Up next in 10
The CORVETTE TODAY podcast (and YouTube video channel) is honored to introduce you to Corvette Racing legend, Ron Fellows!
Your CORVETTE TODAY host, Steve Garrett, sits down with Ron to discuss his illustrious career. Ron tells you how he got his start in racing, he discusses some of his many race victories, how he got connected with Spring Mountain Racing and began the Corvette Performance Driving School there and his affiliation with Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.
Ron was part of the team that started Corvette Racing with the C5.R. He also got Corvette Racing's first win. You'll hear him reminisce about his years with Corvette Racing and how he is still connected with Corvette Racing today.
The heritage of Corvette Racing is in full view on this episode of CORVETTE TODAY!
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0:00
[Music] welcome to corvette today the podcast
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that talks about everything corvette with your host steve garrett mc and dj at one of the largest corvette weekends
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in the country corvette fun fest president of the corvette club of kansas city missouri and radio disc jockey at
0:19
the number one radio station in kansas city for over 40 years here's steve garrett
0:28
thanks for listening to corvette today the podcast that talks about everything corvette brought to you by mid-america
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motorworks pursue your passion at mamotoworks.com i'm your host steve garrett i appreciate
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you tuning in you can listen to corvette today on all podcast platforms you can also listen on your smart device just
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fellow corvette enthusiasts like yourself at mid-engine corvette forum.com also a shout out to
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canadiancorvetforum.com welcoming corvette owners from around the world my guest on corvette today is one of the
2:39
founding members of corvette racing he did the initial testing and development on the c5r race car he's recognized as
2:47
one of north america's most versatile racers winning in series that span the spectrum of motorsports from nascar all
2:53
the way through to le mans it's my honor and pleasure to welcome to the show mr
2:59
ron fellows ron thanks for being on corvette today hey thanks for having me steve my pleasure first of all let's
3:06
talk about your earliers ron you started cart racing and then moved to formula 1600 and then formula 2000 racing talk
3:14
about those early years and your beginnings in racing yeah for me i got the bug going to a formula one race at
3:22
molesport which is now kitty entire motorsport park and it was 1969. that was my first car race i went to one with
3:29
my brother rob and my uncle and his buddy it was at the age of 11 and i've
3:35
said it multiple times if an 11 year old can have an epiphany that was it i wanted to be on the other side of the
3:40
fence through paper routes and saving money i managed to start go-kart racing at the age of 15 which in these days is
3:49
late i started racing go-karts locally in the toronto area and then i wanted to be a formula one driver so i got into
3:55
formula forward and basically went broke doing that and got myself in an awful
4:00
lot of debt around 1981-82 i had to stop i was working full-time in construction
4:06
as a machine operator didn't do anything for probably four or five years and then
4:12
along came general motors of canada with imperial tobacco they started a single make championship with the f-cars so
4:19
basically they were showroom stock camaros and firebirds right and it had unheard of levels of prize money you had
4:26
to drive the car to the truck it had a six point roll cage a racing seat there was a three thirty second tread depth
4:32
goodyear that you used for the dry and you used the full tread for the wet and literally you drove them to the track
4:37
and it paid six thousand dollars to win it was incredible the series gained a
4:43
lot of popularity quickly just because of the size of the grids and there were almost 80 cars the first year so they
4:50
were qualifying races the series was had two of the races were live tv i managed
4:56
to win one of the two that were live on tv and that's where things began to change getting sponsorship it was a
5:02
series that super intense competition affordable marketable all the things
5:08
that i didn't have a great deal of experience with marketing racecraft and finesse you learned all of that doing 50
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mile races with 40 plus cars in the race with everybody basically in the same equipment so as the marketability of the
5:22
series enabled my brother and i to eventually get our own team together one of the sponsors i had was a canadian
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mutual fund company the president whom i met after he saw me win my first race in
5:33
86 which was at one of the indycar races he was a big enthusiast he was so thrilled to see me win this last lap
5:40
last quarter pass that's how the relationship started winning a championship in the late 80s and winning
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a number of the big events at the support race for the grand prix in the 80s and then the toronto downtown indy
