Results:
5th Annual Forza Amelia
March 14-19, 2OO4

Well, you missed it! Unless you were one of the two-dozen couples who signed up for the fifth annual Forza Amelia rally, it zoomed right past you in mid-March. You missed a once-in-a-lifetime chance to drive 1100 miles on challenging Florida back roads, visit unbelievable private collections plus spend hours talking cars with America's premier collector, Miles Collier, during dinner at his spectacularly-expanded museum.

The world-class Amelia Island Concours was just a warm-up for the rally. Actually, the rally cars themselves put on quite a show. Vintage Spirit Award winners Ron and Carol Novrit held their beautiful but delicate 1946 MG TC together for four days, mostly with grit and determination.

Carl and Narcelle Schneider came all the way from Eureka, CA to drive their Pininfarina-bodied '52 Packard, the most unusual and beautiful Packard two-door fastback you've ever seen.

Other rare rally machines were the lovely Ferrari 212 PF Coupe of Helen and Richard Fraser, the perfect Jaguar XK-120M of George and Emily Crook and the trio of Austin Healeys driven by Ralf/William Berthiez, Bill/Sandy Parks and Scott Patterson/Foster Barnwell.

Other concours-quality rally cars included the gorgeous AC Ace-Bristol of Dan Leonard/Randy Moss, the immaculate Porsche 356 Carrera 2 of David/Paula Fischer and the equally immaculate Porsche 911 Carrera RS of Robert/Ann Hanson. The Hansons even drove their orange Porsche all the way from Sioux Falls, South Dakota for the event.

Norm and Bernice Koglin brought their familiar Ferrari 275 GTS from Chicago, Don Polak/Howard Serkin drove Don's Fly Yellow Morgan Plus 4 from Nashville. There were four '64 to '67 Sting Rays, rallied by Jim/Suzanne MacDougald, Bruce/Cindy Troxell, Fred/John Ehle and Joe/Kathy Lukason.

Two V-12 Ferraris, Gene/Mary Jane Hammer's Daytona coupe and Terry/Carolyn Smith's late-model Barchetta, shared the road with the Mercedes-Benz 280SE Coupe of Rich Taylor/Anne Ehle and the overall rally-winning Mercedes 450SL of Charles/Chuck Goolsbee.

After a wonderful—and sunny— weekend at the Amelia Island Concours, the rally crowd gathered for Sunday dinner at nearby Amelia Island Plantation where we also received clothes, presents and route books.

Amelia Island Plantation is a very private resort on 133O acres bordered by the Intracoastal Waterway on the West and the Atlantic Ocean on the East. Among other things, it boasts 23 tennis courts, a health and fitness center, a 54 hole golf course designed by Pete Dye and Tom Fazio, miles of private beach and multiple swimming pools. It’s the secret place to stay on Amelia Island, much more unique than the Ritz Carlton.

The driving started Monday morning at 8:00 am sharp when rally wrangler Jean Taylor flagged off the Goolsbee's 450SL from the Amelia Island Plantation driveway. A nearly three hour drive through amazingly empty two-lane back roads in northern Florida brought us to Gainesville Raceway.

The dragstrip at Gainesville was already jammed with thousands of racers getting ready for the Gatornationals later in the week, but not one of them ventured back to Gainesville's neat 2.5-mile road course to find out what the old sports cars were up to.

What we were up to was high-speed attacks on the road course, cleverly split in half for the occasion. The long course could be lapped in just under 50 seconds; the short course took about 40 seconds. Terry Smith in his incredible Ferrari Barchetta fittingly posted the fastest combined time on the two courses, followed by John Ehle in his '67 big block Corvette. Chuck Goolsbee was third overall, after a pair of inspired drives in his father's stock 450SL.

Lunch was a catered trackside picnic with steak, salmon and shrimp grilled on the barbie. After lunch, the group rallied south through the scenic Florida "Hill Country" on surprisingly twisty roads to the Old Florida city of Lakeland.

Parish Heacock Insurance is headquartered in Lakeland. Owners Ford and Kate Heacock started SVRA many years ago, as well as Vintage Motorsport magazine. They now insure many vintage racing and collector cars. For the Forza Amelia, they organized an informal car show and cocktail party.

