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Index by last name:
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[1993] [1994] [1995] [1996] [1997] [1998] [1999] [2000] [2001] [2002] [2003] [2004] [2005] [2006] [2007]
Bill Sadler (1993)
Canada's most successful racecar builder, Bill Sadler earned a place in motorsport history with the cars he designed and built. His most successful racers were the Comstock-Sadlers he built in 1961. He won against some of the great European racecars of the day. Although ahead of their time, the Sadlers had a profound effect on the future design of Group 7 and Can-Am cars.
More about this member :: Back to top Dr. Hugh Scully (2000)
Dr. Scully has made an immense medical and safety contribution to the sport of auto racing in Canada. Working with safety proponents such as Jackie Stewart and Dr. Sid Watkins. As well as chief of surgery at Toronto General Hospital, Professor of Medicine at University of Toronto and immediate past-president of the Ontario Medical Association, current president of the Canadian Medical Association, Dr. Scully is also medical director of the Grand Prix of Canada/Montreal and the Molson Indys Toronto and Vancouver. As well, he is No. 2 in the world (behind Prof. Sid Watkins) on the FIA Medical and Circuit Safety Committee. Although not as visible to motorsport fans as the drivers, promoters, and team owners the contributions of people such as Dr.Scully are vitally important to the growth and prosperity of our sport.
More about this member :: Back to top Dave Sehl (2001)
Dave Sehl was very likely Canada's most successful dirt-track motorcycle racer. Unlike the up-and-over motocross rider, or the super-smooth motorcycle road racer, dirt-track motorcycle racing is conducted on speedways from a half-mile dirt track to ones a mile long. The riders are flat on the machines down the straights and then slide through the turns with one foot skipping along the top of the dirt surface to keep everything upright. Dirt-track speedway motorcycle racers are the bravest of the brave. During his three-year professional career riding for Harley-Davidson, Dave won six AMA National races, a marvellous record. He won on the half-mile tracks at Louisville (three times), Columbus and Terre Haute and on the mile at Atlanta, Ga. Dave Sehl was king of the dirt. He won the dirt portion of the AMA championship in 1969; he was fifth in the AMA National title chase in 1971 and 10th in 1972. As well as competing in the United States, Canadian Motorcycle Association records show that Dave was the 250 Expert Dirt Track Champion in 1970 and 1973 and the 750 Expert Dirt Track Champion in 1971 and 1973. As well as winning sanctioned events, Dave was also expert at running non-sanction, big-money events, notably an invitation-only race in 1971 at Roosevelt Raceway on Long Island, N.Y., when he walked away with first prize money of $4,000 from a $15,000 total purse.
More about this member :: Back to top Bill Sharpless (1996)
Scrambles, Enduros, Trials, Road Racing, Dirt Track and Ice Racing - in a career that spanned 22 years, Bill Sharpless rode them all. And he wasn't just a dabbler. He tackled each motorcycle discipline with panache, verve and winning form, earning himself the handle "all-rounder", not to mention a trunkload of championship titles. He started racing in 1953 when motocross went by the name "scrambles" and few serious dirt bikes were available. Most off-road competition then was done on motorcycles that were little more than modified street machines. Compared to today's state-of-the-art motocross weapons, they were heavy, (weighing up to 180 kilograms), technically unsophisticated, and far from dirt friendly. Bill Sharpless may well be considered a motorsport anomaly, and not just because he was a master of several disciplines. Unlike most of his peers and successors, who sacrificed post-secondary education for a career in racing, Bill studied mechanical and aeronautical engineering at the University of Toronto, and spent those summers taking pilot training in the RCAF. Bill modestly credits his success in racing not so much to talent, but to a passion for motorcycles, and the fact that he rode street bikes as a chief means of transportation for 30 years. His love affair with motorcycles not only translated into "ace competitor," but "event organizer" as well. He was a founding member of the competition- oriented Nortown Motorcycle Club in 