5:53
winning at those places he rewarded me by helping me get into the trans am series the dream of wanting to be a
5:59
professional racing driver was on the back burner for a good number of years this series was the one that allowed me
6:06
to develop my skill i became a springboard into the us that's right now that was an 89 that was the players gm
6:13
challenge series and that's when you won the drivers championship in 1989 yes sir and then
6:19
from there you went on to fcca and nascar in trans am racing you won 19
6:24
times in 95 starts you also participated in the nascar craftsman truck series the
6:30
nascar nationwide series and the nascar cup series talk about all your time racing there in nascar yeah the
6:37
transient series was a support race for the cup race in watkins glen and i just thought wow those looked like a lot of
6:42
fun it wasn't until i began to race for chevrolet in 95 that the team owner of
6:48
the chevy factory transplant team was buzz mccall and buzz got into nascar he initially had a team in the xfinity
6:54
series and then he expanded to the cup series herb official who was head of gm racing i had a three-year contract with
7:01
chevy at 95 96 97 at the end of 96 they decided to pull out of the trans am
7:06
series and i'm thinking no more factory deal now what herb was keen to keep me under contract and let's see where
7:12
things would go and encourage me to try other things that's where in 97 i did
7:17
some truck races with billy hass aer manufacturing long time sponsor again they helped support our efforts in a few
7:24
of the craftsman trucks series races but i managed to win one in 97 and i also ran a ferrari 333 sp which was in the
7:31
prototype classes sports cars and i did that couple times as well managed to win a race with rob morgan my co-driver at
7:37
the home track and things began to progress again and it was in the fall of
7:42
97 when my contract was up i did some truck races managed to win one in the
7:48
world sports car championship met with her official and joe negri who was running gm racing and i met with them in
7:54
september of 97 and they talked about taking a corvette to le mans
7:59
there you go would i like to be part of that for a nanosecond i'm in yeah
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that's all it took the interesting part was the gt class was kind of all over the board and i was
8:11
sort of thinking what category were you going to run this car it all worked itself out and herb talked about this
8:17
guy by the name of don penos who was going to start an american le mans series had great vision for the future
8:22
of sports car racing we tested for an entire year in 98 but we debuted at the rolex 24 daytona in 1999 and the rest is
8:29
history there you go i tell you what ron let's take a quick break and in the next segment we're going to talk about your
8:35
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motorworks [Music] and now back to corvette today with your
10:05
host and my husband steve garrett [Music] hey thanks for listening to corvette
10:10
today the podcast that talks about everything corvette brought to you by mid-america motorworks pursue your
10:17
passion at mamotorworks.com i'm your host steve garrett with me is fame corvette racing
10:23
legend ron fellows in the second segment we're going to talk about ron's years with corvette racing ron in the late 90s
10:29
you began your career with corvette racing primarily as a development driver with the c5r talk about the development
10:36
of the c5r and then your transition into corvette racing in 1999. yeah the first
10:42
test that i did was in november of 97 and it was at sebring and that became an
10:48
annual thing by the way corporate racing testing at seabee in november but anyway it was myself and then chris knifel
10:55
chris had some history with chevy in the trans m series as well so chris and i were the first two drivers the early
11:01
days of corvette racing was a pickup truck a trailer about four guys one
11:07
laptop and a driver wow ken brown who was an engineer with
11:12
corvette on the production side he was one of the engineers initially gary pratt was there right from the start
11:18
obviously it was a pratt miller project and john rice on the engine side of it it was fun to begin that development
11:24
process and we brought on steve cole who i knew from more of a race engineer he came on board we tested the entire 98
11:32
season because some of the rules were changing for gts at the time you know that first year of the american le mans
11:39
series we tested typically on a monday tuesday or a monday tuesday wednesday following one of the races and it was
11:46
really useful data you've got lap times you've got race run comparisons
11:52
and goodrew was our entire partner at the time it was a great opportunity to work on their tire development because
11:59
of the compatibility issues this series then was multiple tire manufacturers were competing in the series wow so
12:06
michelin was fairly dominant but there were others competing as well along with goodyear dunlop yokohama you name it the
12:13
general general was there by the time we got to the end of the 98 season i had branched out to do a little bit of
12:19
nascar as well and what was then the bush series at watkins glen but the
12:25
focus was on the testing and the preparation was rolex 24 daytona 99.
