I started racing in 1967 and the last race I drove was this 1992 12 Hour Firehawk Endurance race – Roger Elliot, Bill Lamb and myself drove Wayne Hosaki’s Mazda RX7. Also down from Canada were Rick Bye, Tom Hnatiw and a few others. About 3 hours in while Bill Lamb was driving, the clutch let go and the car coasted to stop driver`s left near the bridge at Corner 3. I saw Marty Kaufman in the Tower who said that the car was not going to be towed in, so we did a driver change over to me. The car was pushed into the infield and 30 minutes later, I had the clutch out on the ground smoking – by myself (no help allowed, the driver had to do all the work by himself.) About an hour later, it was all back together with a ‘borrowed’ clutch – no help, all by myself – and I went back out to do my shift!!! True story!
I owned and was operating my own shop at that time – The Old Car Factory – and was hands-on, so pulling and re-installing the clutch on my own was no biggie. Today? Uh – not so much!! LOL!