VIR - 1957 October - Pre-race Press
Virginia International Raceway - October 26-27, 1958
Racing Notes - D-Jags Favored At VIR
DANVILLE, Va., - It will be hard for the D-Jaguars to lose at Virginia International Raceway (VIR) when the foreign sports cars return to the road course Oct. 26-27, time trials on the first date, then six hours of endurance races on Sunday with the President's Cup as the feature.
Foremost among the British cars will be the team of Briggs Cunningham, New England sportsman and racing enthusiast. Cunningham will himself drive, and it might be the Cunningham which his mechanical crew built some years ago.
But his specials are the white D-type Jaguars in which Walter Hansgen of Westfield, N.J., has climbed to the national point championship for Class C Sports. Hansgen and Charlie Wallace of Chevy Chase, Md., drive the two lead Jags of the Cunningham team, and they will be favored to capture the President's Cup which will be contested in a 2-1/2 hour endurance race.
Hansgen has won the last two national events of the Sports Car Club of America, but he encountered tough competition at both places (Watkins Glen, N.Y., and Bridgehampton, Long Island, N.Y.) In fact, at the latter race he was pushed surprisingly by Bob Holbert of Warrington, Pa., in a Porsche RS.
Four races are set for Sunday the 27th, starting at 10 a.m., and the speed record of 78.2 miles per hour which Carroll Shelby and his 4.5 Maserati set in the VIR Inaugural is expected to be broken due to the cooler weather. It was 100-plus degrees at the first race in August. Shelby was injured in California some weeks ago, his big car torn up; and he will not compete here next week end.
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