The audio for this story was produced by Susan Scott Peterson.
In its 42nd year, the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix is one of the largest summer events in the city, drawing “car nuts” from all over the world.
WESA Morning Edition host Priyanka Tewari spoke with WESA Weekend Edition host Ted Sohier about racing, vintage car culture, and whether electric vehicles will one day make good collectors items. (Spoiler: He doesn’t think they will.)
The Vintage Grand Prix’ most popular event takes place Saturday, Aug. 3 and Sunday, Aug. 4, 2024, with a car show featuring more than 1,000 vintage race cars and races winding through the streets of Schenley Park. For details, visit pvgp.org.
Priyanka Tewari: We're finding out that you have a totally different side to you other than the serious public radio host that we all know and love. You're also a car guy. So how did you actually get involved in the Grand Prix here in Pittsburgh?
Ted Sohier: I was a racer. I was a road racer for Sports Car Club of America (SCCA). And my dad was a car nut and we had a Porsche when I was a kid. When [the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix] started in Pittsburgh in 1983, all of us SCCA people stepped forward and said we'd help put on the race. I was on the radio and next thing you know, I was the announcer.
Tewari: The Vintage Grand Prix is a 10-day event that actually started last Sunday, but the main event is coming up this weekend at Schenley Park. So what can visitors expect once they're there?
Sohier: It’s up on the fairways of the Bob O'Connor Golf Course there at Schenley Park. We've got a thousand-plus cars. There's a Porsche Club group and there's a BMW group and there's an Italian car show called the Cortile. There's British Car Day. A few years ago, we had a gentleman who came from England with a car that is controlled by [a British cultural organization]. He had to get special permission to take that car out of England to bring it to the US to race because it's a treasure. It's a British treasure. So, a lot of cars on show on Saturday. And then our race cars are going to be on that course, warming up and qualifying on Saturday. The races are Sunday afternoon.
Tewari: You love cars, you love racing. But for somebody who's not really into cars that much or doesn't know much, is there a culture that's attached to car racing and vintage cars?
Ted: I think my interest in it has several facets. One is history. I love history anyway, but the history of automobile racing, both in Europe and here in this country. In fact, through a [story about Brunot Island] that was on the air a few years ago here on WESA, I learned that Louis Chevrolet had raced in Pittsburgh in 1905. This is before Louis Chevrolet had his own car company. He was a hired race driver, driving for the Fiat company, and he came and raced on Brunot's Island on a horse racing track in 1905.
[I also appreciate] fine machinery. Machinery that was designed well, built well, has been maintained well, and runs like a fine clock. And then the beauty of [vintage cars]. You know, you go and look at Ferraris and Alfa Romeos and Maseratis and certain BMWs and Porsches through the years. There's an absolute beauty in just the look and the body style.
Priyanka: One of the sort of classic laments that I hear about modern cars these days is that they don't make 'em like that anymore, or they just don't stand up to the classics. What would you say about that?
Ted: That’s one of the things that we talk about quite a bit. We'll look around at cars today and say, How many of these will anybody be interested in in 40 years? The technology is changing. Electric cars are on the horizon and they're on the streets today. Will there be vintage electric car racing someday? I can't see it. Because part of the gripping part of being close to race cars is the sound that they make. Electric cars don't make that sound.
This past weekend at Pittsburgh International Race Complex in Beaver County, we had the Ford GT 60th Reunion celebrating 1964 when that car was first designed. We had 62 of those cars at Pitt Race. So we saw them on track going fast last weekend — and it's pretty impressive.
There are hardly any straightaways there, but one of the drivers who's from Pittsburgh, Brian Dolan, his family owns one of those Ford GTs. He said he got up to 200 miles an hour on the backstretch there at Pitt Race. Now we don't run those cars at Schenley Park, because it's so twisty, but even those old cars from the 1960s will go 200 miles an hour, in the right place, with the right driver.
