which was raced along with other marques he constructed or owned. In 1950 Briggs Cunningham entered two Cadillac cars for Le Mans, one a stock-appearing Cadillac Model 60, the other a special-bodied sports car dubbed "Le Monstre."〔See: ''Motor Sport'', January 1951, Page 8.〕 They finished 10th and 11th overall.〔See: ''Motor Sport'', August 1950, Page 389.〕 On December 31, 1950 Cunningham participated in the 6-hour Sam Collier Memorial Race, the first automobile race held on the Sebring Airport race track, which was won by a Crosley HotShot. Cunningham finished 3rd in class and 17th overall in his Aston Martin DB2 Vantage LML/50/21, the first Vantage produced. 1955 was last year for the Cunningham marque of cars. The Internal Revenue Service rules of the time allowed such prototype low volume manufacturers 5 years to reach profitability before classifying the business as a non-deductible hobby.〔http://www.virhistory.com/vir/people/cunningham.htm Briggs Cunningham Biography, Phil Allen〕 By 1956 Team Cunningham, which also fielded other marques, was described as a dominant force in SCCA sports car racing — a distinction the team retained for the next decade. The team traveled in a caravan with tractor trailer vans that contained the automobiles, mechanics and equipment, and set up in the pits to serve every mechanical or personal need of the team. This contrasted with the typical arrival into the pits of a single race car on a trailer, and was described as "impressive" by driver Lake Underwood. The team's chief mechanic was Alfred Momo. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Briggs Cunningham」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|