Journalist and racer Tony Dron has passed away at the age of 75.
Dron spent a lifetime in automotive journalism and successfully blended his working passion with an associated love and talent for race driving, racing for over 40 years.
As a racer, Tony is best know for his exploits in touring cars, as part of the factory-backed Triumph squad in the 1970s that produced a fifth place overall in the 1974 Spa 24 Hours and 6 race wins in the British Touring Car Championship that saw him finish third in the Championship in 1974 and 1978 and second in 1977.
But there were adventures too in sportscars and GT machinery including a class win at the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1982 with Richard Jones and Richard Cleary in the latter’s Porsche 934. He raced three times at Le Mans, the last run in 1983 aboard a Kremer CK5 Group C car with the same driving trio from the previous year.
Also in 1982 he formed part of an effort that took a Porsche 924 Carrera GTR to fifth overall (and another class win) in the daunting Nurburgring 1000km.
He was part too of the ‘Big Blue’ Morgan GT effort that was the precursor to the company’s Aero 8 road and race cars, driving in both the British GT Championship and FIA GT Championship in 1997.
In his latter years of racing, he focused primarily on historic racing, alongside his writing duties for, amongst others, Thoroughbred & Classic cars (which he edited for a decade), The Daily Telegraph, and Octane.
There was though a class podium finish in 2002 with an Ecurie Ecosse-entered BMW M3 E36 alongside Gregor Fisken and Ian Donaldson, their A6 class effort taking third in class and a highly impressive 17th overall.
DSC sends our condolences to Tony’s family, friends, and colleagues
Pics copyright and courtesy racingsportscars.com