The original plan was to park the cars along the lake shore, but a late afternoon rainstorm drove everyone into a nearby parking garage. It didn't dampen the party. As Ford Heacock observed, "Put a bar almost anywhere and they will come!"

That night, we stayed overnight at the 1924 Terrace Hotel, a Lakeland landmark that's been totally renovated. Dinner was at The Grille, a restaurant with the elegant ambience of the Twenties. Already, the group was buzzing with car talk as the rallyists made connections with new friends with similar interests.

Bright and early Tuesday morning, we followed a short transit stage to Fantasy of Flight, the massive aircraft museum assembled by wealthy collector Kermit Weeks outside Polk City. From a 1909 Glenn Curtiss pusher to a Gee-Bee replica to a polished aluminum B-25, there are dozens of beautifully-restored planes, all kept in flying condition. We even got a private tour of the restoration shops organized by the Vintage Rallies folks.

From Polk City, we rallied over tiny two-lane back roads all the way to the Royal Palm Yacht Club in Fort Myers where we had lunch overlooking the Gulf of Mexico. Just down the street are the winter homes of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, now open to the public. After touring the surprisingly cozy Edison and Ford homes, we drove a transit stage down the highway to Naples.

We all checked into The Inn on Fifth, a "boutique" luxury hotel in the heart of Old Naples, a wonderful area that's on the National Register of Historic Places. Most of the women found time to shop the length of Fifth Avenue, the Naples equivalent of Rodeo Drive. The rally organizers provided a shuttle so we could leave our rally cars safe in the hotel parking garage and enjoy a few glasses of wine before dinner.

Dean and Wendy Edmonds are wonderfully enthusiastic friends of many vintage rallyists. Near the Naples Airport, they have a hanger full of rare cars including a low-chassis 4.5 Invicta, Type 55 Bugatti and Blower Bentley. We started with cocktails and hors d'oeuvres at Dean and Wendy's.

Less than a mile away is Miles Collier's private automobile museum. The Collier Collection includes the entire Briggs Cunningham Museum collection which Mr. Collier bought many years ago en mass, plus his own collection of historic Porsche racing cars, plus dozens and dozens of other significant machines including an Alfa-Romeo 8C-29OO that won the Mille Miglia and a Mercedes-Benz W125 race car that only recently resurfaced in Romania.

Dressed up and on our best behavior, we wandered around the elegant Collier Museum carefully sipping more white wine and munching more hors d'oeuvres. Patron Miles Collier and museum major domo Scott George affably greeted every rallyist and guided us through the unbelievable collection.

After dinner on the mezzanine, we were free to spend more time ogling the cars, or visiting the automotive library and the restoration shop. Peter Markowski, the official mechanic for Vintage Rallies events and one of the best vintage car restorers in the country, kept repeating, "I'm in awe. I'm in awe!" If anything, that was an understatement.

Wednesday morning, we headed back North, following a transit route to Gerd and Feli Petrik's home on Casey Key. It is good to be Gerd Petrik! His wife Feli is a striking fashion model, as smart and pleasant as she is beautiful. His home is a sort of mini-palace built of Mexican coral rock, filled with art and overlooking a private beach.

And the cars! Gerd specializes in over-the-top supercars. Among dozens of 200 mph machines, he has a Bugatti Veyron, a CLK Mercedes factory racer, a Jaguar XJ-220, Porsche GT-1, GT-2 and GT-3 racers, etc. etc. etc. Lunch was catered on the patio, where Feli handed out hats embroidered with the house's name and logo. Does your house have a name? Does it have its own logo? Do all your guests receive commemorative hats? It is good to be Gerd Petrik!

From Petrik's, it was just a short transit to the Sarasota Classic Car Museum. About as different from the understated art museum hush of the Collier Collection as it could be, Sarasota Classic Car Museum is a boisterous melange of everything from a V-8 60-powered hydroplane racing boat to a late-model Rolls-Royce station wagon. There's a whole wing of cars designed by Piero Rivolta, who lives nearby.

Rick Furtado, of Rivolta Boats, got Piero to autograph two dozen copies of Winston Goodfellow's definitive Iso Rivolta history. As we left the Sarasota Classic Car Museum, we each received a Rivolta carry bag containing an Iso history and Rivolta Boats brochure. Neat surprise!

