Carrera Panamericana Crash Destroys Studebaker, Porsches, Alfa, and a Benz; Everyone Survives

by Murilee Martin

Published: October 22nd, 2012

carrera panamericana crash destroys studebaker porsches alfa and a benz everyone

La Carrera Panamericana 2012 ran its third day yesterday, and we’ve got a report of a five-cars-over-a-cliff wreck during yesterday’s race segment ending in Querétaro.

TTAC’s correspondent in Mexico is Christine The Arc Angel, known to thousands of 24 Hours of LeMons racers as the woman who welds the barnyard animals to their cars after a bad-driving bout. She’ll be sending us photos and descriptions as cellphone service in rural Mexico permits; you can also keep up with the action by reading her blog.

Christine is serving as interpreter for Taz Harvey’s and Rudy Vajdak’s Datsun 510 team, which took the Class A Historic win for Sunday’s race session.

Here’s Doug Mockett’s amazing ’54 Olds, which you may recall hauling ass up the mountain at the Pikes Peak Hill Climb.

The hot topic in Santiago de Querétaro was the five-car crash that ate some very nice machinery. Here’s Christine’s account.

Paul Hladky and Adrian Gerrit in a Studebaker lost it on a corner and stopped , when a Porsche hit them and pushed them about a off the road on the hill. They were fine, until another Porsche lost it and hit the first Porsche, who hit the Studebaker and stuffed it down the rest of this small hill. But then, the story gets crazier. An Alfa driven by Trevor Pettennude and Joshua Finkleman spins out at the same turn and stops, both driver and navigator get out just in time to have a Mercedes lose it and hit their car, bringing the car collection at the bottom of the hill to a ridiculous toll of FIVE cars! Incredibly, everyone is fine, only one broken ankle to report.

Sadly, the first day of La Carrera claimed the life of Javier Dávalos Valenzuela, whose Studebaker rolled in Puerto del Aire.

It’s a shame for classic race cars to go out like that, but we’re sure at least a couple of them will be fixed up to race again. Meanwhile, the trophy girls are getting ready for tonight’s awards ceremonies in Morelia.

#CarreraPanamericana #MexicanRoadRace #Mexico #Oldsmobile #Racing #Studebaker

Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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2 of 8 comments

AmeroGuy on Oct 22, 2012

Did you hear the one about the guy who bought his 18 year old son a Ferrari F430? Predictably tragic results. http://www.wsbtv.com/news/news/local/ferrari-seriously-damaged-early-morning-crash-wood/nShLW/

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Panzerfaust on Oct 22, 2012

From the one picture it looks like the Studebaker will probably roll again, if not, at least it took a couple of Porsches with it before it died. What a way to go!

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