the following is a transcript from an interview conducted at thunderhill raceway in willows, ca, usa on may 18, 2025. content edited for clarity, but all quotes are kept as close to verbatim as possible. to maintain anonymity, the driver will be referred to by her initials (MC).
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MC: (To her husband, Bob:) You had your first race in 1970? Mine was in ‘73.
greensectors: Wow. What made you want to start driving?
MC: I always wanted to. My parents were both pilots, and Mom was a WASP. I don't know if you know anything about the WASPs in World War II. That's a little bit of history. WASPs were Women's Air Force Service pilots. It was about 20,000 women who signed up and only 1,800 who made it. But they were pretty extraordinary women, so I was raised by a pretty extraordinary woman. The kids in my family knew that nothing was off limits. And a lot of kids don't have that, but we did. And I started knowing cars. We would take trips across the country every year, camping, and I could tell you – at age five – every make, model, and year of car that we passed. Everything. Who knows why? But I didn't do anything about racing until about 1968. I started working as a communicator at the track, but then I started autocrossing a Lotus Seven. And an autocross lasts, what, two minutes? It wasn't nearly enough for me. It just wasn't. So I decided I wanted to go road racing. Bob was the fastest Mini driver in the country, and I wanted a Mini. So, I met up with Bob and said, okay, help me find a Mini. Little did I know I was going to find a husband. We ended up not finding a Mini that wasn't trashed, so I decided to go with a Triumph GT6. So I bought one, and I started racing in a class that's no longer there – it was called Show and Stock Sports Cars. And that was in 1973. I went to driver's school, it was two weekends then. The first weekend, I was at Riverside. And the second weekend was at Holtville, which is down by San Diego. (To Bob:) Since then, I've owned 14 cars, you've owned 16 cars? Something like that. (To me:) Bob retired probably 20 years ago from racing, but I didn't. And this whole time, I'm a firm believer in payback. So, although I couldn't go out on a turn – because, I mean, how do you get back out there, get into your race car, and go? I started working timing. And I have worked timing, you know – I'd go out on course, do my session, come back in, take a shower, tell Bob what was wrong with the car, and then go off to timing. I did that for a lot of years, and then I retired about 10 years ago. Maybe a little longer. And I started doing timing full time until they needed a pace car driver. I'm your man. So I did that for two years. And that was fun. But then the safety steward decided he was too old, and he retired. Well, we don't have a lot of stewards, so two stewards retired at the same time. So the better use of my time for the region was being a safety steward. I started doing that this year. And I'll do it as long as I can, but SCCA is my family. All my friends are here. I don't think I keep in touch with people that are not racers. except very casually. This is my family. We're still on a crew of Lynn Griffith's car, another racer, and she went to school down at Willow Springs, either late 1972 or '73. And she's still racing here, going down to Willow Springs to race the last race there next weekend. So I have a Class A license, so I drive the tow vehicle.
greensectors: Like the tow truck?
MC: No, I tow the race car down to the Southern California tracks.
greensectors: Oh, cool. So you have the Class A license…and you said you retired ten years ago, right? What was the last car you drove?
greensectors: And what was your favorite car overall?
MC: I...Bob? What was my favorite car? (Bob replies. Marcy agrees:) Once we got the problem solved, yeah, probably. (To me:) My last car was a Nissan Central SE-R and, you know, once we got some of the problems fixed – although the SE-R was supposed to be the racing model, it had a radiator this small (cups both hands together). So five laps into a race – electronically, it said, "Oh, I'm hot," and I couldn't go more than 40 miles an hour. That got really old, so we had to fix everything to make it good for racing. And once we did, it was a fabulous car. We also had a Ford Fiesta – that was just fun to drive. It was just fun. And whether we did well or not, we were running against Datsun 510s, which had more power…except in the rain. In the rain, I had more ability to get power to the ground, so while they’re spinning around, I’m moving up in the field. But definitely the Nissan was – that was the Showroom Stock B car, and we didn't have to work on it all the time. Some of my other cars we had to work on all the time. We'd come home from work, we'd have dinner, we'd go and work on the race car for five hours. Then we’d go to bed and start again the next morning, because we did all our own work.
greensectors: That’s dedication.
