by Bob Wachtel –
On Sunday September 3 I attended the Lime Rock Concours event that I registered for over a month ago and was accepted to enter. I drove my silver 1999 Dodge Viper GTS coupe there, which is only about 30-40 minute away from my house.
Dual Ghia
Virgil Exner prototype
What an unbelievable turnout! The guest speaker there was Ralph Gilles. He’s the chief of design for Stellantis/Fiat and has been with Chrysler since 1992. He also led the design team that created the 2014 SRT Viper. He came by my car and I immediately recognized him. I’ve seen him pictured in back issues of the Viper Quarterly magazine. We talked for a while as I showed him my album of the cars I’ve owned and really liked my Viper.
Lamborghini 400 GT
Very slick vehicle, make unknown
Magnificent polished alloy Jaguar XKE
It was obviously due to his status that Chrysler was able to ship some very rare, one of a kind, Virgil Exner prototype cars to Lime Rock Park along with the Chrysler turbine car which looked a bit like the Ford Thunderbird hardtop of the sixties. In addition, there were many Chrysler powered cars such as Jensen Interceptor, Cunningham, Chrysler letter cars, Dual Ghia and the Chrysler Atlantic (of which I have a 1:18 model).
Cunningham coupe with Chrysler Hemi V-8
Chrysler-powered Jensen Interceptor
There were over a 1000 cars on display that day, maybe a hundred of them were registered for the concours. They gave out a free $15 food voucher for every concours entrant plus there was no admission or entrant fee. All in all, it was a magnificent day weather wise and a terrific event.
Bob Wachtel’s 1999 Viper GTS coupe
Original owner Shelby GT 350 with over 200,000 miles
Chrysler Atlantic Coupe
Chrysler Atlantic Coupe
Chrysler by Ghia
Virgil Exner prototype
Let us know what you think in the Comments.
THE AUTHOR: Bob Wachtel has written stories for My Car Quest before.
Lime Rock Lime Rock Park at 7:15am just as the dew clouds were rising and the bright sunshine was burning it off
The yellow car is a Chrysler dual cowl show car developed for the Indy 500. They built a few besides this one. Look closely and you’ll see the name on front.
Dear Bob,
Great photographs and article about Lime Rock and its cars!!! The car of unknown make appears to be a Cord with a modified front end. As far as the Chrysler Turbine car’s design being similar to the early ’60s T-Birds, there is a simple explanation for that: Elwood Engel. Mr. Engel had worked as a successful designer at Ford for many years, his most famous designs being the early ’60s T-Birds and those classic, formal rectangular-boxed Lincolns, including the 4-door convertible. At that point, Chrysler lured him away from Ford, thus the Turbine’s resemblance to the T-Birds, as well as that era’s Imperials’ resemblance to the Lincolns.
Glenn in Brooklyn, NY.