Bob Riley, designer of a vast array of successful silhouette, single seater and sports racing cars in a career spanning almost seven decades has passed away.
After an early career that saw Bob working in aviation and spacecraft design – coupled with homebuilt racer design, the racing bug bit deeper. A move to Ford saw his engineering prowess utilised on the Le Mans Ford GT Mk IV before another shift, this time to single seaters and an Ivy 500-winning Coyote for AJ Foyt in 1981
From single seaters to sports cars and two groundbreaking prototype programmes , the Ford Mustang GTP and the Intrepid, designed with his son Bill, the car built by Pratt & Miller.
Next up was 20 years in partnership with Mark Scott as Riley and Scott and then together with his son Bill as Riley Technologies, his designs competed in many of the biggest races on the planet with huge success in North American road racing.
“Cars have been a passion since I was a child—the faster the better,” Riley told the Wall Street Journal back in 2018. “Fortunately, I also had a talent for art, so car design was a natural combination for me.”
His Riley & Scott Mk III took no fewer than 17 Driver’s Teams and Constructors Championships between 1996 and 2002 with three wins at the Daytona 24 Hours and a win at the 12 Hours of Sebring amongst the Roll of Honour.
His design was refined into the Cadillac LMP that brought GM’s brand into Sportscar racing and back to Le Mans.
The Daytona Prototype era saw Riley Technologies dominate with eight back-to-back Grand-Am Championships and seven back-to-back wins at the Rolex 24 Hours.
Post unification into the United Sportscar Championship, a win at Sebring too.
Whilst the tributes to Bob’s achievements will surely be long and fulsome, we need only look back just over two weeks to the words of IMSA Senior Director of Competition Mark Raffauf as Bob was inducted into the IMSA Hall of Fame by a somewhat emotional Marshall Pruett:
“It’s hard to condense his career into something short and sweet. He probably was directly involved or personally conceived at least 20 significant [designs].
“In my opinion, he is the single most significant American race car designer in history. I could dig up a list of what he made in IMSA and it’s just mind-boggling.”
Back in 2018 Bob co-authored The Art of Winning Race Car Design with Jonathan Ingram, who noted that: “emergence from building junkyard hot rods in southern Louisiana to become one of the most inventive designers at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway during the go-go years of the 1970s (working on A.J. Foyt’s cars, among others) is a saga in itself. From Indy, he moved into his ultimate specialty of sports prototypes, starting with the outrageous, front-engine Mustang GTP. Along the way, he helped recast American GT and Trans-Am road racing with game-changing designs.
“The sports prototypes designed by Bob Riley featured speed and style. His Riley & Scott Mk. III helped sustain the World Sports Car class by regularly beating the Ferrari 333SP. If you wanted to win Daytona Prototype races, the Riley chassis, which won more Grand-Am races and championships than any other make, was your best bet.”
With later efforts in LMP3 and LMP2 falling short of the standards that Riley had set for themselves the focus, with son Bill now at the day to day helm, to race team management, with yet further success.
Bob stayed busy almost to the end, but took much pride in the continued success of his son and the team they established.
Our sincerest condolences to Bill, Bea and to all of the Riley family.
Pic top copyright and courtesy Rick Dole