MC: Yeah. You can't do that forever. It just gets too old.
greensectors: So along those lines, racing is a…it's a big time and money commitment. How much would you say the time and money situation impacted your relationships with other people, your education, or other stuff like that?
MC: It really didn't, because we were able to do most of our education before we started racing. Our last year, both of us, was – mine was 10 years after I should have graduated, and Bob's was 20. But that's okay, we both did it. With the money situation – my job paid for our racing, while Bob’s job paid for our living.
greensectors: And what did you guys do, if you don't mind me asking?
MC: I was an accountant, and Bob was an engineer at IBM. And we had some really good sponsors. I mean, these were people that I worked for in one case, Precision Track School. They sponsored…well, for a couple of years, they sponsored entry fees, tires…It was ridiculous. Most people don't get that. And when we had British cars, I had access to a British Leyland wrecking yard. So if we needed an engine, we'd just go to the yard, pick an engine, rebuild it, stick it in the race car. That saved us a lot of money. And entry fees were a lot less then, but I guess track rental was also a lot less then.
greensectors: I can imagine. How much more expensive would you say it is now than it was then?
MC: Much. Much more expensive. I can't tell you percentage wise, but our entry fees – when I started, it was like $25.
MC: I mean, obviously, it went up, up, up, but the reason we built this racetrack (Thunderhill Raceway) was exactly that reason. Sonoma and Laguna Seca just kept raising their rates, and we realized that eventually, that was going to put the club right out of the ability to hold races. And none of us wanted that. I have always wished there were more women racing. There just aren't.
greensectors: And why do you think that is, mainly?
MC: In some cases, I think they don't think [women] can balance something like racing with the rest of what is expected in their life, like having babies. And I raced when I was pregnant.
greensectors: That's impressive.
MC: It was no big deal to me. And it was my mother who took me to enter in the race. It was an endurance race. And when our medical director saw me in a driver's suit, belly out to here, he pulled my license. But I qualified the car. And the other three [in the endurance team] ran the race. I just had to sit it out, but I would have been fine. But most people, first off, wouldn't have the support of their moms. And my doctor was okay with it, but most people get nervous when there's something unusual going on. I don't. You just take in the situation, and you weigh the risks, and you decide what you're going to do. And I have not felt the need to quit racing. And if I could do it now, you know, we're getting old. So the amount of work that it takes – [Bob’s] definitely not up for it, and I'm getting less up for it. You know, up here (points to her head). And I don't want to do it without him.
MC: We've been doing this a long time together, so…and with Lynn Griffiths still racing, and we're – Lynn is my daughter's godmother. She and I go to Formula One races together.
MC: We leave [Bob] at home. We're going to Spa in about eight weeks.
greensectors: That's so exciting.
MC: I'm really excited, really excited. But anyway – Lynn has a Porsche Boxster and she says I can race it. So I may race the last race here.
greensectors: The four-hour endurance?
MC: No, we won't do the enduro, but we have three races before that. The 1.9, 3-mile and 5-mile. So I'll do one of those, I think. And if I don't get around to it, I don't get around to it, but I'd really like to drive her car. You know, I like staying involved, and I like mentoring women who are out there. I...I think Joan [driver] is the only one this weekend. Think Joan's it.
greensectors: So if you were to encourage, maybe, a woman of any age to get into racing, what would be your number one piece of advice?
MC: Don't let other people talk you into no. 'Cause there are a lot of people, still, who would think it. A lot of people would think that women shouldn't be racing. Yes, they should. Yes, they should.
MC: But it's really hard, because it's hard to get sponsors and it's, you know – people don't mean to be misogynistic, but that's the reality.
greensectors: Would you say you’ve seen an underlying attitude of misogyny in the racing industry?
MC: I haven't found it in people who are in it [the community].
greensectors: Me neither, honestly.
MC: Yeah. It's people getting into it that let that stop them. People who are in it – I can probably count on one hand the number of people, that I know, that don't think that women should be out there. Within this organization, I mean. People on the outside, though – a lot of people don't think that [racing] is even a viable sport, much less that women should be out there.
greensectors: Yeah, I've noticed that as well. Within the SCCA, or at least, as far as I've gotten within the SCCA, I've found the community to be very inclusive.