From Sarasota, the afternoon rally through gorgeous Central Florida ranchland and back into the Florida Hill Country was the best driving of the whole trip. Who knew there were great driving roads and spectacular scenery in Florida? After hours of twisties with no traffic, we arrived at The Mission Inn in Howey-In-The-Hills. This is a Spanish-style golf resort that's been in the same family for decades. It's all newly refurbished.

Before dinner, a group of us sat outside on a second-story patio, drinking wine, looking at the stars and quietly relaxing after what had been a truly memorable day. What an unexpected mix of cool cars, beautiful scenery, nice people and great roads! This is Florida as most people never see it, a Florida that is rapidly disappearing in the face of uncontrolled development. How lucky and special we felt to have experienced it before it's all gone.

For our final morning, the rally route took us along more twisty Hill Country roads and through cute old towns like Mt. Dora, Weirdale and Summerfield. As we got nearer to our checkpoint, the horse farms got bigger and more lavish, with increasingly impressive thoroughbreds standing regally in their fields. Padua Farms was the ultimate, with barns nicer than most people's homes.

Our checkpoint was in front of the Don Garlits Museum. If you have any interest in drag racing at all, you really have to see this remarkable collection of literally hundreds of famous racing cars and all sorts of unusual memorabilia, including Smokey Yunick's engine-building room. In an adjacent building, Big Daddy has more hundreds of antique and classic cars. To be honest, it's all a bit overwhelming. You could literally spend days examining every drag racing artifact.

From Garlits' place, we rallied diagonally across Florida through the Ocala National Forest on more picturesque back roads. The final checkpoint of the morning was in a waterfront park in the Historic District of Palatka, overlooking the St. John River. This surprisingly charming spot is one that few tourists will ever find. That was typical of the Forza Amelia; we went places and did things that only organizers Rich and Jean Taylor would bother to search out.

From Palatka, a 30 mile transit brought us to the well-known tourist town of St. Augustine on Florida's east coast. St. Augustine is the oldest city in America, with a restored Spanish Fort and quaint historic area. There was a choice of lunch spots; we sat outside on the patio of the White Lion and gorged ourselves on fresh broiled grouper. There are worse ways to spend an hour in St. Augustine.

After three and a half days, 1020 miles of driving and 21 separate stages, five teams had zeroed every checkpoint. Ralf Berthiez and his father, William, in their Austin Healey 100 LeMans, David and Paula Fischer in their Porsche 356 Carrera, Don Polak and Howard Serkin in Don's Morgan Plus 4, Fred and John Ehle in Fred's blue Stingray roadster and Charles and Chuck Goolsbee in Charles's Mercedes 450SL were in a five-way tie for overall honors.

The last rally stage was a simple 60 mile drive up AIA along the coast, followed by a bit of highway to get us out to 105 North and onto Amelia Island. The final timed checkpoint was at the end of a 3 mile, one-lane twisty road that leads to historic Kingsley Plantation. The rally instructions left 80 minutes to cover 60.75 miles, an average of just 45.56 mph. Vintage Rallies timing and scoring counts a one point penalty for each second you're early or late, up to a maximum of 500 penalty points per stage.

Of the leading group of five cars, on this diabolical last stage, the Berthiezs and Fischers each earned 500 points, Polak/Serkin had 300 and the Ehles got 256. Only the Goolsbees zeroed the checkpoint and the rally. I asked Chuck Goolsbee how they did it. "We were very lucky, and we drove like hell!"

Charles Goolsbee and his wife Carol have won rallies in the past, but son Chuck has been trying for seven years to win a Vintage Rallies event. To win cleanly and brilliantly on the last stage was obviously a thrill. He and Charles were still excited at the Victory Banquet that night, sharing their victory champagne with the rest of us.

Rich and Jean Taylor of Vintage Rallies have put on dozens of events since their first New England 1000 in 1993. After they cover their costs, all the rest goes to charity. Break even is around 30 cars; fewer than 30 cars means Rich and Jean are subsidizing the event out of their own pockets.

