Dear Car F(r)iends
With the recent passing of Burt Reynolds, clips from his movies have been all over the TV. One of his best-known films is The Cannonball Run.
As most of you probably know, the Cannonball Run–officially known as the Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash–was a real underground race across the USA, run a few times in the 1970s.
Besides protesting speed limits, the race creators really wanted to test which vehicle was best to drive long and fast, coast-to-coast in real-world conditions. The best American cars (and trucks), as well as European cars and exotics, competed head-to-head.
A team of filmmakers is working on a feature-length real Cannonball Run documentary about this iconic secret race. If you were there or have Cannonball material please get in touch with them. They found several of the Cannonball outlaw racers and even hunted down a few surviving real Cannonball Run cars.
I managed to catch up with one Cannonballer and his car the documentary crew had not located yet: Ed Brewerton and the American Motors AMX he ran with his brother Tom in the 1971 and 1972 Cannonballs. Here is our short interview for you:
If you prefer to view this video at higher quality, you can find it on our website.
I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see the finished documentary!
Keep on drivin’,
Duane