1968 CAMARO TRANS-AM: PENSKE’S UNFAIR ADVANTAGE!


Mark Donahue and top racers of the day consistently put Roger Penske’s Sunoco Blue Camaros on the Podium. Mike Gulett blogs about the first Camaro built for Penske’s 1968 Team, now owned and raced by Don Lee.



A few days ago I was visiting Don Lee's garage to see his classic AC Cobra 289. He opened his garage door and there was his beautiful Sunoco Blue 1968 Camaro Trans-Am racecar that looked familiar. It turns out that I had taken pictures of this car a few years earlier in the paddock at the Monterey Historic Races at Laguna Seca.




If you looked closely at Penske’s Camaro when it raced in 1968-’69, you might have noticed the small holes drilled around the “number roundel” on the acid-dipped body. This car was subject of infamous number switching between cars for tech inspection and qualifying at Sebring. Penske sent the legal car through tech twice with switched numbers and qualified the lightweight car with each set of numbers.



Penske’s Sunoco Blue Camaros had blueprinted Z/28 small-blocks fitted with prototype dual-quad manifolds with fresh air induction, oversize filler necks on the 40-gallon fuel cells and even vacuum retracted brake pads for quick service.





Please visit My Car Quest for Mike’s blog on the unstoppable Penske Camaro,

http://mycarquest.blogspot.com/2011/02/1968-penske-sunoco-camaro-race-car.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MyCarQuest+%28My+Car+Quest%29&utm_content=Yahoo!+Mail