 We are just over 30 days away from this summers Cortile Italian Car Show at the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix! We've got some great new things for you to enjoy this year! Saturday & Sunday July 20-21, 2019 2019 Proiettore Macchina: Alfa Romeo  The 2019 Spotlight car of the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix is Alfa Romeo. Poster art by artist Kelly Telfer. As you know, each year the Cortile selects a marque to highlight for our annual event. The Macchina of Alfa Romeo have been selected as our 2019 Proiettore Macchina! Joining us this summer is the Alfa Romeo Owners Club (AROC) who will be holding their North American Convention and honored also as the spotlight car of the 2019 running of the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix.. The theme for the AROC convention is "Cortile della Corsa", the "Courtyard of Racing" and will feature Alfa Romeo's on the track as well as iconic racecars on the showfield. Be sure to check out the poster car that was raced by Fangio and Phil Hill. Wine on 9 & Lunch on 9!  Deb Schurko came up with the idea of Wine Tasting on Turn 9 a few years ago and it's become the best place to watch the races on Sunday. Plenty of shade and some wine tasting, courtesy of Mazza Winery, after the opening ceremonies and parade! This year we're introducing something new, but first... This year, we've had a slight price increase on weekend registration to $150. After 10 years we've experienced a few cost increases and it was time to adjust up a bit to make sure we where keeping our contribution to the charity growing compared to the other marques down the hill from us. JKS Sponsors Lunch on Sunday! But, in conjunction with Wine on 9 at the Westinghouse Pond on Sunday,we've also got a NEW sponsor in JKS Financial . As a company with more than 45 years of combined experience, JKS Financial prides themselves with the relationships they build with their clients and they want to build some charitable relationships with us! This summer they are sponsoring and hosting the Sunday Catered Lunch at the Westinghouse Fountain.  This year your weekend entry will get you lunch for two on both Saturday and Sunday! We've also upgraded some of our goody bag stuff. This year we're including a collapsible umbrella (to keep you in the shade of course) and some beeswax lip balm so your lips aren't burned for the wine tasting! And you will love this year's t-shirt! It features the poster art you see up above. Artist Kelly Telfer will be on hand to autograph the posters and even your shirt or hat. Oh! I forgot to mention the hat! This year's is different from previous years. You'll just have to wait and see that! Meet the Cortile Judges! If you have not gone over to the judges tent at the previous years events and chatted with the judges you may just want to do that.
Did you know that Steve Barney was the first person outside of a direct Ferrari employee to ever get to own a Ferrari Grand Prix Car? Ask Steve about Nikki Lauda's F1 Car that he owned thanks to his friend Enzo Ferrari. Steve is also the founder of Foreign Cars Italia in the south and is pretty intimate with all Italian marques. You may also want ask some questions of Tom Frasca. Tom was Dipendenti Ferrari for the North American Racing Team, more commonly known at NART. Tom served as Luigi Chinetti's right hand man for 26 years until 1994 and was a witness to much of the history that has made Ferrari an iconic name today. Stop by the judges tent at 2pm to ask them some questions! Now, to do all that you've got to register! If you have not done so already, click the button below and register now for the Cortile Weekend. (If you own an Alfa Romeo CLICK HERE instead). Thank you very much for your continued support of our charities! Bernie
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 1968 Bizzarrini 5300 Strada PITTSSBURGH, PA - The Cortile, the Italian Car Show at the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix is pleased to announce that a very rare 1968 Bizzarrini Strada 5300 (No. 0303) will be gracing the Cortile Showfield on July 14-15, 2018 as part of the Proiettore Macchina celebration of Iso Rovolta and Bizzarini cars. This very rare and unique car was once owned by famous stunt driver Carely Loftin and garnered the top result at the debut Keno Brothers Finest Automobile Auction when it was sold for $1,010,800 in 2015. It was recently featured on the inaugural poster for The Greenbrier Concours d'Elegance in May 2018. This slinky, charismatic “rolling sculpture” 1968 Bizzarrini Strada 5300 is rare Corvette-engine-powered bombshell that still attracts stares, whistles and thumbs-up. Bizzarrini was a star engineer behind three of Ferrari’s greatest cars: The 250 Testarossa; The 250 SWB and The 250 GTO. As many great automotive talents do, Bizzarrini yearned to build his own car and power it with reliable American muscle under its curvaceous aluminum Bertone coachwork. The result is a smooth-riding, easy-shifting sports car that feels more like a grand tourer. 1968 Bizzarini Strada Provenance
About Giotto BizzarriniBizzarrini was an Italian automotive company, founded by former Alfa Romeo, Ferrari and Lamborghini engineer Giotto Bizzarrini in 1964. The company produced around 200 high performance coupés - including the 5300 Strada - before closing down in 1969.
