1988 Spokane Grand Prix

[latendresse76]

So i looked through my stuff and found that i have a program from the 1988, I'm working on scanning it but right now my friend doesn't have his hooked up and i ain't got one. I'll edit it in to this post when i do get some more scanned in.

[RandyL14]

Sea Fury,

One error, the island Riverfront Park is one is a natural island, not man made, as is Canada Island (also part of the park) just to the northwest of the main Park. Used to be the main rail yard for several years until it bacame the site of the Expo 74, the World's Fair hosted by Spokane. After Expo '74 the City of Spokane turned it into a City park, which it still is today.

It is also where I met my wife when we were both working Grounds Maintenance in the summers while we were going to College. I spent one summer taking care of Canada island, that was an interesting place at 6:00 am. Yesterday was the 28th anniversary of our first date, by the way.

They put divers under the bridges for practice and the races. I don't think it would have done much good if a driver had gone off on the Post street bridge, as it was probably 80 -100 feet down to the river.

The race was a great event, I sat above the tunnel as the cars came down Washington Street and went into the tunnel both years. But. like so many street races of that era, it just didn't work financially. I still miss it, and I still have my commorative bottles of wine from, I think, the first year.

[Sea Fury]

http://www.wegcircuits.nl/blog.html

There's information on both Tacoma and Spokane about halfway down the page. Note the fifth-place finisher in 1988.

The brief life of the Budweiser-sponsored Spokane Grand Prix partially overlaps with that of its Tacoma counterpart. The idea for a downtown street race in Washington's second largest city as a new addition to the annual Neighbor Days Festival was first put forward in 1986. A year later and after dodging a range of financial and political issues, the definitive green light was finally given in late June 1987, days before the planned inaugural running in early July. The programme, very similar to Tacoma's, included four races:

* NASCAR Winston West Series (100 laps)
* Formula Atlantic (40 laps)
* Formula Club Ford (17 laps)
* Pro Sports 2000 (30 laps)

The 1.65-mi Spokane circuit encircled Riverfront Park, a man-made island in the Spokane River, and like Tacoma was essentially your typical grid-pattern American street course, except that it also included a tunnel and no less than three river crossings. As such it was quite a remarkable course.

A lap began on North Washington Street just before the Washington Bridge. At this point the fastest cars would be doing around 150 mph before entering the Monaco-esque tunnel on Havermale Island. Coming out of the short tunnel, drivers forked left, going over the water again, and then turned sharp right onto West Spokane Falls Boulevard. This straight permitted 120 mph or so, before another sharp right and an S-curve led onto the narrow Post Street Bridge, the third and final crossing of the Spokane River. The rest of the lap was rather less remarkable, as the course simply zig-zagged past the post office, the Coliseum (since replaced by the Veterans Memorial Arena), and the pit lane, which was situated on West Gardner Avenue rather than at start-finish. A final 90-degree right completed the lap.

Sadly, the Spokane Grand Prix was plagued by delays. All running on Friday was cancelled as preparations to get the course ready were still ongoing. Rain showers during the weekend further upset the schedule, and on Sunday the headlining Winston West Budweiser 300 didn't end until 8 pm! Here's the top five:

* Roy Smith (Ford) 100 laps
* Chad Little (Ford) +3.7s
* Sumner McKnight (Ford) 100 laps
* Bill Schmitt (Chevrolette) 98 laps
* Hershel McGriff (Pontiac) 96 laps

The other races were won by Johnny O'Connell (Formula Atlantic), Randy McDaniel (Pro Sports 2000) and Ed Freutel (Formula Club Ford). O'Connell also turned out the fastest driver of the weekend, as he clocked both pole position (1.14,991) and the fastest lap (1.14,998) of the Atlantic race, averaging just under 80 mph for both laps.

Afterwards, city officials declared the inaugural Spokane Grand Prix a success despite numerous teething troubles. It was announced the soggy three-day event attracted 32,000 people, which, although less than hoped, was not bad for a first time, but it later turned out that paid attendance was only 12,000 or so, meaning many people had sneaked a peek without buying a ticket, hence a six-figure deficit.

