Sam Posey: Where The Writer Meets The Road
In a sense, I grew up with Sam Posey
About the time as a teenager that I became infatuated with motorsport, particularly road racing, Sam Posey’s name would come up in reference to driving all sorts of race cars. From the artful but unsuccessful Caldwell Can-Am car, to Dodge’s chartreuse Trans-Am car, the Indy 500, F1, F5000, LeMans and IMSA, there was Sam. In pretty darned good rides too. I got to see Sam work his magic with the factory IMSA BMW 3.0 CSL at Lime Rock Park, every bit the match for his mythical teammate, Hans Stuck.
Where The Writer Meets The Road is a collection of Mr. Posey’s musings about cars and car racing, as told through his writings for print, tv and introducing racing legends. If you’ve been watching Formula One races on tv the last few years, you’ve no doubt become used to David Hobbs’ dryly funny and very knowledgeable commentary. You’ve also heard Mr. Posey doing 
poetic prologues for many F1 races, as well as races such as LeMans or the Indy 500. Mr. Hobbs developed his media style in company with Mr. Posey during the early 1970s races of the U.S. F5000 championship. The frenemy relationship between the two has become the stuff of comedic and racing promotion legend. It’s fitting that Mr. Hobbs wrote the foreword to this book.
Turns out Posey is pretty talented outside of the race car. His talents have been well documented before: race driver, artist, architect, writer, broadcaster, train collector. I’ve read hundreds of magazine articles over the years, but only vividly remember just one: the October 1977 Road&Track article about LeMans, written by one Sam Posey. It was 
beautifully composed, an account of what it’s like to be a driver at LeMans, both in and out of the car, experiencing all that is wonderful and terrifying about auto racing all in the one race. I believe his late wife, Ellen Griesedieck, shot the photos for the piece as well; his prose and her photos made for an unforgettable article. That article (minus the photos, sadly) is just one of the pieces in Where The Writer Meets The Road.
Like many folks, I read too few books. Sure, I have lots of racing books, mainly photo compendiums for reference. Most of the past reads dedicated to motorsport have been rather dull. Factually perfect, artfully forgettable.
Take it from me when I say that this book was the best $30 I’ve spent in a very long time.
In its second printing, get your copy now. Auto racing books this good don’t come along every day. Published by David Bull Publishing. Hardcover, $29.95.