12:30
there you go now you had corvette racing's first alms victory in september
12:35
of 2000 at the texas motor speedway with andy pilgrim as a matter of fact andy was on corvette today podcast number 80.
12:42
talk about that it had to be so thrilling to win corvette racing's first victory yeah in 99 and 2000 we weren't
12:49
doing all of the races we were doing majority texas in 2000 was not on the
12:55
schedule we'd come very close to winning at my home track i talked to both herb
13:00
and joe we need to go to texas it's a brand new track for everybody we'll go there a level playing field it wasn't in
13:07
the budget so what i helped do was one of my long time sponsors aer manufacturing they're based in addison
13:14
texas and this was a great opportunity for them to make a bit of splash in the dallas area with corbett racing they
13:21
helped make it happen we managed to get our first win it was one a very tough race but in the end it worked out
13:27
because we were at a track that nobody had any data nobody had any information right it was a role in today's terms of
13:34
the road course oval just magic to get the first win and absolutely nearly unbearable heat oh my gosh i'm sure as
13:41
we developed as a team we were continually improving we got our first win that was can we get more can we win
13:48
the big ones because the focus from the start was going to le mans and getting a class win there right 2001 was really
13:54
the breakout year for quarterback racing we got the rolex 24 overall in 2001 got
14:00
the first class win at le mans that year and that was a huge thrill i was going to say you've won at 24 hours of daytona
14:07
the 12 hours of sebring 24 hours of le mans i mean almost virtually everything in north america and then in 2002 you
14:14
won the alms gts drivers championship and you shared that title once again
14:19
with johnny o'connell in 2003 2004. that had to be exciting as well yeah it was a
14:25
bit bittersweet johnny came on his first race with us was 2001 to win at daytona
14:31
that was a great event because we had both dale earnhardt senior and junior in the car with andy and kelly wow in our
14:37
car it was johnny chris knifel frank freon and myself frank was usually in the four car with andy and kelly for the
14:43
longer races but this is how we use four drivers at daytona so that's how we broke it out and awesome opportunity for
14:50
all of us to work together but the rules were such that they only awarded one driver yeah it was crazy a lot of the
14:56
drivers we were lobbying hey we're not alone in this we have teammates it should be the two full-time drivers
15:02
should get equal points and they were rewarding the difference between johnny and i in 2002 that was points based on
15:10
fastest rates lapse that made the difference i had more facets race laps and it was crazy we should have just
15:16
shared it and then after 2002 they changed the rules wow it really was the two full-time drivers shared equally and
15:22
that's the way it should be it has been ever since yeah absolutely right also besides your duties with corvette racing
15:29
you competed obviously in nascar you won back-to-back fcca speed world
15:34
championships while driving the cts-v for cadillac how did you balance all those ron you know what i was quite used
15:42
to jumping in multiple cars it goes back to the experience i had racing in canada
15:47
because it was also i raced at 944 turbo porsche it was not unusual to be in a race
15:53
weekend where i was racing a short stock camaro and that 944 turbo porsche that
15:59
was on slicks when i was doing trans am there was a couple of years there where i did all three on the same weekend so
16:05
getting an opportunity to be a third driver with cadillac world challenge team and just do a few and try to help
16:10
where i could when cadillac team was at alms events for me was super fun it was an opportunity to get into a sprint race
16:17
they were 50-minute races and i was there strictly to help with the points i wasn't chasing a championship if i had
16:23
an opportunity to win that's what i was there for we managed to get a few wins for cadillac to help with manufacturer
16:29
points and oh 506.07 something like that or 0.456 doing two or three here and
16:35
there yeah it was a lot of fun let me take you back to 2006. long beach california you ran a spectacular race
16:42
just phenomenal you passed on the last lap talk about that race ron
16:49
oh boy yeah that was a lot of fun and long beach is such a great street circuit it is just so much fun to drive
16:54
doesn't matter what you're in you know the cadillacs were strong although with the balance of performance adjustments
