The 70s US superteam that tried and failed to crack F1
Vel’s Parnelli Jones Racing was briefly one of the biggest names on the US motorsports scene, but its ambition outstripped its resources. STUART CODLING relates the story of a Formula 1 campaign cut off in its prime
You could drive past 20555 Earl Street, Torrance without any inkling of the site’s previous life. Once the hub of one of US racing’s most dynamic and ambitious operations, it’s now just another anonymous low-rise office complex in the greater Los Angeles urban sprawl.
In the early 1970s Vel’s Parnelli Jones Racing juggled successful IndyCar campaigns with Formula 5000, NHRA Top Fuel and Funny Car and USAC dirt racing, earning itself the somewhat unimaginative sobriquet of “the Superteam”. When VPJ hired Lotus 72 co-designer Maurice Phillippe in late 1971, Formula 1’s addition to that portfolio seemed inevitable.
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