The New England 1000, Texas 1000 and Forza Mille are solidly in the black; Forza Amelia may not survive. That's too bad. You'd think vintage rallyists would find Forza Amelia's combination of mid-winter sun, back-country roads, great hotels, secret car collections and priceless camaraderie to be irresistible. As we said at the beginning, if you weren't on this year's Forza Amelia, you missed it! Perhaps forever. Results:
2nd Annual Forza Amelia
March 11-16, 2OO1

Organized by gracious Road & Track photographer Bill Warner and his wife Jane, the Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance is the best concours in America. It beats Pebble Beach all hollow. The quality of cars is just as good, there are nearly 25O vehicles on display, the variety is staggering—everything from Brass Era motorcycles to Porsche GTP race cars—the seaside golf course setting is spectacular and unlike Pebble Beach, the crowds are small enough that you can actually walk around without feeling like you're in a Tokyo subway at rushahouru.

In order to prolong the enjoyment, last year we organized one of our 1OOO-mile rallies to begin after the concours. Bill and Jane let us display our cars in their show before we set off on our drive. It all worked so well, we did it again this year. At the 2OO1 Amelia Island Concours, six of our rally entrants won prizes: Tony Singer's 196O Ferrari 25O GT California Spyder, Lou Hilton's 1957 BMW 5O7 roadster, Russell Glace's 1957 Jaguar XK-14OMC, Chuck Sussman's 1968 Shelby GT-5OOKR, Charles Goolsbee's 1957 Mercedes-Benz 3OOSL roadster and Monty Monteith's 197O Mercedes-Benz 28OSL hardtop.



Our group ranged from Richard and Helen Fraser's 1949 Ferrari 166 Inter Vignale coupe to Peter and Sarah Tedeschi's Ferrari 36O Modena. There was a whole class of Mercedes 3OOSLs and another whole class of Ferrari 25O GTs—including a Tour de France, a SWB California Spyder and a one-off Pininfarina showcar. We had a little of everything. John Whitney Payson rallied in his 1962 AC Greyhound, but he also brought his awesome CL6OO RennTech 7.4 coupe just to play with during the track events!



After the concours, we assembled for dinner at nearby Amelia Island Plantation. Our rally sponsor is the Jacksonville Region of Mercedes-Benz USA. Jacksonville Region's Ellen Randall Oakes was busy with post-concours activities, so she deputized Brand Heritage Specialist Maryalice Ritzmann from M-B USA to join us for dinner. Maryalice, of course, is the sponsor of our New England 1OOO and Forza Mille V-12, and a special friend. She was surprised to find she knew half the people in the room, either from previous rallies or MBCA events. Maryalice had to fly back to snowy Montvale, but she gave us her smiling benediction.



On that happy note, we began what can only be described as a four-day party! As Lisa Weinberger said when she called me a week after the rally, "My cheeks still hurt from laughing." I don't know why, but this was the most congenial group. Nobody was grumpy, nobody was left out...we all just chatted and joked and ate and laughed and drove and looked at stuff and had a great time. Osteopathic surgeon Dan Kary even straightened out Vicky Simmons nagging backache after dinner one night. Talk about your full-service rally!

Thanks to the ministrations of our official mechanics, Steve Markowski and his fiance, Gillian McGarvey, all our cars were still running under their own power after 1OOO miles. A few people had to temporarily borrow our Mercedes SL5OO or SLK32O support vehicles, but they were back in their own cars by the end of the event. And for the first time in the nine years that we've been putting on these events, we didn't even have one speeding ticket! Amazing.

Last year, we headed North toward Savannah. This year, we headed South and West toward the Central Florida "Hill Country"—highest elevation, 187 feet above sea level—and then over to the Gulf Coast. Jean and I spent days searching out the windingest roads we could find.

We started Monday morning with a time-speed-distance rally stage from Amelia Island to the old Spanish fort at St. Augustine, now a National Historic site. From there, we took back roads to Daytona Beach and the new museum at Daytona International Speedway. We ate lunch in the Bill France Room, toured the Speedway and museum and then popped up the road to the Klassix Museum that features not only dozens of neat hot-rods and racing cars in clever dioramas, but the best milk shakes and ice cream cones in Daytona.

Our last stage on Monday was from Daytona to Mount Dora, a quaint Victorian town on a lake in the middle of square miles of orange groves. A large population of British expatriates gives Mount Dora the ambience, of all things, of a tourist town in the Lake District. Dinner was at The Gables, run by Edgar Payne, a former pub owner from Glasgow with a deadly dry Scots sense of humor and an excellent wine cellar. Overnight was at the Lakeside Inn, a charming old pile that's closer to Fawlty Towers than it is to the Ritz-Carlton.

