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MILLER: Farewell To Formula Atlantic
The top of their web page says the season opener is set for 3/19 and there’s a countdown clock still ticking. But, sadly, time has run out on Atlantics.
Robin Miller  |  Posted March 03, 2010   Indianapolis, IN
The top of the web page says the season opener is set for March 19 and there’s a countdown clock still ticking.

But, sadly, time has run out on Formula Atlantic.

After 37 years of cranking out some of the top talent in North American open wheel racing, the Atlantics have closed down.

“I called everybody before I left in November and most everyone was prepared for this but it’s still a very sad day,” said Vicki O’Connor, whose run as Atlantics’ boss began in 1985.

“There are so many great memories from something that was close to a lot of our hearts.”

Sprouting from the roots of Formula B, Atlantics debuted in 1974 in Canada with support from Player’s tobacco and was sanctioned by Canadian Automobile Sport Clubs. Toronto’s Bill Brack won the first two titles but this category really took off in 1976 when Gilles Villeneuve stormed into the picture.

The favorite son of Montreal battled Bobby Rahal, Howdy Holes, Tom Gloy, Price Cobb and Elliott Forbes-Robinson along with future F1 mates Keke Rosberg, Patrick Tambay, James Hunt and Alan Jones to win back-to-back Player’s Challenge Series championships.

“If you had a desire as a young guy to go to Formula One there was only series to be in and that was Formula Atlantic,” said Rahal, whose performance launched a career in Indy cars, Can-Am and a brief fling in F1. “The competition was fierce and our first race in Edmonton we had 32 cars within two seconds of each other.

“Every year you got a shot at all the heroes from Europe at Three Rivers and it was just an amazing time. It got Gilles his break and I guess the rest of us also did pretty well.”

During the past 30 years, Atlantics was the springboard to CART and Indy Cars (along with Indy Lights) and the list of graduates is impressive, to say the least.

It includes former CART, F1 and Indy champ Jacques Villeneuve, past CART champions Michael Andretti, Jimmy Vasser, Bobby Rahal, 2004 Indy 500 winner Buddy Rice, open wheel veterans Patrick Carpentier, Scott Goodyear, Mark Dismore, Kevin Cogan, Memo Gidley, Richie Hearn and Alex Barron along with current IndyCar regulars Ryan Hunter-Reay, Graham Rahal, Danica Patrick, Rafa Matos and rookie Simona De Silvestro. Two-time king Jon Fogarty is now a GRAND-AM sports car champion along with Alex Gurney and A.J. Allmendinger has moved on to NASCAR.

Dismore is the career leader in victories with 15, while Gilles earned the most pole positions (14).
A product of Formula Atlantic in his own right, Bobby Rahal later became a team owner, fielding entries for two-time champion Jon Fogarty and a certain female driver with Sprint Cup aspirations. (LAT)

Teams like Condor Motorsports, Jensen Motorsports, Polestar, DSTP and Lynx were loyal fixtures along with Toyota, Mazda, Swift and Cooper Tires. Ben Johnston purchased the series two years ago and tried to keep it going but couldn’t.

“My first race in 1985 we struggled to get 15 cars to Summit Point, West Va. and in 2006 we had 28 Swift/Mazda Cosworths on the grid at Long Beach,” said O’Connor.

“When Champ Car and the IRL got together it was the right thing but we were the casualty. With the right timing, it might be able to come back some day and I hope so because it’s a valuable piece of history.”

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The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEED.com, FOX, NewsCorp, or SPEED
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