***“Life is too short to drive boring cars.”***

The Shelby name, the cars, his legacy, is recognized around the world. The impact of what Carroll Shelby has done for the motor industry is still felt today like a rolling thunder as his cars did. Carrol has lived several lives all at once, Race car driver, Team manager, Sports car constructor, entrepreneur and a personality that would leave him with a Legendary status up there with Enzo Ferrari and Colin Chapman.

In his early years Carroll swapped out Aircraft and Trucks for racing, starting out in a plucky MG TC in 1952 Carroll quickly gained traction and attention with 12 wins to his name in 2 years, by 1954 he was approached by John Wyre who was Aston Martins Team manager at the time and asked Carroll to be a part of Aston Martins factory team, since then favouring European cars to conquer races that still stand the test of time.

Carroll went on to Achieve 1st in Class in 1955 at Sebring in a DBR3, he also went on to win several races in a Austin-Healey 100S while dabbling in Grand Prix racing in Maserati’s throughout the 50’s and regular appearances in Porsche’s and Ferrari’s for good measure. Carroll went on to become Sports Illustrated magazine’s driver of the year in 1956 and 1957.

At Carroll’s peak in 1959, as a fully fledged Aston Martin factory driver. He would be racing in Formula 1 and Sports Cars In a DBR4 and DBR1 respectively. Achieving two top 10 finishes in the Portuguese and Italian Gran Prix but his most notable race was Winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans with Roy Salvadori leading an Aston Martin 1-2. 1960 would be the end of Carroll’s racing career as heart problems would eventually force him to stop, although Carroll never really knew how to stop and quickly worked out you can still race cars with out being in them.

His true genius came with Shelby-American. Carroll, ever the opportunist, noticed a gap in the American Car market, after a career in racing European Sports Cars, Carroll saw America did not have an equivalent, a sports or grand touring car that was capable on and off the track.

Carroll had heard of AC Cars, they were a small British Sport Car manufacturer with a good lightweight chassis but recently were left without an engine supplier, Carroll approached AC with his idea and they couldn’t wait, all he had to do was convince the giants at Ford to lend him some engines, and that’s exactly what he did. Right off the bat Carroll had intended that the car would go racing, and would be in direct competition to Corvette in the States and Ferrari in Europe. By 1962 the AC Cobra was born, 75 cars were created by the end of the first year and Carroll had already started putting them to work.

The AC Cobra started racing at the end of 1962 with the help of Billy Krause, by the end of 1963 Carroll and Billy knew modifications were needed to be competitive against the rest of the GT cars of the time. So by the start of the 1964 racing season Carroll had created yet another Legendary car, The Shelby Daytona. The Daytona picked up a couple of class wins at Le Mans and Goodwood. Ultimately it went on to win the US GT Championship and the following year would win the World Manufactures GT Championship, doing so making him the first American team to win.

At the same time as Carroll’s own cars competing in the States and around the world. Shelby-America became involved with Ford’s GT40 Program in 1964. Thanks to the recent film ‘Ford vs Ferrari’ we all know that 2 years later in 1966 Ford won with a historic 1-2-3 in GT40 MkIIs thanks to the friendship of Carroll and Ken Miles. Shelby-American carried on making Prototype race cars up until the Ford GT40 Mk IV, as new rules for the following year meant the Ford engines were no longer legal.

Shelby-American carried on racing with Ford in the form of the Shelby GT350 and GT500 through to 1968, from then on, the GT Shelby brand was produced in-house by Ford and by 1970 Ford and Shelby ended their racing agreement. During the 70’s Carroll ‘retires’ and would spend most of his time traveling around Africa.

Through the 80’s Carroll would return to the automotive world by joining up with Dodge thanks to Lee Iacocca who had previously been with him during the Ford days, Carroll had originally been brought in as an engine consultant and went on to help design the Dodge Viper and later on in 2002 would help Ford develop the Ford GT, Two of the most iconic American Sports Cars of the 00’s.

A ‘successful career’ just doesn't cover Carroll Shelby's achievements. What he set in stone so early on for the teams he drove for and the cars he built, are they the foundations of what sportscars are today? The Viper GTS, Ford GTE and the Aston Martin GT3, Can we claim Carroll Shelby is still accountable for the success of the modern GT categories? I guess that’s for you and me decide.

Regardless, I'll tip my Stetson to this one of a kind Cowboy.

Having done this research, the one takeaway from all this is Carroll’s passion, enthusiasm and determination is something for all of us to be inspired by.

Let me know which is your favourite Shelby Car, leave a comment and don’t forget to subscribe for more content and so much more!

Freddie Jenner

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