"The pictures of Don Hulette and Dave MacDonald at Cotati brought to mind a story that Hulette liked to tell.  I don't know if this occurred at the '61 Cotati race or not but I suspect it may be the race because of the finishing order.

As the story goes, on Saturday Don and Dave had a pretty good race and as they approached the finish line both had serious engine explosions.  After the race, post mortems revealed that each had damaged one bank of cylinders.

Somehow, between them they managed to patch things back together.  However MacDonald had to borrow pistons from Hulette.  The problem was that Don and Dave had different stroke engines.  This resulted in the two banks of Dave's engine having different compression ratios and God knows what the balance was like.

Naturally, the Sunday race was a repeat of Saturday and as they approached the finish line again, you guessed it, both engines let go again!

True or not,  it was a story that Hulette told with obvious relish." 

Submitted by Don Hood