By Lewis Franck, Special to Kickin’ the Tires
Rick Hendrick has started off 2024 with a bang. Not only was he this year’s Honoree at the Amelia Concours d’Elegance; one of his Hendrick Motorsports NASCAR teams won the Daytona 500 last month. Moreover, on the concluding day of the iconic event motoring held this past weekend on Amelia Island, another of his drivers won the Cup race at Las Vegas on Sunday.
A 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO was voted Best in Show, Concours de Sport while a 1947 Delahaye 135MS Narval Cabriolet took home Best in Show, Concours d’Elegance.
A Concours d’Elegance is a contest in which owners bring their exotic machines not to race, but to be judged on their condition. A total of 285 vehicles were shown on Sunday. It is billed as “a motoring event like no other.”
Along with the car event, Broad Arrow Auctions sold a portfolio of drool-worthy machines for a total of over $63 million with the top car, a 1967 Ford GT40, going for over $4.4 million.
As much as Mr. Hendrick is one of the winningest owners in NASCAR, he told Kickin the Tires, “I’m just a car guy,” adding that he bought a few cars including an “all-alloy ’55 Gullwing (Mercedes) … they only made 28 of those”.
The weekend’s events included a panel discussion with Hendrick, Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Terry Labonte and Ken Schrader. On Friday, Ricky Craven, along with IndyCar drivers Danny Sullivan and Paul Tracy, participated in another panel on “close finishes”.
Click to view an exclusive interview with Rick Hendrick.
Click to view an exclusive interview with Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Among the 27, 000 attendees for the weekend was Gary Nelson, currently the General Manager of the Action Express IMSA team and former crew chief for Bobby Allison’s 1983 Cup Championship team. Nelson posted some of Mr. Hendrick’s classic racing machines on X(formerly Twitter).