Veteran racing driver, team owner, businessman, automobile collector and motorsports history preservationist Rob Dyson is the Grand Marshal for this weekend’s Vintage Festival 43 at Lime Rock Park. Dyson also is the event’s Honored Collector.
“Rob Dyson’s history with Lime Rock Park goes back 50 years to his earliest days as a racing driver,” said Skip Barber, chairman of the Vintage Festival and former president of the track. “More than just as a competitor, Rob has been a steadfast supporter Lime Rock Park in particular and of the sport overall in numerous ways, both large and small, through thick and thin. Everyone who treasures Lime Rock Park today owes Rob a debt of gratitude.”
Barber also noted Dyson’s work over the past decade on the board of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum, most recently as chairman, developing and overseeing the execution of the museum’s recently completed major expansion and renovation.
“I’m deeply honored by this recognition,” Dyson said. “Lime Rock is Dyson Racing’s home track and a special place for me and everyone on the team now and throughout the years. Forty years ago we scored our first professional win at Lime Rock, at the IMSA Camel GT race on Memorial Day. It’s a memory I treasure – and I’m proud that on display this weekend will be our Porsche 962, in exactly the configuration it was when it took the checkered flag. But there are plenty more from my earlier SCCA Club Racing days, and even more in the years since.”
Over the four days of the Historic Festival 15 cars from Dyson’s personal collection will be on display at three different locations in the paddock.
Among the cars in the Ragtime Racers Tent (racing cars from the first years of the 20th century) will be three of Dyson’s, including his 1913 Isotta Fraschini Tipo M, 1904 Napier L48 “Samson” Racer and a Hispano Suiza.
Five of Dyson’s cars are among those in the Vintage Indy Cars Tent, including the car that led the change from front-engine to rear-engine at Indy, the 1961 Cooper Climax T-54, driven by the then-reigning F1 world champion Jack Brabham. Dyson’s beautiful 1974 Carling Black Label McLaren M16 C/D will be reunited with its driver that year, David Hobbs, who is the Historic Festival’s Honored Guest this weekend.
Others of Dyson’s Indy cars on display include his jewel-like 1927 Miller 91, the 1967 All American Racers Eagle and McLaren Racing team’s 1978 Budweiser McLaren 24B, as raced by three-time 500 winner Johnny Rutherford.
Seven of Dyson’s other cars will be in A Paddock Tent 2. Race cars include the 1974 Datsun 510, in which Dyson began his racing career, working with longtime crew chief Pat Smith; the 1984 Porsche 962 that scored Dyson Racing’s first professional win; the 2002 MG Lola EX-257, the American Le Mans Series championship-winning 2011 Lola Mazda B11/86; and three-time Trans Am champion Chris Dyson’s 2018 Ford Mustang. Also on display will be the street-driven 1965 Shelby Cobra Rob has owned for more than 50 years and the Ford Model A coupe Dyson bought when he was 13 and rebuilt in anticipation of getting his driver’s license at 16.