Anniversary of first 426 hemi raced today

Great effort by Mother. From the drawing board in July 1963 to not only finishing it's first, gruelling 500m race, but coming 1,2,3,4.
Some may not know that on the dyno leading up to the race, engines were blowing up due to core shift in the bores. New blocks were hurriedly re-cast & the winning block was cast on Feb 10.
Compare the Hemi to the POS Ferd 351C raced in this country & had to be extensively resigned to finish a race, let alone win. The most popular Ferd racer here commented, 'They blow up on the starter...'