Scooter Patrick

The Otto Zipper Porsche 906E , with which Scooter Patrick drove in sports car races

Merlin "Scooter" Patrick (born December 30, 1932 in Torrance ; † September 27, 2016 ) was an American racing car driver .

Career in motorsport

Scooter Patrick started his career in the late 1950s. In 1957 he made his debut on an MGA in a sports car race in Palm Springs . Patrick was closely connected to the Porsche brand , with whose racing models he contested most of his racing appearances in sports car racing. He won his first championship in a converted Porsche 550 in 1961 in the Pacific Coast Series of the International Motor Sports Association .

In 1966 he became a works driver at Porsche. Together with Gerhard Mitter , he finished third overall in the Sebring 12-hour race in 1967 with a simultaneous class victory . For Porsche, he won several national GT and sports car championships in the late 1960s . After the end of the collaboration with Porsche, he accepted an engagement with the American actor James Garner in 1968 . Garner had for a lead role in the film Grand Prix of John Frankenheimer found interest in motorsport and founded its own racing team. Patrick drove the Garner- Lola T70 in sports cars race and Garner TS5 in the formula A . In 1968 he fought a duel with partner Dave Jordan for victory with two works Porsche 907s in Sebring, but was canceled after an ignition failure.

In 1974 he was third overall in the Canadian-American Challenge Cup on a McLaren M20 and, after retiring as an active driver, was a welcome visitor to many motorsport events into old age. Scooter Patrick was married to his wife Cathy for 44 years, had five children and twelve grandchildren.

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1968	Porsche System Engineering	Porsche 908	Joe Buzzetta	failure	suspension

Sebring results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1965	Precision Motors	Porsche 904 GTS	Dave Jordan	Rank 10
1966	Otto Zipper	Porsche 906	Don Wester	failure	accident
1967	Porsche car	Porsche 910	Gerhard Mitter	3rd place and class win
1968	American International	Lola T70 Mk.III GT	Dave Jordan	failure	Cylinder damage
1969	American International Racing Inc.	Lola T70 Mk.III GT	Dave Jordan	failure	Motor overheated

Individual results in the sports car world championship

season	team	race car	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	11	12	13	14th	15th	16	17th	18th	19th	20th
1965	Precision Motors	Porsche 904	DAY	SEB	BOL	MON	MON	RTT	TAR	SPA	ONLY	MUG	ROS	LEM	REI	BOZ	FRE	CCE	OVI	ONLY	BRI	BRI
				10
1966	Otto Zipper	Porsche 906	DAY	SEB	MON	TAR	SPA	ONLY	LEM	MUG	CCE	HOK	SIM	ONLY	ZEL
				DNF
1967	Porsche	Porsche 910	DAY	SEB	MON	SPA	TAR	ONLY	LEM	HOK	MUG	BRH	CCE	ZEL	OVI	ONLY
				3
1968	American Racing Porsche	Chevrolet Corvette Lola T70 Porsche 908	DAY	SEB	BRH	MON	TAR	ONLY	SPA	WAT	ZEL	LEM
			29	DNF						DNF		DNF
1969	American racing	Lola T70	DAY	SEB	BRH	MON	TAR	SPA	ONLY	LEM	WAT	ZEL
			7th	DNF
1972	Zipper Racing	Alfa Romeo T33	BUA	DAY	SEB	BRH	MON	SPA	TAR	ONLY	LEM	ZEL	WAT
													DNF
1974	Aase Brothers	Porsche 908	MON	SPA	ONLY	IMO	LEM	ZEL	WAT	LEC	BRH	KYA
									DNF

literature

• Christian Moity, Jean-Marc Teissèdre, Alain Bienvenu: 24 heures du Mans, 1923–1992. Éditions d'Art, Besançon 1992, ISBN 2-909413-06-3 .
• Ken Breslauer: Sebring. The official History of America's Great Sports Car Race. David Bull, Cambridge MA 1995, ISBN 0-9649722-0-4 .
• Peter Higham: The Guinness Guide to International Motor Racing. A complete Reference from Formula 1 to Touring Car. Guinness Publishing Ltd., London 1995, ISBN 0-85112-642-1 .

Web links

Commons : Scooter Patrick  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Scooter Patrick at the Driver Database
• About Scooter Patrick