17:01
we were not fast in a straight line and that was all b.o.p and long beach has one very long front straightaway i was
17:08
racing against a dodge viper and the viper was just so much faster on the front straightaway but i was quicker
17:15
cornering stopping so it was just a matter of timing it the good news is that when you come around the hairpin
17:21
last corner at long beach the start finish line is only about a third of the way up the straight line so it was just
17:27
a matter of timing the pass and i got a good run and he blocked the inside i went around the side of him and got
17:33
around him and there was like two corners from there to the hairpin we were able to hang on for the short drag
17:39
race to the checkered flag yeah it was an exciting one that was an awesome race now in 2008 you became ambassador for
17:47
corvette and a technical advisor for gm racing talk about what that entails
17:52
right it was mostly ambassador my last year with corvette racing was 2008 there
17:58
are a number of things happened one there was talk about a high performance driving school with the sixth generation
18:05
zr1 that was out there being the first old driver what do you do with somebody who's got
18:11
10 years with corvette racing i was 51 52 at the time i'd had a really good run
18:16
privileged and honored to be part of the corvette team with corbett racing and pat miller they offered up this
18:22
ambassador opportunity it was a great way to stay involved and be helpful with some of the newer drivers that were
18:28
coming into corporate racing and also be able to spend more time when you're not driving as corporate racing became more
18:34
and more popular corvette owners were in the hundreds coming to the track it was an opportunity for one of the drivers to
18:41
spend a lot more time with corvette owners of the track it was a great opportunity for me to step into that
18:46
role and an honor and i continued to this day with that role that's fantastic it's a great way to stay connected to
18:51
corvette racing after you get out of the car after you're done behind the wheel ron we would be remiss if we didn't talk
18:58
about lamar for a minute you had a stint at le mans where you gained like 30 seconds on the leading aston martin car
19:05
talk about le mans and some of your best memories there where did you get that information from i do my research my
19:11
friend well yeah the one that you're referring to that le mans was 2007 and it was oh
19:20
gosh i think i got in the car and it was three and a quarter maybe three and a half hours to go i get into the car you
19:26
know like 11 40 and then shortly after i got in it monsoon it just rained and rain
19:33
typically at le mans rain or shine they're not bringing out the safety car and i said a really good reason for it
19:39
right that's sort of the european way i think we were p3 at the time pastor martins were 1-2 but we were down two
19:46
laps i'd always done pretty well in the wet for the next couple of hours uh got ourselves back on the lead lap just by
19:52
staying on the track and going fast in the wet the unfortunate part was that when we got back on the lead lap they
19:58
did bring out a safety car essentially we tunneled around behind the safety car for 45 minutes or so and then they went
20:06
green with i don't know five minutes to go there wasn't enough time left when i was making up time on them for the
20:11
longest time you know i was in this super focused mode and i had no idea where i was i'm just trying to survive
20:18
and i'm passing cars and prototypes i asked our engineer how are things going like where are we at it was joe kieffer
20:25
and joe just came on the radio and he said hey just keep doing what you're doing you're running i forget what he
20:32
said you know 30 40 seconds a lot quicker than the aftermarket you will take the lead with 20 odd minutes to go
20:38
it was one of those really cool moments where you're just finding ways to stay on the track make speed unfortunately it
20:45
was the safety car that ended our day yeah well ron let's take our final break and in segment number three we're going
20:50
to talk about what you're doing today here on corvette today
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[Music] this is the corvette today podcast with
23:37
steve garrett hey thanks once again for listening to corvette today the podcast that talks
23:43
about everything corvette brought to you by mid-america motorworks pursue your passion at mamotoworks.com
23:50
i'm your host steve garrett with me is fame race card legend from corvette racing ron fellows in this third and
23:56