Bizzarrini then joined the ISO design team to lead the development of a new GT car, a mating of great Italian style to a high-powered, reliable Corvette engine, which he believed superior to Ferrari’s power plants, offering bulletproof reliability and prodigious torque.
He joined forces with the great, young design talent, Giorgetto Giugiaro, who was already in charge of styling at Bertone, and they created the beautiful ISO Grifo A3/C. But Bizzarrini’s urge to return to racing left him restless. So, he once again called upon Pietro Drogo to help develop a new racecar, one based on the ISO Grifo A3/C. It would bear his own name - the Bizzarrini GT 5300 Corsa. This summer you are in for a very special treat at the Cortile! We're excited to host artist Alex Wakefield at the Cortile with a wonderful display of his art work during the Schenley Park weekend of races at the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix.
According to Alex, "I don’t feel like I need to be pinned to one style, as I like the freedom of portraying motorsport in different ways. I want to show motor sport from my viewpoint. I want to take the viewer on a colorful, exciting ride into a sport I’m passionate about. If it’s something that you, the viewer, are moved and inspired by, then all the better. Hope you enjoy what you see." Alex has a very impressive CV of late! Here's a short list of drivers, teams, and exhibits of which he has most recently worked with:
A Sample of ALex's Work "Respect the Kink" Brian Redman - Ferrari 312-PB - Spa 1000 KMS 1972  Dan Gurney - Eagle Weslake - Belgian F1 Grand Prix 1967 Winner  Gilles Villeneuve - Ferrari 126 C - Monaco F1 Grand Prix 1981 Winner  This past spring we where approached by Rob Straw from R7 Filmaking and Photography inquiring if he could get some night shots of the Cortile Italian Char show. Rob thought that that city lights in the background would make for some really incredible photography. Needless to say we are impressed beyond our wildest imaginations with his work. Take a look below as some of his magnificent images! Read more below....  Rob Straw went to the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix with his family when he was in high school and was immediately attracted racing. He'd always admired automotive design and, as he tell us "Now I got to see those "works of art" speeding around corners on the public streets of Schenley Park!"  "Fast forward about 20 years and here I am. I've been a photography, video and design teacher at the college level for over a decade. I find my free time in the summer is now spent at the local park with my two daughters or traveling to racing events throughout the region including those at Pitt Race, Watkin's Glen, Mid-Ohio and VIR. In the winter I snowboard in my free time and always have a "project car" to work on like most gear heads." ~ Rob Straw  "For me racing is not just about the speed of the cars on the track. It’s about the personal stories that led them there. Not an event goes by that I don’t talk to people about where they got their car or what got them into racing. I’ve been fortunate to meet some wonderful people along the way and hear so many stories. I’ve met people who design cars for wounded veterans, met a man whose daughter now races the car he once did and even met someone who now races the vintage car they once saw on the track when they were a child over 50 years ago" ~ Rob Straw  The major renewal of the Westinghouse Memorial started in 2011 in Schenley Park is now complete! The Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy partnered with the City of Pittsburgh in 2009 to renew this remarkable space with the financial help and support from members of the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix's Cortile Italian Car Show participants. The fully restored Westinghouse Memorial includes a reestablished lily pond; renewed memorial sculpture; native plant landscape; new nighttime lighting; and stormwater management and we will be celebrating on the newly completed restoration this July 15- 16! About the Westinghouse MemorialLocated near the entrance to the Steve Faloon Trail, this memorial to George Westinghouse has been a distinctive feature of Schenley Park since its dedication in 1930. Originally financed by small donations from over 55,000 Westinghouse employees, it encompasses history, art, and natural beauty.