1953. From '54 to '65 (except for a 2-year stint in the Air Force) he served the club as either president or treasurer and spearheaded the organization of more than 100 motorcycle events. Motorcycle competition, however, is where Bill excelled above all else. He won his first Canadian Championship in Enduros in 1955 on his modified 650cc street bike. 1956 and '57 were spent in the RCAF in New Brunswick, where he organized the Maritimes' first Road Race and first Enduro. Then back to Toronto to an engineering job at De Havilland Aircraft, and to begin motorcycle competition in earnest. And what success he had. 1958 was the first of 4 consecutive years that he laid claim to the coveted "White Trophy", (named after Ron and Eve White, early CMA officials who are also members of the Hall of Fame). The trophy was awarded to the rider who accumulated the most points in Canada in the various disciplines, and with it, the overall championship. During this period, Bill's successes included the 1959 Canadian Trials, the '59 and '60 Canadian 500cc Scrambles, and numerous Regional Championships. Although road racing championships escaped him, Bill was recognized as one of its top competitors, both in Canada and in the Amateur Class in the United States, where in 1961 he was sponsored by the Triumph Corporation. But then in March of '62 disaster struck. While leading the 125 mile road race at Daytona, Bill suffered a crash that left him in traction for 6 weeks with a multiple-fractured leg. Problems with the leg and mounting family responsibilities forced him into semi-retirement, now competing only in Trials and Enduros, and refereeing at Road Races. The operative words are ``semi-retirement'' because Bill won the Canadian Enduro Championship in 1966 and '67. In 1969 at age 35 he decided to go overseas to ride his first International Six Day Enduro, but one week before leaving he was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis in his left hip. Since his motorcycle had already been shipped, and with a prescription of an anti- inflamatory drug that seemed to work, he left for Germany anyway. He did not finish his first ISDE, but he had to try again, so off to Spain in 1970 where he finished with a Bronze Medal, then to England's Isle of Mann in 1971 for a Silver. In the spring of '72 Bill again won the Canadian Enduro Championship, but further trips to the ISDE in Czechoslovakia in '72 and the USA in '73 did not produce the elusive Gold Metal he longed for. By 1974 arthritis in Bill's hands prevented him from further ISDT attempts, but it didn't stop him from trying the new sport of studded- tire ice racing. It did, however, finally put an end to his competiton career in 1975. But he still does score- keeping at enduros as his interest has never wavered.
More about this member :: Back to top Lloyd Shaw (2006)
Competitor/Builder Oval Track Racing
Lloyd Shaw had a spectacular career as a builder of racing cars, as a
champion racer at home and in the United States in both open-wheel and
closed-wheel cars, and as an administrator and promoter. Born in Toronto in
1912, he was 20 when he built his first sprint car and went racing at
speedways in places like Leamington, Chatham, and Sarnia. With most of the
records missing, we don't know how many races he won in those days but we do
know that on his first visit to the circuit in Leamington, he set Canadian
and British Empire speed records for a half-mile dirt track. Following the
Second World War, in which he flew bombers for the Royal Canadian Air Force,
Lloyd won Canadian Auto Racing Society sprint-car championships in 1948,
1950, '51 and '52. During the 1950 season, Lloyd also drove a stock car and
won that year's CARS stock car championship. In 1953, NASCAR opened up a
Grand National race at Langhorne, Pa., to "foreign cars." Lloyd's sponsor,
James Cook, who was the Canadian agent for Jaguar cars and had dealerships
in Toronto and Winnipeg, entered a Jaguar for Lloyd and he won the pole in
it. To this day, Lloyd Shaw is the only Canadian ever to win a pole in
NASCAR's premier division. As well as racing himself, he was also a builder.
He was one of the founders of the Toronto Racing Drivers' Club (he also
served as treasurer and was instrumental in the club's construction of
Canada's first post-war race track, Pinecrest Speedway) and the Canadian
Auto Racing Society. He retired from active participation in the sport in
the mid-1950s and died in 1983.