final segment we're going to talk about ron's time after corvette racing around in 2008 i know you left corvette racing
24:02
like you said at the end of the season but you set up your own school in pahrump nevada talk about spring
24:08
mountain yeah chevrolet was looking for an opportunity when the sixth generation zr1 came out there's a number of the
24:15
senior executives including mr bob bletz that was absolutely adamant that we're
24:20
going to have a car with over 600 horsepower let's figure out how to get driver training as part of the ownership
24:25
package tom wallace who's a chief engineer back then very supportive i had coincidentally met the ownership the
24:32
managing partner john morris at spring mountain met him in february of 2008
24:38
they sort of developed him there and then michelin was keen to be part of it as well we started in october of 2008
24:45
fairly humble beginnings we probably had half a dozen instructors got rick alone
24:50
to become a chief instructor a couple of months in we were basically in support of the ownership program that was part
24:57
of the purchase experience for c6 tier one as that progressed we were gaining
25:02
momentum as a high performance driving school and an experience working with the corvette team and chevy marketing it
25:09
was agreed that the right thing to do here going forward was extend the high performance driving school program to
25:16
every owner and so starting with the seventh generation and now the eighth generation corvette every first owner
25:22
gets a two-day school at spring mountain it's been great to be part of it it's grown to where you know we were probably
25:28
eight or nine hundred in the first few years and now it's north of four or five
25:33
thousand owners a year come to the school certainly the c8 in 2022 will probably see the best numbers yet based
25:40
on its popularity and it's been great for me to be part of it rick and the team that he's put together there you
25:46
know we're up to around 30 instructors now we're running multiple programs a day as the car has evolved so it has our
25:52
curriculum it's been a lot of fun to be able to provide an opportunity for corvette owners and enthusiasts to be
25:58
able to come to the school and have a much better understanding of the
26:03
capability of the latest generation corvette c7 ca and also leave a solid
26:09
knowledge base of not only the cars capabilities but the road and it can be intimidating these cars are incredibly
26:16
sophisticated highly capable and they're also great daily drivers that two day
26:21
experience is invaluable for owners to really get an opportunity to leave with
26:26
a much better understanding and appreciation for what their corvette is capable of spring mountain is just a
26:32
phenomenal experience i always call it top gun for corvette because they teach you to drive that car to the edge of the
26:39
envelope and rick malone and his staff do an outstanding job todd crutcher and his staff are just fantastic and it is a
26:46
premier facility in north america now you also own part of the group that owns
26:51
most sports which is now called canadian tire motorsports park that's kind of like spring mountain in canada isn't it
26:58
well it's a little bit different spring mountain is a motorsports country club it doesn't host any spectator events
27:05
isn't set up that way from an infrastructure standpoint membership in the facility has grown and they've added
27:11
track it was initially 2.2 then 2.4 isn't it a mile and a half added then another two
27:17
miles now they're up to the northeast the property is another three miles so the facility has about nine and a half
27:23
miles of racetrack seeing how it has grown and developed over the years has been awesome to be part of that and then
27:29
a couple of guys carlo fidani and help out we were actually at my school with carlo's two sons in the fall of 2010
27:36
carlo said let's buy a racetrack okay we're all in toronto areas what
27:42
about motorsport would it be for sale that's really how it started i said i don't think it is but i know who to call
27:48
it don pinos who was the founder of the american lama series he had purchased the track in 98. he also owned rhode
27:55
atlanta sebring as well as the series he was a big history buff and there was a
28:00
tremendous amount of history with den mosport it opened in 1961 and has hosted
28:05
everything from floriano under knm trans am all the sports car open wheel you
28:11
name it i approached don and scott atherton who is the president of the america le mans series and don's
28:17
right-hand person there with his racing empire i just said hey any chance you
28:22