MC: It is. And it doesn't matter how old you are. I'm almost 75, and still, I relate to people, and people relate to me. It doesn't matter what the age is, because we have the interest, and that's the important thing. Part of the problem of getting people involved, I think, boils down to two things. There are a lot of organizations now that do track events, whether it’s racing or HPDE or just track days. There are a lot of different options. But when we (she gestures to herself and Bob) started, there was only SCCA. If you wanted to do something else, you could autocross, and there were a lot of autocross clubs, but road racing was just SCCA. And all of the organizations that have sprung out since have SCCA as a base, but either way, there’s a lot more options to choose between now. But the bigger issue is that the cars being built and sold now are not “fun to drive” cars.
greensectors: Yes, I've noticed that, too.
MC: I mean, we had British sports cars. And, oh my God, they were fun. They were just fun. We hoped that the Miata would spur other car manufacturers, and it did for a little while with, like, Ford and the Thunderbird. Which, by the way, was always a piece-of-crap car – I mean, the old ones weren't. But the new one…anyways. Ford had the Mustang, and as years went by, the Mustang became more and more of a mom-and-dad car. It's not anymore. Well, until last year, when it became an SUV. But there just aren't cars that are fun and that you can work on. So people have gotten out of the car community. And if they are in a car group, it's the vintage cars. But I mean, these cars that are out here now, they’re expensive. And fixing them is really expensive. We had a car like the yellow one, I think he's leading. (she points out of the motorhome towards the track. A yellow blur roars past.)
greensectors: Yeah, I saw him earlier on the timing sheets – fast!
MC: So that's an A-Mac, and we had an A-Mac. I mean, out of the multiple cars we've had…it is so expensive, it is so much work. People really don't have time for that, so most of these guys you see out there don't do their own work. The yellow car notwithstanding – he does.
MC: He does all his own work and has other A-Mac people that help him out.
greensectors: Yeah. So would you say you agree – well, some people might say that racing is sort of a graying industry. I mean, there’s not a lot of young people getting into racing; partially because of the prices and partially because they just don't think it's plausible in their position anymore. Do you think the motorsport community is graying?
greensectors: And what do you think is the biggest contributor to that besides the modern car industry not producing fun cars?
MC: No, I think that's the big deal. Cars aren't fun anymore. They just aren't.
greensectors: Yeah. Plus, I think it might also be an institutional thing – I mean, Laguna is under new management now, and I've heard a lot of stuff about how the people who live around Laguna are lodging complaints about the noise and lobbying to get the track shut down. Do you think there might be a bigger trend of people just not tolerating fun anymore?
MC: No. We’ve dealt – I mean, every track has dealt with that sort of thing since the day it started. Every track, including this one. I mean, you’re kidding me. But I went to school at Riverside, and Riverside is no longer…it's now a storage facility. The track is completely gone. We had a track at Vacaville. It's now a farm. The noise situation is just something that that is a factor. Every one of those houses were built well after the track was established, and the homeowners knew when they bought it that Laguna was right there.
greensectors: Yeah, it’s messed up.
MC: And it's like airports. Same situation. So I don't think that that has so much to do with the decrease in popularity. I think it's just the reality of racing: it's noisy.
greensectors: Yeah, I think that is true. But I think another factor might be that when you see racing in popular media or online – like, when you see Formula One being broadcast, you start to see racing as something that’s unattainable. Because, you know, it’s become sort of common knowledge that every Formula One driver has been training since they were practically infants, and that it takes millions of dollars to get to where they are. Do you think that sort of publicity has influenced how people think about racing as a whole?
MC: I think as time goes on, yes, because it's those parents who put their kids into quarter midgets and go karts. Those people have been less and less over the years. So naturally, there are less people now in feeder groups like F4. But we had a lady, Nicole, who was driving – I think it was a Formula Atlantic. So it would be in this group (she points out at the track, where the open-wheel group is currently running). It's a wings-and-things car. Her parents probably spent 5 million dollars doing club racing – in a year.
MC: She kept crashing the car.