The memorial was originally financed from $200,000 in donations made by approximately 55,000 workers of Westinghouse companies in electricity. It was dedicated on 6 October 1930. There opening ceremony was attended by over 10,000 people, including U.S. Representative James F. Burke and Pittsburgh mayor Charles H. Kline, and a celebratory dinner was held the night before at the William Penn Hotel. The memorial was on the original site of the Pittsburgh Zoo. The Westinghouse Foundation paid for the memorial's restoration in 1986 in honor of the centennial of Westinghouse Electric.  Westinghouse Memorial and Pond About Schenley ParkSchenley Park began as "Mt. Airy Tract," which was property willed to Mary Elizabeth Croghan by her maternal grandfather, General James O'Hara. In 1842, 15-year-old Mary created an international scandal by leaving her Staten Island boarding school and eloping to England with the 43-year-old Captain Edward Schenley (Pronounced "Sheen lee"). Distraught by the news, Mary's father initiated a lengthy legal battle over her inheritance, successfully winning the title to all her property. Mary and her father eventually reconciled, and she received her inheritance upon his death in 1850. Edward Bigelow, Pittsburgh’s Director of Public Works, envisioned a grand park system for Pittsburgh, and no piece of land was more desirable than Mt. Airy Tract. When Bigelow learned in 1889 that a real estate developer's agent planned to travel to London to convince Mary Schenley to sell them her land, he sent an East Liberty lawyer who hopped a train for New York and then boarded a steamer for England - beating the real estate agent by two days. The appeal to Mary paid off, and in 1889 she gave the city 300 acres of Mt. Airy Tract with an option to purchase 120 more, provided the park be named after her and never sold. The city bought the extra acres in 1891, and later purchased some adjoining land to complete the park.
While two of the three bridges remain, many of the attractions to which they provided access in the 1890s have disappeared. Among them: a 120-foot circular electric fountain on Flagstaff Hill that offered nighttime light shows; the marvelous Schenley Casino (on the site of the present-day Frick Fine Arts Building), which featured Pittsburgh's premier indoor ice skating rink but was destroyed by fire after only a year; and a band shell designed by architects Rutan and Russell on the site of the present-day Anderson Playground. 1907-1909 saw the development of park features that are still present today: the Schenley Oval and racetrack, the tufa bridges in Panther Hollow, and Panther Hollow Lake, which was created from an existing small body of water. The park also underwent large-scale planting in its early years. Bigelow's reports indicate that the land was mostly barren when the City acquired it, and he pursued the highest standards of horticulture in hiring William Falconer, who was trained at London's Kew Gardens, to take charge of Phipps Conservatory and of the park's landscape. Falconer's tenure lasted from 1896 to 1903. Schenley Park underwent a second period of growth in the 1930s and 1940s during Ralph Griswold's tenure as the Director of Public Works. Griswold designed several gardens around Phipps Conservatory, but the park's biggest change was the construction of the Anderson Bridge, which brought the Boulevard of the Allies through the park and linked Squirrel Hill to Downtown. Since then, there have been few major changes to the park as a whole, as certain amenities (like the Panther Hollow Boathouse) have disappeared while others (the ice skating rink) were introduced.  Click here to read an article by Parks Curator Susan Rademacher about the fascinating life and legacy of Mary Schenley.
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The Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix Association is a federally registered 501c (3) non-profit organization with a mission to hold a world-class vintage automotive race event for charity.
Since 1983 this volunteer-driven event has raised over $5.8 million to benefit autistic and developmentally disabled individuals through the Autism Society of Pittsburgh and Allegheny Valley School. The Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix remains North America's largest vintage race event, the only one run on city streets, and the 8th largest car show in the World. |