On the Thursday evening of the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach race weekend, the Road Racing Drivers Club hosted its traditional banquet at the Hilton hotel on Ocean Boulevard, this year convening to honor George Follmer. Before a room filled with racing royalty, Master of Ceremonies Bobby Rahal, the RRDC President, led George through his career stage by stage.
The evening began with a cocktail reception in the hotel’s courtyard, sponsored by American Honda, where two cars from Follmer’s career—the Lola T70-Chevrolet he drove for Mecom Racing in 1966 and ’67 (now owned by Ben Reiling), and the Sunoco Porsche 911 RSR he shared with Mark Donohue in 1973 (now owned by Albert Arciero)—were on display.
Upstairs the evening opened with a humorous video tribute to Follmer presented by David Hobbs, after which Rahal began his interrogation of the honored guest. They began with George’s early days driving a VW Beetle in Cal Club events and progressed swiftly to 1965 when “Giant Killer” George topped the mighty Chaparrals of Jim Hall, who was in attendance, to win the USRRC crown.
Asked to speak of his experiences with George was Trevor Harris, creator of the first AVS Shadow Mark 1, the ultra-radical “Tiny Tire” Can-Am car that Follmer debuted in 1970. He called Follmer “the bravest guy in the world” for his ability to drive “the wheels off” of the notoriously difficult car.
Follmer and Rahal were also joined on the stage by Roger Penske, who called on George to substitute for Donohue in the first of the Porsche 917/10s after Mark injured his leg in a big crash at Road Atlanta. George proceeded to win the Can-Am crown, adding it to the Trans-Am title he’d previously secured to become the only driver ever to win two major U.S> championships in the same season.
“When George joined us,” Penske recalled, “he became the glue that held our team together during a time of trial.” He then noted that even though it already had a significant advantage, the “family” team embraced George, and he and Mark worked together to make the cars even better.
“It was a friendship and a competitive friendship that started way back in the early ’60s,” said Follmer. “We raced together for years, sometimes as teammates and sometimes as competitors, and yet we were always respectful of each other.”
Even though that Can-Am crown might be the highlight of a career during which he drove “everything”—USRRC, Can-Am, Trans-Am, Indycars, Formula 5000, IMSA, Formula One and NASCAR—winning in most of them, George offered that he had “always enjoyed my time with Porsche, I won a lot of races, but my time with Bud Moore and Parnelli in the Trans-Am was pretty special.” Jones, a previous RRDC honoree, was also in the audience for his friend’s tribute.
As the evening drew to a close, Follmer was toasted with champagne and presented with the first limited edition giclee print of the banquet’s backdrop mural by artist Randy Owens (above). For complete information about the RRDC and its many programs, please visit www.rrdc.org
