Car Guy Magazine Car Guy Magazine Issue 1014 | Page 15

At Laguna Seca in 1962
Ruby won one heat and finished a close second overall to Roger Penske’s Zerex
special. He finished third
in the USAC championship
that year.

and Ruby finished the race in a 5.7-liter Maserati owned by Jim Hall and Carroll Shelby.
Ruby later raced a 450S for Chattanooga,
Tennessee bottling tycoon J. Frank Harrison.
In 1961, Harrison upgraded his stable with a
Lotus 18 Formula 1 car and in 1962 a Lotus
19 with a two-liter Climax. Ruby quickly acclimated to the mid-engined cars although he
was a doubter at first. “I looked at that little
old thing (the 19), and I thought, it might run
through them turns but wait till I get to that
straightaway! I was wrong there, too. That little

old thing would run!” At Laguna Seca in 1962
Ruby won one heat and finished a close second overall to Roger Penske’s Zerex special. He
finished third in the USAC championship that
year. In 1963 a Ford 289 replaced the Climax
and a one-off body was made. Ruby drove it
to a win in the Kent USRRC race. “It was a
more powerful engine, but I wouldn’t say it was
any faster. It messed up the balance of the car,”
Ruby recalls.

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