More about this member :: Back to top Bruce Simpson (2006)
John Bird and Bruce Simpson - Competitors Rally Racing
"Always play to win." That was the motto of the rally team of John Bird and
Bruce Simpson - and win they did. As a team, they entered 140 rallies and
won 107. A few times they were merely close, recording 12 seconds and 5
thirds. That is a record unmatched in motorsport. The record shows that John
Bird, a university professor, was Canadian Rally Champion in 1963, 1964,
1965 and Bruce Simpson, an elementary school teacher, won the title in 1966.
In those days the Fidler Trophy was given to the winner of the National
Rally Championship. There was no separate category for drivers and
navigators as is the case today. They won four consecutive events with
losses of 0, 1, 0, 0 penalty points. John Bird still insists that the
organizers made the mistake on the second of those four rallies. This all
took place at a time when rallying attracted a large number of competitors
and 100-car fields were not unusual. The team of Simpson and Bird defined
rally excellence in Canada against all comers. They became legend not just
for their ability to win but for the way they went about winning. They were
all business, but they also indulged their other interests as they competed,
listening to football games and cheering for their respective teams - John
supporting the Argos and Bruce for the TiCats. John Bird entered the
ultimate Canadian rally, the Shell 4000, six times and won it twice while
navigating for driver Klaus Ross. Ross and Bird were the only team ever to
win it back-to-back, in 1964 and 1965. John and Bruce each won the Ontario
Rally championship seven times. Bruce won it seven consecutive years from
1963 to 1969. John missed in 1964 but won it in 1962. John, Bruce and Paul
Manson shared the Wilson Trophy for most active competitor of the year in
1965. Bruce also won it in 1963. They also had success rallying with others.
John Bird navigated for a number of other drivers on 100 rallies winning 37.
Bruce Simpson won 14 of 27 rallies while driving for other navigators. He
also won 50 rallies while navigating for several other drivers on 97
rallies.
More about this member :: Back to top Bob and Leone Slack (2002)
As Hall of Fame member Ernie McLean earned induction as the man who built stock car racing in New Brunswick, so Bob Slack, and his wife Leone, became known as the couple who built the "Charlotte of the North,'' Ontario's Cayuga Speedway. Commitment, dedication and hard work were the trademarks of Bob and Leone Slack. Their devotion and loving care, along with an emphasis on taking care of the fans as well as the competitors, established Cayuga as one of the premier short tracks in North America. As H.A. "Humpy'' Wheeler, president and general manager of the Lowe's Motor Speedway at Charlotte, put it, "If ever there were promoters who truly put the fans first, it was Bob and Leone Slack while at the helm of the Cayuga Speedway.'' It was 1967 when Bob, known as the Lumber King of Caledonia, took over Cayuga, which had fallen on hard times. He said he knew nothing about racing, but he was a fast learner. Within three years, Bob and Leone were promoting the two biggest oval track events held in Canada to that point -- the Thrush 200 and the Maple Leaf 250. It was the Slack's who dreamed up the idea of bringing in top NASCAR stars to battle local and regional Canadian and northern U.S. stars. Bobby Allison was his first guest in 1972, and it's a Cayuga tradition to this day. Others to take on the locals have included Dale Earnhardt, Buddy Baker, Donnie Allison, Rusty Wallace, Alan Kulwicki, Mark Martin, Bill Elliott and Sterling Marlin. And the locals learned well. Names like Hall-of-Famers Junior Hanley, Earl Ross and Don Biederman would refine their talents at the Cayuga oval and then head south of the border. The Slack's were promoting pioneers, bringing in the ASA stock cars, the Big Rig racers and the Busch North series. Usually, Cayuga would mark the first, and sometimes only, Canadian appearance by major series. They even dared to bring the USAC sprint cars into what was stock car country and featured the likes of Gary Bettenhausen, Larry Dickson, Tom Bigelow and the late Rich Vogler. Amenities were the order of the day at Cayuga ? an up-to-date press facility, corporate suites and a new, massive grandstand with good food and good washrooms made Cayuga stand out as a first-class facility. The business downturn of the early 90s caught up with Bob and Leone and they sold Cayuga Speedway. But their legacy lives on, and current owners and promoters, Brad Lichty and Garry Evans, are the first to say, when confronted with a problem or the puzzle of a promotion, ``What would Bob and Leone Slack do?''
