Fast Friday: Dan Gurney 1963 Lotus Ford

I figured I might try to start a regular weekly feature here and call it Fast Friday, wherein I will show off some of my model race cars, and maybe occasionally stray off into a discussion of racing in general. Seems a good thing to do in the off-season to keep interest high.

So let's start out with a real game changer, a 1963 Lotus Powered by Ford. I built the Jimmy Clark green version years ago as a kid, so this time I thought I would have a go at the Dan Gurney bright white version. While not the first rear-engined cars at Indianapolis, they were the first to seriously threaten the status quo. Clark very nearly pulled off the win, finishing second to Parnelli Jones, though with some controversy about a leaking oil tank on Jones' Watson. Gurney, meanwhile, started 12th and finished 7th, a very respectable showing for Colin Chapman's Lotus newcomers. Following this, there would be only one more victory for the venerable front-engine cars, with Lotus achieving its first victory with Clark in 1965. From then on, every winner would have the powerplant behind the driver, for better or worse.

This model is built from the old AMT kit, which still stands up reasonably well right out of the box. One could take it to another level, but I was just going for a straight build. Decals are from Cady, though Indycals does a set that is probably better. As a I recall, it's just your basic Testors gloss white finish. The tires aren't quite right, but this was a case of close enough. All in all, an enjoyable build.