In the 1960’s, the international racing scene was largely dominated by European teams and drivers.  Americans were content to participate in NASCAR and open-wheel events sanctioned by the American Automobile Association but in Formula 1, long considered the premier racing series around the world, participants hailing from the United States remained conspicuously absent.  Even rarer were American drivers competing in cars that had been designed and built on their home soil.

In 1965, tired of the status quo, two burgeoning legends in sports car racing combined their talents in order to challenge this perceived inequality.  Both Dan Gurney and Carroll Shelby were well known as drivers with a long history of success in SCCA, World Sportscar Championship and Formula 1, and by the middle of the 1960’s had already managed to build a great relationship based upon their competition of Shelby’s very impressive sports cars.  Seeking to provide international racing with an American presence, the two combined to form All-American Racing, or “AAR” for short.

AAR would immediately begin building open-wheeled cars to compete at the Indianapolis 500 and in F1.  Known as Eagles, these vehicles quickly became a hot commodity not only amongst American racers but also their European competitors.  Indy and Grand Prix Eagles were found in the garages of many top racing teams, including AAR’s own, and in 1967 Gurney would pilot one to victory at the Grand Prix of Belgium, becoming the first American to win a Formula 1 race in an American car of his own construction in the 100 year history of F1 racing.

      Eagle cars continued to evolve with the times, and AAR’s business and facilities grew right along with them.  The company opened a British branch named Anglo American Racers in order to facilitate the production of their F1 racecars, and their manufacturing capacity in the United States also expanded to an appreciable level.  The 1970’s would see a flurry of activity for the company, beginning with Shelby’s departure and Gurney’s assumption of total control over AAR’s racing teams and facilities after his retirement from racing in 1970.  A co-branding with Plymouth to create the 1970 AAR ‘Cuda, meant as a production twin to the vehicle that Gurney was campaigning in Trans-Am racing, would also help introduce the company to a wider public audience.

           The 1980’s would also be a very busy time for AAR, after partnering with Toyota in order to bring their racing efforts up to an entirely new level.  Great success in IMSA would result from the perfect combination of Gurney’s racing insights and Toyota’s engineering resources.  Alongside their Sports Car racing campaigns, AAR would continue to build engines and chassis for a wide variety of corporate and private clients.  Flush with the spoils of victory after victory, the motorsports crew finally bit off more than they could chew when they decided to backstop Toyota’s entry into the CART open wheel series in 1996.  After 3 years of frustration and poor results, the automotive giant parted ways with AAR, effectively terminating their participation in Champ car and bringing about the end of Eagle chassis production.  Gurney would go one to field a team in the Formula Atlantic feeder series in 2001, but this too would fizzle out, bringing a proud chapter in American racing to a sad close.

In its 35 years, AAR had won eight championships, with 78 victories and 83 pole positions, employing 66 different drivers. In 2008 Gurney has partnered with Saleen to introduce a special limited-edition Mustang to commemorate his racing in the TransAm series.

By Benjamin Hunting

Benjamin is a professional, published writer living in Montreal, Canada. He has a deep background in three industries: medical, music and automotive. 

He is President of an independent record label for close to a decade, and also spent over eight years as a musical promoter and touring musician.

He has restored and raced automobiles for 15 years, and writes for a number of automotive publications on the web.