BangShift Readers, Do You Know Anything About The Lincoln Mark VII That Raced Trans-Am?


BangShift Readers, Do You Know Anything About The Lincoln Mark VII That Raced Trans-Am?

Alright, readers, I come to you requesting help. See, while doing research on Trans-Am cars for a different story, I accidentally slipped and entered “Trans Am L” into Google and the next thing I know I’m looking at what I’m pretty sure is the only all-out race-prepared Lincoln Mark VII ever done. The thing looks like it’s ready to go play, but for the last three days I have been stonewalled in finding anything really useful about the car, so here’s what I know.

The driver of the car was Russ Theus. The Lincoln appeared in 1984, ran six races between the 1984-85 seasons, and didn’t do any better than 9th place at Watkins Glen. Theus had partial sponsorship by HyTec, but I’m not sure if he only had one Lincoln or two, since I have found pictures of both the dark red car above and the liveried one below. The only other info I have found is that Theus drove a Toyota once in 1979.

We are pretty fond of the Fox-era Marks around here, and seeing one that actually raced is really sweet. If you have any more info, pictures, or video of this car hauling ass and battling it out, please post it below!

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25 thoughts on “BangShift Readers, Do You Know Anything About The Lincoln Mark VII That Raced Trans-Am?

  1. Tedly

    You find the weirdest stuff. And I mean that as a compliment! Never knew this existed, I’ll snoop around and see if I can find anything though.

  2. Nick D.

    I searched around and didn’t really find anything, other than it was built and sponsored by Hy-Tech, it had middle-of-the-pack performance and something about Theus worked for Ford and they got pissed that he was racing a Lincoln instead of a Ford. One guy remembered seeing it at a race and he said it was pretty tail-happy and that the crowd loved it.

  3. Gerald Krueger

    I noticed the name Mark Windecker on the 2nd photo of the Lincoln. Mark is very active on a Facebook group called SCCA pro racing photo swap. Contact him and I’m betting he will have details.

  4. CTX-SLPR

    Go dig up the story of the NASCAR Mk VIII that Ford tried to get in when they killed the Thunderbird MN112 but not the Mk VIII for a single year.

    1. James Payne

      John Andretti drove that car in a test at Charlotte . Tim brewer built that Lincoln for kranefeus hass racing

      1. Jerry Rose

        I remember that car being tested at Charlotte. WSOC tv reported that it was only a test for aero, and was in no way heading to race, as I remember it. But that shit was cool as hell.

  5. Mark-VII-FB-RX-7

    Being the owner of an 88 LSC that’s basically the same colour as the top photo. This is the coolest thing I have ever seen. Makes me want to wide-body my car JK.

  6. Chris Horning

    The car was based in Michigan, I remember seeing it after a heavy race crash at a friends work place in Farmington hills I think. That friend is Dan Roaenau, the current fabricator for
    Andretti racing. He would know more about it. I will post a link to this on his
    Facebook page. Russ crashed the car into the end of a pit wall sideways. It took a long time for Him to recover. I took a ride around Waterford hills in a heavily modified lotus cortina with him driving once. He was on three wheels

  7. Patrick

    Remember seeing a TBird of the same vintage race at Riverside in the GTO class driven by Bruce Jenner, it may have been a Roush entry

  8. Chris Horning

    Dan’s reply-
    Dan Rosenau Designed by Jim Bartel , an engineer at carron &co. In Livonia Michigan. Driver was Russ Theus. He had a bad crash at I.R.P., caught a gap n the wall on the ft.straight, cut the car in half. Took a long time to recover.
    1 hr · Unlike · 2

    I asked for the trunk lid when I found out the car was no longer around. Turned out they had trash binned the body a week earlier.

  9. C.R. Krieger

    The lower photo is at Mid Ohio. I remember being there and thinking it was cool as hell seeing a Lincoln race. Unfortunately, I remember nothing else about it. I’m not even certain it finished.

  10. J BYRON WALKER

    Russ was a very active driver at WATERFORD HILLS – WHRRI in Clarkston Mich. for years and an exceptional talent in both design and fab of his Toyota as a national Champ and driver and great guy to be around. The IRP incident is correct but as memory serves me I thought he went off the track at the end of the front straight which is VERY FAST. I do recall as we were there for a national as well that weekend. Some time ago though.

    You may be able to make contact with Russ through WHRRI – try Joel Hershorn

  11. BeaverMartin

    I have no info, but that is the baddest Lincoln ever. Put Matt Mcconaughey in that bad boy! Bet they would sell more badge engineered Fords then.

  12. John Humason

    I was there at IRP for a SCCA Club race where Russ crashed it. It was a beautiful car in the maroon livery (and the mostly-white car in the photo above is the same car.) It bounced off of walls of IRP’s front straight/dragstrip several times after slipping on a river across the track in the rain and Russ was injured very badly. He returned later with a GT4 Toyota Tercel which he raced competitively for several years.
    Photo of the Tercel: http://www.scca-milwaukee.org/Photos/99cat/99cat19.jpg

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