MC: And the people who were supporting the car…one day at Sonoma, she took all four sides off. All four corners. And she was out there the next morning. They worked all night, and it probably cost $50,000 for that fix. Most of us can't do that. So, you know, what we're seeing now is the popularity in the classes that are cheaper to run. The Miatas. It used to be the Spec Racer Fords, but now they’re getting expensive. They're getting sequential shifters and other things that are expensive. So we had a spike in both those classes for a while, but now even they're trickling down in numbers as well, so I don't know. I don't know what the future holds. My crystal ball is…not working well.
greensectors: Yeah. It’s tough.
MC: But I'll support SCCA as long as I can.
greensectors: Yes, I think that's very…wow, I can't think of the word. It's – I guess it's a very honorable thing to be out here supporting the organization that's supported so many drivers for so long.
MC: It's given me so much fun. I mean, it just has. I've had so much fun racing, and I can't imagine what we would have been doing had we not been doing that – because it takes all your time. It just sucks up all your time. And if you're fine with it, you're fine with it. But that was a lot of time that got sucked. What would we have done with that time? I can't think of anything. Racing kept my interest for that long. I mean, I'm a quilter, but I can pick it up and put it down, because it's just not a passion. This is a passion. And when you find a passion, oh my gosh. It's wonderful, and you build a life around that passion, and that's what we've done. A lot of people, if you don't have a spouse that shares that passion – good luck, it's probably not gonna last for a very long time.
greensectors: Yeah. So, ultimately, what would you say you love most about racing?
MC: It's the family. It’s the support, whether you're on course or off course. It's really funny, because you see a lot of really hard racing going on, and there is – there's a lot of respect and confidence in trusting that the guy who is two inches away from you is not going to hit you. He’s not going to, you know, knock you off first. Well – every once in a while, it happens, but not because they're being nasty. It's more like “oops.” On the part of one driver or both. And I just don't know of many other clubs that you can be a part of for as long as we have here at the SCCA where [respect] continues to be the norm. And it's really nice.
greensectors: I've noticed there's a really strong sense of community in racing. I like that, also.
MC: Well, Lynn and I have gone to a couple of Formula One races already, and we have found that it doesn't matter where we go: we can talk to just about anyone there. And we all share the same passion. Details are different, but the passion is there. You know, we're all interested in each other's experiences. It's fun.
greensectors: Yeah, I really like the sense of closeness or community that comes with racing and car culture in general. It feels – local, but also it’s worldwide.
MC: Yeah. Well, and we go to the SCCA runoffs. I've been going to the runoffs since 1996. Bob went in 1972. (Bob: Yeah, it was ‘72). And he didn't have a lot of fun because he crashed. He hurt himself...the crew brought the car home because they needed weight on the trailer. He had to fly. He could not travel for five days with a broken collarbone. He just couldn't do it. So in '96, I went as the rig driver for them. And when I came home, you know where he from? I wasn't even totally out of the car when I said to Bob: “You get ready, because we're going to start racing in January. And I'm going to race at the runoffs.” And we did it. I ran races everywhere, so I could learn how to learn new tracks. When you race at the same tracks all the time, you get to know them pretty well. I've never been to Road America – mid Ohio, which is where the runoffs store.. So I had to relearn how to learn a new track. We hit 14 races that year, and then went off to the runoffs. And I've been going almost every year ever since – not with the car. That was expensive. That was really expensive. And we had some sponsorship, but not a lot, so it costs a lot of money. But...every year, I've gone and there are like 7, 800 people there, and by the time the week is over, I've touched almost every one of them. And I work timing, and at this year’s runoffs, I will work safety steward part of the time, and timing some of the time, and I may be towing the car back. I don't know. But I'm going one way or another, because I've made so many friends over the years that it's old homework. It's so much fun. But I can go to a racetrack anywhere in the world, and the commonality is still there. You're never far from home in this community. It's amazing.
greensectors: Yeah. I haven’t been with you guys for long, but I think I know what you mean.
MC: And I feel safe. I feel safe. You can't say that everywhere. It's a very accepting community – much more accepting than more than people realize, I think.
greensectors: I agree. And…I think that concludes my questions for you. Thank you so much for your time, your expertise – this has been so insightful.
MC: Yeah. I've said a lot, I'm sorry.
greensectors: No, no, this is really good. Like, I'm going to do my best to put this in an article, and hopefully it'll be out in the next issue of The Wheel.
MC: Oh, cool. So do you want to talk to Lynn Griffiths?
greensectors: I would actually love that, thank you.
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