1964 Ford Falcon/Howmet GT Sprint

1967 Daytona 24-Hour/Sebring 12-Hour

The builder and driver of this Ford Falcon, Ray Heppenstall, was an active amateur road race competitor from Pennsylvania who, beginning in the mid-1950s, raced European sports cars in SCCA events all over the country. By the mid-1960s, with his sights set on competing in the 1967 Daytona 24-Hour race, and with some sponsorship money from Howmet Corp, Ray turned this then-stock 1964 Falcon Sprint into an endurance racer. He swapped out some body panels with fiberglass replacements, changed the front suspension to a Shelby G.T. 350 set-up, installed a Ford 289 from a wrecked Hertz Shelby Mustang, and went racing. Amazingly, he and co-driver Bill Seeley came in 12th Overall and 2nd in the Over Two-Liter Touring class. The car soon appeared at Sebring, looking somewhat different, now classified as a Prototype and entered as the “Howmet GT Sprint.” Heppenstall had convinced the FIA that with further modifications, all paid for by Howmet, the car was now essentially a Howmet. Howmet was in fact developing a turbine-powered endurance prototype, the Howmet TX, but it would not be ready until the following season. The result of the machinations was that Howmet was named as a “manufacturer” and the ex- Falcon sedan had become a “prototype.” Though not pretty to look at with its modifications, the Howmet GT Sprint, with Heppenstall, Seely and Bob Nagle co-driving, nonetheless finished an impressive 19th Overall and first in class P-12. This restoration is to the car’s Daytona configuration.