The second Spokane Grand Prix was held a year later with an identical programme, except for the addition of Pro Formula Russell as a fifth class and slight tweaks to most of the race distances. Dean Hall took pole position for the Formula Atlantic race this time, but Johnny O'Connell got by after a lap, and although both drivers turned in near-identical best laps (1.15,622 for Hall vs 1.15,687 for O'Connell), the latter ultimately claimed his second consecutive Spokane victory with ease. The Budweiser 300 NASCAR race was also won by last year's winning driver, Roy Smith, who also took home the championship that season.

* Roy Smith (Ford Thunderbird) 100 laps
* Bill Schmitt (Chevrolette Monte Carlo) +3.34s
* Jim Danielson (Buick LeSabre) 100 laps
* John Krebs (Oldsmobile Delta) 100 laps
* Tommy Kendall (Buick Regal) 99 laps

The second Spokane Grand Prix ran a lot more smoothly than the first. Each race ran as scheduled, and rain that once again threatened to cause trouble never materialized. Immediately after the event, Grand Prix officials painted an optimistic picture for the future... In reality though, the organising Spokane Grand Prix Association faced a $700,000 debt after two years of auto racing on city streets. By December 1988 hope for a third running, to be headlined by SCCA TransAm, had all but faded and the event was declared dead unless an unforeseen saviour would step forward... which, of course, never happened.

[SteveK51]

Great stuff!

Great to see you online Calvin

[chaparral 2k]

Great stuff!

[SoundMan360]

Found this (thanks, Vic, for the O'Connell tip); looks like Formula Atlantics for '87 and '88:

07/05/87, WCAR, Spokane, Johnny O'Connell, Ralt/Ford RT4
07/03/88, WCAR, Spokane, Johnny O'Connell, Ralt/Ford RT4


And the following headlines from July 6, 1987:

"Pole-sitter Johnny O'Connell grabbed the lead on the fifth lap and won the 40-lap Formula Atlantic race in the inaugural Grand Prix of Spokane (Wash.). Formula Atlantic cars are scaled-down versions of Indy cars."

"Pole-sitter Johnny O'Connell grabbed the lead on the fifth lap and held off Ted Prappas the rest of the way to win the 40-lapFormula Atlantic race in the inaugural Grand Prix of Spokane. O'Connell's victory margin in the 66-mile race was 6.5 seconds."

"Pole-sitter Johnny O'Connell took the lead on the fifth lap and held off Ted Prappas to win the 40-lap Formula Atlantic race in the inaugural Grand Prix of Spokane, Wash."

Cool Fourth of July weekend event.

[latendresse76]

here are a few images i have on the PC right now from then..


This image is of the Fleckinstein HM1 (Home made one), built by Gregory La Tendresse and John Fleckinsteine (sp? been years) and support facility for the car that was the winner of the 1988 Formula Club Ford race. It now sits a little worse for ware about 25 ft behind me.



And a post card.... you still see those barriers being used around Spokane flat on one side and three times as thick as a normal one.

[cornutt]

Edit: Here's the wiki article on the late ARCA racer Chris Gehrke, stating that he won a Star Mazda race at that event: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Gehrke

Wow. I had no idea that Chris did any open wheel. He was a very talented racer and his death was doubly tragic because it was so unnecessary.

[latendresse76]

Ah the fond memories..... I was 11 for the first race my father was running in the Formula Ford class he finished 6th with a broken sway bar.... in 1988 he couldn't race because he hadn't competed in enough races that year, so he rented the car to Mark Jaremko he qualified second. On the last lap i think it was Eric Youngstrom that was in the lead and watched in his mirror the guy in second, his name eludes me #8, have a lapped car get in his way and take him out. Eric was a bit more worried about what was going on behind him to notice the turn and he caught the wall. Mark Jaremko was given the lead and the win.

there was Formula Ford, formula atlantic, NASCAR's Westerns and the sport 2000 cars i'm not sure if it was the American City Racing League at that time but it's the same cars use in that series.


if you look in the google news archives now most of the Spokesman Review papers from then have been scanned in

1987

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=0klj8wIChNAC&dat=19870704&printsec=frontpage&hl=en

1988

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=0klj8wIChNAC&dat=19880702&printsec=frontpage&hl=en

oddly the July 3 1988 paper is MIA which for me is kinda amusing because i know i have bits of it

yea it was a money looser but it wasn't the races fault the SPD was paid like 25K to provide security and didn't people were knocking down fences and getting in for free while the police that were suppose to stop it watched.

