Can-Am Racing

When the Can-Am racing series petered out in 1974, it left a vacuum in the road-racing world. The thundering McLarens, Lolas, Chaparrals and Porsches had provided some of the most thrilling racing anywhere in the world, and the sound of a full grid of 700 hp behemoths was a serious assault on the senses.

The sound of a full grid of 700 hp behemoths was a serious assault on the senses.
The SCCA also had another professional racing series, the F-5000 Championship. This pitted single-seat formula cars with 5-liter, stock-block V-8s against 3-liter Formula 1 cars (although few of the latter ever showed up).

New Clothes
The Chevy and Dodge-powered racers mostly used chassis built by Lola in England, yet there were other manufacturers as well. Although F-5000 had done fairly well, the SCCA always considered it a pale shadow of the Can-Am. So in 1977 they stuffed F-5000 cars into Can-Am suits to emulate the famed series.


The F-5000 engine rules were continued, with 302 Chevys being the most popular choice. Lola, which had sold dozens of F-5000 cars to the States, introduced a rebody kit to turn a single-seat F-5000 car into a full-bodied sports-racer. Unlike the original Can-Am, only one seat was required. The body shell cost $6,000 and many were sold (the SCCA had dropped the F-5000 series, forcing teams to switch or sit it out). Other teams upgraded their old F-5000 cars on their own, and a few even built all-new cars.


The new Can-Am cars were fearsome performers; with over 550 hp they were almost as quick as the old Can-Am cars. There was also an under-2-liter class that was mostly populated by smaller Lolas with four-cylinder engines.