More about this member :: Back to top Jack Smith (2005)
Jack Smith, who flew combat missions in not one but two World Wars, built his first race car in 1911 in his hometown of Calgary after watching the legendary Barney Oldfield in action. He was 15. After World War I, he built and drove his own sprint cars to two successive Alberta championships. He then moved to British Columbia, where he proceeded to win the Victoria, Northwest, B.C. and Vancouver championships. His many talents enabled him to manufacture not only his own chassis but his own engines and the parts for them. In 1927, he decided to branch out and try boat racing but returned to cars after winning 14 of the 15 races he entered. He's particularly remembered for two things from the early 1930s: he was instrumental in forming, and was the first president of, the B.C. Automotive Sports Association, the parent club from which all B.C. motorsport clubs today have sprung, and he was part of a group that built the Langford Speedway in 1936. His last race as a driver was at Victoria's Colwood Horse Race Track in 1934. He won. He then ran cars as an owner till World War II broke out. Influenced by the European Auto Union cars, he built a pair of rear-engine sprint cars after the war and campaigned them successfully at Langford in the late '40s. Mr. Smith passed away in July, 1974.
More about this member :: Back to top Roy Smith (2002)
"Rapid Roy, the stock car boy'' was one of Canada's most outstanding in this class of racing. He began racing in 1965 at the age of 20 with a 1950 Ford Stock Car. In 1967, he graduated to driving the powerful A-Modified cars and was awarded the popular driver award. Not only was Roy successful in his home country breaking track records and winning numerous races and track championships in British Columbia and Alberta, he was also one of the most respected stock car racers in the western United States. A professional racer, Roy won the NASCAR Winston West championship four times -- 1980, 1981, 1982 and 1988 and was third twice (1987 and 1989) competing against such NASCAR stalwarts as Chad Little, Hershel McGriff and Jim Bown. The highlight of is career came in 1982 with a top-10 finish in the Daytona 500, which is the Holy Grail of NASCAR racing.Roy was 22nd in the 1976 and 20th in the 1978 Daytona 500s. Roy has also been inducted into the Victoria Auto Racing Hall of Fame (1992) and the Greater Victoria Sports Hall of Fame (2002).
More about this member :: Back to top Richard Spenard (2001)
Richard Spenard has been a very active and successful competitor at the senior level of Canadian and international motor racing for more than 25 years. In fact, he tops the list for the most wins in Canadian road-racing history. He won his first championship title in 1974 with eight victories in 10 races at the Jim Russell Racing School series at Mont Tremblant. He raced Formula Atlantic in Canada and the United States and was a teammate of Gilles Villeneuve in 1977. Not content with pavement, Richard also won the Quebec Ice Series championship that year. Richard won Canadian championships, year-after-year, from the late '70s onward in Production GT racing, Formula 2000, the Players GM series and the Porsche Turbo Cup series. In 1986, a banner year, he recorded 12 wins in 24 starts in three different series (F2000, Porsche and GM), including four wins in the Players series, six wins and two poles in Formula 2000 and two wins and four poles in the Porsche Turbo Cup. He holds the record for most wins, poles and earnings in both the Porsche and GM series. Richard has also raced in European Formula 3, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, 24 Hours of Daytona and has recorded victories and poles in Trans-Am, IMSA and North American Endurance racing. But the Quebec native is known for more than being a great racing driver. He is also one of the finest racing instructors in North America. He started teaching initially at the Jim Russell school at Riverside and Laguna Seca raceways in California. In 1985, he founded the Spenard-David racing school at Shannonville, Ont. He was the first teacher for such Canadian stars as World Champion Jacques Villeneuve, the late Greg Moore, Patrick Carpentier, David Empringham, Ron Fellows and Trevor Siebert. He was employed for a number of years as the driving coach for the Player's-Forsythe CART team (Carpentier and Tagliani) and was director of the Player's driver development program during its existence. Although Richard doesn't drive as often these days, he's still fast. Who among us will ever forget his win in the Motorola Cup race at the 1998 Molson Indy when he drove to victory all the way from the back of the pack. Or the Enduro race, also at the Molson Indy, when - not even entered until the night before the race and not having any practice time whatsoever, he started last - and won. A man who freely admits that his timing for success in racing's upper echelons was never the best, Richard Spenard was nevertheless one of the greatest racing talents ever to come out of this country. He has been a marvelous ambassador for Canadian motorsport and is most worthy of induction into the Canadian Motorsport Hall of Fame.
