1963 - 65

            humble beginnings

     Tony describes the Volvo:   My biggest claim to chassis "mods" was a rear sway bar.  I believe I was the first to put one on a sedan back then.  Of course I had Koni shocks, lowered, heavy front sway bar.

     My engine porting job was patterned after the Triumph cylinder heads and provided a lot of power.  My SU carbs were heavily modified including large bell-shaped velocity stacks to capture the fuel fumes around the inlets.  This allowed the excess fumes to be pulled back into the engine at high revs.

From 1963 to 66, Tony road raced his own PV-544 Volvo in East Coast SCCA Regional events

Tony Adamowicz, Gary Wheeler, Tony a2z, Tony Adamowics, a2zRacer, Gary Wheeler, Tony Adamowicz

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The early record:


1963 -- Began my road racing career in my Volvo 544 sedan

            at Marlboro, Md. Raceway and won the race overall.


1964 -- Finished second in Northeast SCCA Region in B-Sedan

            with the Volvo 544.


1965 -- Won the Northeast SCCA Regional B-sedan

            Championship in Volvo.

Marlboro Speedway , Marlboro, Md.  This little 1-1/2 mile road racing track was a host of many great drivers through the years, it was my learning track as well.... my humble SCCA beginnings.  I met Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart and many more greats there in '65.

    The Volvo's ultimate lap time could best the Group 44 Lotus Cortina times at Marlboro, drum brakes and all!

    When I was hired to work for Group 44, Bob Tullius said I had to retire the car and not race it any longer.  Later I drove it to Connecticut to work for Milestone Racing and eventually sold it to someone in Wilton, Conn.  I wish I'd never done that.

   Headers were not yet FIA homologated for the car, so were not legal.  Instead, I modified the stock exhaust manifold by welding in a splitter for the center two exhaust ports.  The stock manifold didn't have one, so it blended the flows which acted like a rev limiter of sorts.  That made a hot cam useless even though it was legal.  The splitter fixed the problem so I could benefit from an experimental ISKY cam sent to me by the man himself.









       In a few years, I'd finish third

       at the 24 Hours of Le Mans

       in the fastest Ferrari

       of them all.

Tony drives away from a Pesky Mini!

With it's rear anti-roll bar, the Volvo was quite "tossable"