By Louis Galanos
Gene Felton in his Datsun at the Paul Whiteman Trophy Races around 1971. Gene Felton has enjoyed an amazing race career, mainly in Professional Road Racing. His list of wins and top 3 finishes are the envy of many and his number of victories are second only to Al Holbert. Before his career spiralled, Gene was a regular on the SCCA circuit - a successful spell with a Ford Mustang, which he took to the 1967 ARRC, was soon followed by a year at the wheel of an ex-BRE Datsun 2000, which he bought from Pete Brock in 1970. The 2000 had previously been raced by John McComb, who Gene had raced against in A Sedan when campaigning his Mustang.

Gene says: "I got the car from Pete Brock after the 1970 runoffs. I had been driving sedans (and crashing them) so I thought it was less expensive to add a roll cage than to obtain more life insurance - I asked Pete Brock to design a roll cage which he did and I had it welded up. It was probably the first roadster around with a "rollcage".