More about this member :: Back to top Brian Stewart (2004)
Quick now. What do Paul Tracy, Brian Herta, Airton Dare, Scott Maxwell, P.J. Jones, Marty Roth, Jacques Lazier and Cristiano da Matta have in common? Well, at one time or another, they've all driven race cars for Brian Stewart, of Sutton, Ont., who is one of Canada's most successful racers. Not a race driver, but a racer all the same. Brian Stewart is known internationally as a fellow who produces winners. He is the owner of racing cars who prepares them, takes them to the circuits and then provides the drivers with everything from logistical to psychological support while they're there. Stewart started in Formula Vees and raced them for three years, winning the Canadian championship in 1970. In 1972, he moved up to Formula Fords and won the national championship in that class. A trip to the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch in Britain saw him finish 12th out of 200 who entered. When no one seemed interested in hiring him as a driver, Stewart decided to go into the business of managing race teams and preparing race cars for other people to drive. In the late 1980s, Stewart formed Brian Stewart Racing and entered the Indy Lights series. From that first season, when Tommy Byrne finished second, through the championship years of Tracy, Eric Bachelart, Robbie Buhl and all the others, Brian Stewart Racing has enjoyed unparalleled success. When CART decided to shut down the Indy Lights series, Stewart thought of going to Formula Atlantic but considered it a step backward. Instead, the Indy Racing League invented the Infiniti Pro Series and invited Brian to join. He continues in that series to this day.
More about this member :: Back to top Bert Straus (2003)
Bert Straus was a drag racer who competed from the mid-1960s to late 1970s. His specialities were stock, gas, altered and pro-stock. He set National Hot Rod Association records in the altered and pro-stock classes and won the D-Gas championship at the U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis in 1971. He built and maintained his own cars and has worked through the years with Hall-of-Famers Dave Billes and Brad Francis on their various automotive and racing projects. He campaigned "Chilly Willy'' throughout North America and it is still one of the most recognized and respected car names in Canadian drag-racing history. Like most champions, he loved to push the boundaries of conventional vehicles. He teamed with Pontiac in 1973 to build and compete in Pro Stock with the Canadian Pontiac Astro, the only one of its kind. The Astro was a 'Canadian only' car. There were also no other Pontiacs in Pro Stock at the time. All this at a time when there was little or no Canadian participation at the professional/U.S. national level. Throughout his career, he consistently won best-engineered/best appearing car/best crew awards. Although no longer a competitor, he has worked and continues to work with Billes and Francis in CART, SCCA, IMSA and NASCAR racing.
More about this member :: Back to top Ted Sturgess (1996)
Ted Sturgess roared out of Hamilton, Ont., in 1938 to become Canada's most successful road and dirt-track motorcycle racer. His early exploits earned 18-year-old Sturgess an invitation to ride for Britain's West Ham racing team in the English National League. Sturgess returned to Canada at the outbreak of WWII. In 1940, he won every track championship in Canada. He served 4-1/2 years in the RCAF, resuming racing after WWII and winning even more Canadian titles.
More about this member :: Back to top
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