Happy Women's History Month!
I wanted to celebrate and share the underrepresented story of a great woman in motorsport history, Donna Mae Mims, the best way I know how: by bringing her hot pink 1963 H-Production SCCA National championship-winning Austin-Healey Sprite into Assetto Corsa.
If you don't know the story of Donna Mae Mims, you are in for a treat. She was a "delightful blonde" who worked as a secretary for a car dealership. Well, that dealership was run by none other than Don Yenko, a prolific Corvette tuner, and Donna Mae was a force ready to be unleashed. Wanting more excitement than a secretary desk offered, she (with the help of her husband) bought a 1957 Corvette to go racing in. Her husband would not let her paint their car pink like she wanted, so she wore pink coveralls, a pink helmet, a pink wig and wrote "THINK PINK" on the car. She soon won her first SCCA race, and from that moment she was hooked. Her husband did not last, but the pink did, and from that point on she painted all of her privateer cars hot pink, retaining the "THINK PINK" lettering.
Throughout her career, she drove the pants off a great many cars including several Chevrolets, an MG B, a Triumph TR3, and a Yenko Stinger. She (along with Janet Guthrie and Suzy Dietrich) took a Sunbeam Alpine the full distance of the 1966 Daytona 24H, becoming the first all-female team to complete a 24 hour race. But her crowning achievement came early on in her career, only a few years after starting racing, when she drove this little pink "bugeye" Sprite to become the first woman to win an SCCA National championship.
About the car mod:
The Austin-Healey Sebring Sprite mod is a good one that's worth having on your grid but was removed from RD for whatever reason. It is available elsewhere with a bit of searching. The folder name is "austin_sebring_sprite".
NOTE: You will need to replace the ext_config.ini file in the car's "extension" folder with the one included in the mod in order to remove a hardtop and endurance lights from showing up on Donna Mae's car. This will remove the hardtop and endurance lights from all skins (except the 1959 Sebring skin) but you can add the hardtop back to any skin by opening ext_config.ini and placing the name of the skin folder, like this:
This is necessary in order to not have the hardtop forced onto every car despite a skin's ext_config. If someone has a better method that is tested and working, please let me know.
Think pink!
1963 #23 SCCA Nationals
I wanted to celebrate and share the underrepresented story of a great woman in motorsport history, Donna Mae Mims, the best way I know how: by bringing her hot pink 1963 H-Production SCCA National championship-winning Austin-Healey Sprite into Assetto Corsa.
If you don't know the story of Donna Mae Mims, you are in for a treat. She was a "delightful blonde" who worked as a secretary for a car dealership. Well, that dealership was run by none other than Don Yenko, a prolific Corvette tuner, and Donna Mae was a force ready to be unleashed. Wanting more excitement than a secretary desk offered, she (with the help of her husband) bought a 1957 Corvette to go racing in. Her husband would not let her paint their car pink like she wanted, so she wore pink coveralls, a pink helmet, a pink wig and wrote "THINK PINK" on the car. She soon won her first SCCA race, and from that moment she was hooked. Her husband did not last, but the pink did, and from that point on she painted all of her privateer cars hot pink, retaining the "THINK PINK" lettering.
Throughout her career, she drove the pants off a great many cars including several Chevrolets, an MG B, a Triumph TR3, and a Yenko Stinger. She (along with Janet Guthrie and Suzy Dietrich) took a Sunbeam Alpine the full distance of the 1966 Daytona 24H, becoming the first all-female team to complete a 24 hour race. But her crowning achievement came early on in her career, only a few years after starting racing, when she drove this little pink "bugeye" Sprite to become the first woman to win an SCCA National championship.
About the car mod:
The Austin-Healey Sebring Sprite mod is a good one that's worth having on your grid but was removed from RD for whatever reason. It is available elsewhere with a bit of searching. The folder name is "austin_sebring_sprite".
NOTE: You will need to replace the ext_config.ini file in the car's "extension" folder with the one included in the mod in order to remove a hardtop and endurance lights from showing up on Donna Mae's car. This will remove the hardtop and endurance lights from all skins (except the 1959 Sebring skin) but you can add the hardtop back to any skin by opening ext_config.ini and placing the name of the skin folder, like this:
[MODEL_REPLACEMENT_4]
FILE=sprite.kn5
INSERT=austin_sebring_sprite_hardtop.kn5
INSERT_AFTER=WHEEL_RR
SKINS=1959_Sebring_12_Hours, SKINFOLDERNAMEHERE
FILE=sprite.kn5
INSERT=austin_sebring_sprite_hardtop.kn5
INSERT_AFTER=WHEEL_RR
SKINS=1959_Sebring_12_Hours, SKINFOLDERNAMEHERE
Think pink!
1963 #23 SCCA Nationals