[Twehttam]

Randy, if you don't mind shooting more info my way, I'd love it.

I was at at least one of those and I distinctly remember being at Riverfront Park with my Dad and brother as the cars whipped by. Great memory.

[RandyL14]

They also ran, if I remember the name right, the American City Racing League, and I think one other small open wheel class.

The race was run right around the 4th of July both years, and there were weather problems both years. The city would not allow the organizers (led by Chad Little's mom, Terri I believe) to shut down the streets until late Thursday night and they never had enough volunteers to get the barriers and fencing up until late Friday afternoon either year.

It was neat track, it ran through a tunnel at one point, under Riverfront Park in downtown, and crossed the Spokane River twice. We always sat in the stands above the tunnel and the cars would go right underneath us, way cool, probably 100 feet above the track. My dad and I got pit passes and I remember standing about 10 feet from Hershel McGriff and being too big a wuss to get shake his hand.

I have the programs from both years, and even a couple bottles of "Spokane Grand Prix Wine" (I think I have both red and white) if anybody would like more information.

[JThur1]

The Spokane Grand Prix. They ran NASCAR Winston West up there. Budweiser 300, won in 1987 and 1988 by Roy Smith. That's right-NASCAR street race. The West series has always seemed a little more open to road racing than the Southern boys, racing at places like Spokane, Riverside, Laguna Seca, Sears Point, and other road courses.

IIRC the whole thing was a money-looser, but that was 20 years ago and my memory of it is a little foggy. All I remember was seeing news reports about it on TV and that they didn't seem to be positive. I think they viewed it as a couple of trial years before making a bid for a big event like an Indy car race, trying to prove themselves the way Long Beach did with F5000 before getting an F1 race, but they never got it to work.

NASCAR's Western series also had a "street race" around the Tacoma Dome in Tacoma, WA.

And, of course, one of the main reasons the Western series has run at so many road courses was out of necessity. The fact that there were good road course facilities in the Western U.S., while larger ovals - even 1/2 miles - were in short supply. I remember times where ESPN commentators would talk about how road racing "dominated" the Western series, which wasn't accurate. I think 5 was the most in one season.

The FIA required courses to hold a preliminary race before sanctioning a championship F1 GP, so that's why Long Beach hosted the F5000 race (it was unusual to do that so close to the proposed date. It had always been done approximately a year earlier. Of course, being a city street course, LBGP organizers were able to argue on behalf of special circumstances).

Many street race promoters in smaller markets probably hoped to have a CART race or even IMSA race, but they were being unrealistic...think about how many other short lived 80's era "street races" there were with secondary classes.

[Twehttam]

Found this (thanks, Vic, for the O'Connell tip); looks like Formula Atlantics for '87 and '88:

07/05/87, WCAR, Spokane, Johnny O'Connell, Ralt/Ford RT4
07/03/88, WCAR, Spokane, Johnny O'Connell, Ralt/Ford RT4


And the following headlines from July 6, 1987:

"Pole-sitter Johnny O'Connell grabbed the lead on the fifth lap and won the 40-lap Formula Atlantic race in the inaugural Grand Prix of Spokane (Wash.). Formula Atlantic cars are scaled-down versions of Indy cars."

"Pole-sitter Johnny O'Connell grabbed the lead on the fifth lap and held off Ted Prappas the rest of the way to win the 40-lapFormula Atlantic race in the inaugural Grand Prix of Spokane. O'Connell's victory margin in the 66-mile race was 6.5 seconds."

"Pole-sitter Johnny O'Connell took the lead on the fifth lap and held off Ted Prappas to win the 40-lap Formula Atlantic race in the inaugural Grand Prix of Spokane, Wash."

[Twehttam]

Wow, stock cars? I don't remember that at all...crazy!

The race I was at was definitely OW and it was probably the first time I really fell for these cars. The sound, in person, was amazing.

[Gerr]

Seem to recall the American Indycar Series ran in Spokane.