From Mount Dora, we rallied to a checkpoint at Salt Springs, a famous underground spring in the Ocala National Forest that flows 92 million gallons a day. Unfortunately, more water than that was flooding out of the Florida skies. This wasn't rain, it was The Flood. From Salt Springs, we went to the preserved Old Florida farm of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Marjorie Kinnan Rawling. Every team received a copy of Cross Creek, her book about life at this house.

From Marjorie's, it was off to Gainesville Raceway. Amazingly, the rain had stopped and we were able to spend hours racing around two different courses laid out on Gainesville's 2.5-mile road course. Everyone got more laps than they could stand. Fastest were vintage racer Mike Studley in his Ferrari 355F1 Spyder, Peter Tedeschi in his 36O Modena and Rick Snow in John Payson's RennTech Mercedes.

From Gainesville, we went off to Cedar Key, a quaint old town on the Gulf of Mexico. We stayed in a variety of waterfront condominiums, took rides on propeller-driven airboats through the marshes to watch the eagles and egrets and ate dinner at Peter Stefani's Island Room. Cedar Key defines "the middle of nowhere," at the end of a 25-mile road through the Florida swamps. Chef Stefani—a transplated New Yorker—served us a dinner that for the first time on any of our rallies, prompted the group to ask the chef to come out and receive a round of applause. I have to tell you, the local grouper was to die for.



Wednesday, we rallied from Cedar Key to Tarpon Springs on little back roads. Lunch was at a Greek restaurant at the famous sponge docks, an area settled by Greek fisherman a century ago that's still like a slice of Mediterranean coastline. After lunch, we zipped up to a combination museum/car salesroom/restoration shop called Classic Corvettes and Collectibles. They had literally hundreds of cars on display, ranging from a Rolls-Royce PII roadster fitted with a Rolls-Royce V-12 aircraft engine from a World War II Spitfire to late model Corvettes and Chevy pickup trucks.



Classics owner Al Weissman then invited us out to his house, where he has more hundreds of collector cars, ranging from an exquisite Duesenberg Dual-Cowl Phaeton to one of the George Barris Batmobiles from the movies. The retired Chairman of Airborne Express, Mr. Weissman proved to be a knowledgeable and entertaining lecturer, describing each car in detail.

By now, most of the women were just about car-ed out and were more than happy to check into the Spanish-style Mission Inn at Howey-In-the-Hills. Set in the midst of a golf course, the Mission Inn seems like a transplanted slice of Santa Barbara, California more than what you'd expect in Florida. Dinner was a feast, and once again we laughed till we got pains in our sides.

Leitmotif for the evening was John Bellefleur's hypothetical question, "If a tree falls in the forest and your wife doesn't hear it, is it still your fault?" followed by Lou Bevilacqua's corollary, "If your wife hears a tree fall in the forest and it's clearly nobody's fault, must you still feel guilty?" The answer to both questions according to our chorus of women, is "Of course!"



Thursday morning found us at the Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing south of Ocala. "Big Daddy" himself showed up to tour us around this amazing place. Arranged in chronological order with explanatory placards that give the history of drag racing since World War II, there are literally hundreds of drag racing cars, owned by not only Mr. Garlits but such famous names as Shirley Muldowney, Don Prudhomme, Stone-Woods-Cook, etc. etc. There's a separate engine room, a corner of Smokey Yunick's Best Damn Garage in Town...plus another whole building filled with antique cars.

A few more short stages brought us to lunch at Gainesville Country Club, then all the way back to Amelia Island Plantation on little back roads through Northern Florida and Southern Georgia. It started to rain just as the last cars turned into the hotel driveway.



After four days and 1OOO miles of rallying, the 3OOSL teams of Joe/Sharon Hayes and Charles/Chuck Goolsbee tied for third with just two penalty points each. Fred and John Ehle, driving a 1967 Corvette Sting Ray roadster, were second with just one penalty point. Winners Steve and Carolyn Bacen drove their Ferrari 36O Modena because their new Mercedes CL6OO is still back-ordered and their Ferrari 25O GT is scattered over the floor of Peter Markowski's shop. The Bacens zeroed every checkpoint to finish with no penalty points. As timing and scoring guru Iain Tugwell pointed out, this is the couple's sixth win in the last eight rallies they've contested.