guys might be interested in selling most porn that's really how it started we sat down and don liked the idea of it going
28:28
back into canadian hands and he and carlo got along really well we took possession june 1st 2011. it's a track
28:36
that annually would have four or five big events a year as well as having car club days manufacturer test days track
28:43
rental is really the bread and butter of the business you know it had all this history but a lot of the infrastructure
28:50
was still a couple of decades behind and so that was one of the first things that we did was looked at investing and carlo
28:56
was a great visionary for a lot of this he could see things that i just took for granted in terms of what the
29:02
infrastructure presented and certainly putting in tunnels we spent a lot of time grooming the outside of the
29:08
racetrack it has incredible sight lines for spectators and then we put a new tower and got corporate suites and then
29:16
built a smaller track on the west side of the property a new karting facility that opened in 2015 and then along the
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way a lot of the corporate partnerships that i've had over the years one of them being canadian tire corporation stepped
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up to be a partner beginning in 2012 with the name and rest of the facility and gm canada is a big supporter
29:34
michelin they believed in what we were trying to do taking this iconic facility and bringing it into the 21st century my
29:41
wife's part of the partnership group our oldest son works in the business as well that's fantastic your list of
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accomplishments reads like a who's who you're a four-time alms most popular driver which was voted on by the fans
29:55
four times also a three-time alms champion two class wins at le mans 19
30:01
fcca trans am wins and five nascar wins that is absolutely incredible any of
30:08
them that stand out the most to you ron yeah there's a few that are defining
30:13
moments in a number of ways in terms of providing opportunities winning the rolex 24 at daytona in 2001 and overall
30:21
was huge we had dale earnhardt senior and junior in the second corvette getting to know them led to me getting
30:28
an opportunity to drive for dale seniors team and also dale jr's team that was certainly a pivotal moment for not only
30:35
corporate racing but also for my career to do other things nascar opportunities
30:40
with dale senior and then dale jr for quarter racing the first firsts were big we talked about the first win in 2000 at
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texas the focus was to win at le mans and that was to take a corvette and win
30:52
a le mans getting that to happen the same year as a rolex 24 was amazing the
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gm execs that were behind the project and certainly herb official in particular was part of the visionary
31:04
behind that i will never forget how happy herb joe doug fee and gary frat
31:09
jim miller tom michael all the folks from fred know but certainly those two with corvette were the two biggest ron
31:15
if somebody wanted to get in touch with you let's talk real quickly about your email and social media probably the
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simplest way is either go through the rentals performance driving school of spring mountain or you can do that
31:26
through canadian tire motorsport park both websites you'll be able to find some contact info and i will get the
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message sounds good ron thank you so much for taking time to be on corvette today the stories were absolutely
31:38
fantastic thank you so much for everything my pleasure thank you steve thanks for listening to corvette today
31:44
and please be sure to tell your family friends and other corvette enthusiasts about the corvette today podcast and
31:49
also thanks to our flagship sponsors mid-america motorworks pursue your passion at mamotorworks.com
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32:03
also aerolary wheels get 100 off your purchase with the new promo code ct111
32:09
at listening to arrowlauri.com today with
32:14
steve garrett if you'd like to contact steve with any thoughts on the podcast or ideas for guests on corvette today
32:21
you can email him at stevegarrattdj gmail.com that's steve stevegarrettdj gmail.com
32:30
garrett has two r's and two t's or connect with steve on social media on facebook twitter or instagram using at
32:37
steve garrett dj thanks again for listening to corvette today [Music]
33:05
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