When Roger
Menadue was given the task of building a lighter and
faster Sprite for the Healey team to race in the 12
Hour Race at Sebring in 1960, he acquired an unfinished "kit
car" project in order to fit its Falcon fibreglass body on to a
Sprite floor-pan. This was the first of the lightweight cars,
preceding the rather more sophisticated all-alloy race cars
which followed in later years. The body was originally designed for "special"
builders to convert old Ford saloons into "sports" cars.
The
car's first outing was at Nassau in 1959 in the hands of
Ed Leavens in the Nassau TT race for cars up to 2 litres
capacity in which he came 6th, and John Christy
who was 24th in the Governors Trophy race. It was fitted with Girling disc brakes at the front
and the larger than standard 8" drums at the rear, together with
steel wheels.
At
Sebring on 26th March 1960, the car had a full
height and
w
idth Perspex windscreen. The
story goes that
John Sprinzel practiced the car but the Healeys
felt he was using too many revs for the engine to last the
distance. Stirling Moss was
driving a Maserati in the 12 Hours but asked if he could try the
Sprite during practice. He went out and did 3 laps, improving on
Sprinzel's best time by
some four seconds, and using lower revs.
Moss was able to tell John where he could improve his speed through
one or two of the corners, and save the engine at the same time. In
the race Sprinzel and co-driver John Lumkin were delayed by a blown head gasket but continued,
and succeeded in taking the class win. They finished 41st
overall.
(Photos thanks to Jonathan
Whitehouse-Bird & Dave Nicholas)
The car was also
entered for LeMans that year when it had a faired-in headrest behind
the driver and the Perspex screen had to be changed for a glass one
in two pieces - which had an adverse effect on its top speed. It was
also fitted with the Dunlop Light Car 4 wheel disc brake set-up
and
wire wheels (for this race only). John Colgate and
John Dalton were the drivers, the car using an XSP
engine bored out to 996 ccs. It ran as a special sports edition in
the prototype class, which it won, displaying the UK registration number 5983AC ~
used subsequently by the DHMC on other racing Sprites. The car's best lap was 91.15
mph, and it covered 2,055 miles, in the 24 hours, coming in 20th
overall (though a Corvette and the entire Triumph TRS team were
later disqualified moving it up to 16th). It was also 11th in the Index of Performance and 12th in
the sports car class. (photo courtesy of
www.sebringsprite.de)
The car later returned
to the US where it was raced as a 'works' entry for the 4th and final time,
at Nassau, in the hands of John Colgate ~ once again
winning its class. He was placed 18th in the Governors Trophy
and 20th in the Nassau Trophy. After the race,
in December 1960, the Healeys sold the car,
in the States, to Leo Picard who subsequently had John Colgate race it for
him at Thompson Raceway. It had three or maybe four more owners,
all of
whom are believed to have lived in Rhode Island, before passing into
the hands of Tom Bratten who ran a firm called Auto
Technia. The business went broke and it maybe that Tom took the
car away with him leading to its eventual abandonment.
In 1971 the Sprite was
discovered, and acquired, by its current owner Roger Sieling, rusting
away on an Ohio farm. It is currently in pieces under-going
restoration.
(Below, the car as purchased by Roger, complete with
seized XSP engine)
