The Shelby American (Winter 2021)

lected his own rides at races and Le- Mans was no exception. In this case, his relationship with Shelby (Hugus financed 27 of the first three batches of cars from AC Cars) had fallen apart fairly quickly after Ford upped its in- terest in the summer of 1962. But Hugus had seen something in CSX2001 and he arranged for AC Cars to build two cars for LeMans in 1963, CSX2142 in white with narrow blue stripes for Hugus and Peter Jopp and CS2131 (no X because it was never eX- ported) in British Racing Green as AC’s entry for Ninian Sanderson and Peter Bolton. Both cars sported the newly developed Ford 289 Hi-Po en- gine and removable hardtops (because of the car’s abysmal aerodynamics and to keep the driver from 24 hours of buffeting in an open car). With that race, Ed Hugus became the first Amer- ican to race a Cobra overseas. He was a DNF with engine failure, but the British entry went on to finish 7th OA behind a parade of six Ferraris. Ford executives, with Shelby in tow, were at the race to evaluate Eric Broadley’s Lola-Ford Mk 6 GT and couldn’t help but notice the performance of the AC Cobra entry. The rest of the story is well known, but the fact remains Car- roll Shelby never would have gotten his Cobra dream off the ground with- out the early backing of Ed Hugus. Hugus eventually retired to Carmel, California where he passed away the day before his 83rd birthday in June 2006. Born in 1933, Krause was Shelby’s first factory driver. Krause’s father owned a machine shop and was heav- ily involved in the SoCal midget rac- ing scene where young Bill cut his teeth as a driver. After a couple of major shunts and a title in 1955, his parents decided sports car racing was safer and bought him a new 1956 D- Type Jaguar. The results were imme- diate. In his first outing at Bakersfield in May, 1956 he started 13th on the grid and won the race. The D-type was modified over the years, ultimately ending up with Chevy power in the early ‘60s. Other rides over the years included a Mercedes 300SL, a Maserati Tipo 61, an E-Type Jag, a Lotus 19 and even a couple of Max Balchowsky’s Ol’ Yellers. His results were good when he finished, which was enough to catch the eye of Carroll Shelby who hired him in the early fall of 1962 to drive CSX2002 at the River- side 3-Hour event in October. The car was raw and undeveloped, but fast enough to jump out to over a mile lead in the race before a rear hub broke on lap 14 and its day was done. Corvettes swept the podium at Riverside that day. After disappointing results for the Cobra at the Nassau races in Decem- ber 1962, Krause elected to sign with Mickey Thompson’s Corvette team for 1963. The Corvette deal fell apart after just one race and after a scare with hot oil in his face at Indy practice in 1963, Krause backed away from se- rious racing and focused on his Honda dealership in Southern California. Bill Krause is 87 years old and lives in Palos Verdes, California. With Krause having gone over to the Dark Side, Shelby went after the top SoCal Corvette driver and signed 26 year-old Dave MacDonald in Janu- ary, 1963, followed quickly by the sign- ing of Ken Miles. Just weeks later MacDonald produced the first victo- ries for Shelby American at Riverside where he and Miles went one-two in both races in CSX2026 and CSX2002, respectively. Over the spring and sum- mer, the pair went on the national cir- cuit with MacDonald producing 10 victories in 20 starts. In the fall Dave was set up in one of the Cooper Monaco King Cobras (CM/1/63) for the winter USRRC Pro series. The second outing for MacDonald in this car pro- duced victory at the prestigious L.A. Times Grand Prix at Riverside, at the time the richest race on the world cal- endar. There he bested the likes of Jim Clark, A.J. Foyt, Dan Gurney, Graham Hill, John Surtees and a host of other name drivers to win $14,000 and a new Pontiac for his trouble. Dave Mac- Donald lapped the field that day and a week later, at Laguna Seca, he re- peated the feat, finishing three laps ahead of the field with the exception of A.J. Foyt. The winter USRRC Pro-se- ries would morph into the popular Can Am series of races later in the decade. But the bravest of the brave are The SHELBY AMERICAN Winter 20210 43 Biy Krause Dave MacDonald Billy Krause