Steve Saleen

Steve Saleen (left) at the 1997 Le Mans 24 Hours

A Saleen S7R in a run for the 2001 Spanish GT Championship; at the wheel is Carlos Palau

Stephen Mark "Steve" Saleen (born April 2, 1949 in Inglewood ) is an American entrepreneur, racing team owner and former racing car driver .

Entrepreneur

Steve Saleen attended Whittier High School , the alma mater of Richard Nixon , 37th President of the United States , in the Californian city ​​of Whittier in the 1960s . After high school , he graduated with degrees in economics from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles .

In 1983 Steve Saleen founded Autosport in Irvine Saleen , a company that initially dealt with vehicle tuning for Ford Mustangs . The first Saleen Mustang was created in 1984. As a result, other Mustangs were built and sold for use in motorsport and as super sports cars for road traffic. The best-known in-house development was the Saleen S7 and the motorsport variant derived from it, the S7R .

In 1995 Steve Saleen bundled his racing activities in his own racing team, which he founded and ran together with actor and amateur racing driver Tim Allen and former professional driver Bob Bondurant . The team's name was Saleen-Allen Speedlab . Saleen Mustangs were reported in US sports car racing .

In 2007 Saleen withdrew from the company he founded, which went bankrupt in 2009. Saleen founded a new company with which he was active in the marketing of US muscle cars . Steve Saleen is married with three grown children and lives in Coto de Caza .

Racing career

Steve Saleen's racing career began at Porsche club races in the early 1970s . He contested his first sports car races in 1974 in a Shelby GT350 in the IMSA GT series . In 1975 he got into monoposto racing, drove in the US Formula Super Vau Championship in 1975 and in the Atlantic Championship for years .

After the end of the 1984 season, Saleen took a break from racing until he founded his own racing team in 1995, then he resumed activities. He and his racing team were again involved in the IMSA GT series, competing in the 24 Hours of Daytona , the 12 Hours of Sebring and the 24 Hours of Le Mans .

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1997	Saleen-Allen Speedlab	Saleen Mustang RRR	Price Cobb	Carlos Palau	failure	Tire damage

Sebring results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1997	Saleen Allen Speedlab	Ford Saleen Mustang	David Warnock	Robert Schirle		Rank 19
1998	Saleen Allen Speedlab	Saleen Mustang	Tommy Archer	Ron Johnson		Rank 6
1999	Saleen Allen Speedlab	Saleen SR	Terry Borcheller	Ron Johnson	Darren Law	failure	differential

Web links

Commons : Steve Saleen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• About Steve Saleen
• Steve Saleen at the Driver Database
• Steve Saleen at Racing Sports Cars

Individual evidence

1. ↑ American Formula Vau Championship 1975