Our staff always votes a Vintage Spirit Award to the person who shows the most enthusiasm during the week, is most generous with their time and car, who has a good time and gets other people to have a good time, too. Our unanimous choice at the 2OO1 Forza Amelia was John Whitney Payson, who garnered only 38 points while driving the least powerful car in the group, his 1962 AC Greyhound 2-liter.



More importantly, John also let his cousin Rick Snow blast around the track with his RennTech, then loaned the CL6OO 7.4 to Lou and Birgitt Hilton when their BMW 5O7 suffered a minor burp. He graciously let them keep driving it even after our mechanics had the BMW fully operational. Best of all, John showed up at our Victory Dinner wearing a wildly painted car tie, car suspenders, pants with vintage cars driving up and down his legs and velvet smoking slippers embroidered on the toes with an image of his AC. Nobody is more enthusiastic, nicer or more fun.

Results:
First Ever Forza Amelia
March 12-17, 2OOO

Bill and Jane Warner hold their wonderful Amelia Island Concours in mid-March, which is just when everyone wants to be in Florida. In conjunction with their car show, we convinced them to let us have an annual five-day rally sponsored by Mercedes-Benz USI, the separate company that builds the neat M-class wagon in Alabama.

Our rally cars were displayed on the concours field and judged like any other classes. Rally class winners were country music superstar Alan Jackson's exquisite 1957 Porsche Speedster and Bentley expert Bob Reed's 1929 Speed Six Le Mans.

Amelia Island Concours is Sunday. Monday morning, after a night at the lovely and exclusive Amelia Island Plantation, we sped north and west through miles of pine forest to lunch on the deck at Okenfenokee National Wildlife Refuge. After lunch, we all took guided boat rides into the mysterious wetland that covers hundreds of square miles.

From the unspoiled wilderness of Okefenokee, we cruised back to the coast and Jekyll Island Club, where we parked our cars together on the lawn for photos in front of the historic Victorian hotel.

Tuesday morning started with a gymkhana in a huge municipal parking lot next to the beach. The rest of the day was given over to transit stages from one historic site to another. We visited Fort Frederica and Christ Church on St. Simons Island, climbed St. Simons Lighthouse, ate lunch at the posh St. Simons Island Club, visited nearby Hofwyl Plantation and then drove north to Cherry Hill Plantation, the winter home of Henry and Clara Ford.

Downtown Savannah is one of the most gracious cities in America, with beautiful pre-Colonial squares. We stayed Tuesday night at The Mulberry, a real southern-style hotel. After this genteel introduction to southern hospitality, we had a rowdy dinner at Bistro Savannah, a trendy Parisian-style eatery near the Savannah College of Art and Design.

Wednesday morning, most of the women went sightseeing in Savannah, while the men went out to Roebling Road race track to play with cars. We all met for lunch at the Mighty 8th Air Force Museum. From there, it was off to Claxton, "Fruitcake Capital of the World," to pick up a free 2 lb. fruitcake.

Back in Savannah, we stayed a second night at The Mulberry and had dinner at 45 South, generally agreed to be the best restaurant in Dixie.

Thursday was a serious rally day, starting from the Historic Railroad Shops in Savannah, with a morning checkpoint at Fort King George in Darien, a 1721 stockade fort. Two more rally stages brought us to Osprey Cove, a golf resort on the Atlantic coast, for lunch overlooking the salt marshes.

One last rally stage, and we came into Kingsley Plantation, a rice plantation just south of Amelia Island that's now a National Park. A short transit brought us back to Amelia Island Plantation for our hilarious "Victory Banquet."

After four days of rallying, Bob and Sandy Hatch in their Ferrari 355i tied Ed and Barbara Sutherland in their 1929 Bentley 4.5 LeMans for first overall. Steve and Laura Maier in a Ferrari 348 and Fred and Anne Ehle in a 1967 Corvette Sting Ray tied for second. Lou and Bobbi Bevilacqua were next, with a Ferrari 512 Testarossa.