Historical Notes of the Founding of Hill Country Chapter Ferrari Club of America
Founded 2000
Hill Country Chapter is 25 in 2025!
Preface
In December of 2023 Ferrari Club of America members were asked to provide memories of the early days of the Chapter. FCA members from Hill Country/Austin Chapter and the San Antonio Chapter contributed to these memories that were then compiled by Bob Bianconi.
Hill Country Chapter Presidents
Dave Scott
Scott Reid
Mike Lambert
Scott Reid
Luke Graves
Andy Fish
Tim Cronin
Bob Bianconi
Ed Pensock (current President)
On-Going Chapter Sponsors
David Moore/Moorespeed
Ferrari of Austin
There weren’t a lot of Ferraris in Austin back then. No Ferrari club. No Dealer. We were the only workshop in town that specialized in Ferrari except Ben’s Workshop which was primarily a Mercedes shop. That’s right, Ben Schotz, another club member, who owns a classic 512Bbi Boxer.
As Austin grew, so did the number of Ferrari in town with David Scott and James Legg initially forming Austin’s Ferrari Owners club.
In short order, this morphed into the official Hill Country Region Chapter we have today.
David Scott became our club’s first President.
We became an active supporter of the club and had Wednesday night Tech Sessions and anything else Dave came up with to get together. Dave is a driving instructor and track junkie these days He was a judge at the most recent Porsche v Ferrari Shootout.
Then the baton was passed onto Scott Reed who did an outstanding job continuing to add events that members wanted. Scott’s philosophy was if members wanted to do something, he’d make it happen.
Mike Lambert took over after Scott did two terms, the max allowed consecutively. Mike put together hosting our first FCA Regional event Andiamo Austin to help promote the new track and later became FCA National Vice-president. A job that I wouldn’t wish upon anyone.
Our club was still small though, Christmas parties were held at members’ homes. First Christmas party I remember was at Tom McMurry’s house. We had around 16 or 18 members.
Mike & Jenni Lambert hosted another year as did Phil and Dorothy Aldridge (Rest in Peace my friend). Lloyd and Lyra Bemis hosted two or three times and even Tonya and I hosted one year.
After Mike’s term, we struggled finding a replacement. I was even asked but declined not wanting anyone feeling pressure to support Moorespeed but would continue to help anyway needed.
Well Scott Reid came to the rescue again…….and man did he leave a legacy for our club creating our hallmark annual event, Hanging at the Hangar. Scott is still very active along with his wife Trish planning and mapping out the routes for the event every year. No small undertaking.
Moorespeed has proudly sponsored every year with the “Sag Wagon” run by Master Technicians Carl Murgas and Brandon Littleton, both here tonight every. We look forward to this event.
The club was growing and around this time we moved the Christmas party to a restaurant, the original Back Yard, bought by club member and “captain fun” Marc Balouz. I miss Marc’s donuts. Sorry insider joke there.
Our next president was fighter pilot Cool hand Luke, Col. Luke Graves who did a wonderful job with a growing list of volunteer leadership within the club.
Andy Fish then stepped up to the plate just as the club really began growing along with Austin and the inaugural running of the USGP. Andy’s contributions were not only for our club but helped the fledgling Circuit of America and arguably Austin host out of town visitors by creating events such as the Ferrari F1 Gala that was held successively for ten years. But who can forget the show he and his cousin Ann Fish put together at ACL for F1 with Willie Nelson and a host of other Grammy winners. He assigned me a tough job that night, entertaining Ross Brawn for the evening, the mastermind of Ferrari’s F1 championships during the Schumacher era.
As the club grew even bigger, Andy moved the Christmas party to Barton Creek Country Club which may have been our largest party, but somewhere in our history I’m told Bill and Betsy Harrod organized the party at Balcones Country Club, I missed that one. They also helped with cool happy hours at Barton Creek Country club at a bar on the end where we had it to ourselves and parking outside. I believe that was a Monday where the club was closed but opened special for us.
Tim Cronin was president during difficult times with government shutdowns for the pandemic. Big thanks to Tim for that undertaking.
Which leads me to our current President. Bob Bianconi. Bob got us going again. The members were hungry to see each other and have events. I remember a number of you reaching out discussing the desire to see each other, and to return to a club in person, not virtually” as soon as possible. Bob was the catalyst that made that happen leading our club with a strong staff of volunteers back to the vibrant club we have today where we have more events annually than any other time in our history.
He has been instrumental in personally helping me along with PCA Porsche club member John Brindley to organize and manage the Porsche vs. Ferrari Shootout the past three years which was both clubs first major event post lockdowns.
We originally got the club going with offices at Autostrada (41xx N Lamar) back in ~2000’ish. This is when Bo Rivers (Harris Hill Raceway founder) decided to open a sportscar dealership. They sold used Ferraris, Qvale, some Lambos and Lotus.
Dave Scott was president, I was VP, Jason Stoneberg was secretary. This was with FOC, not FCA. It was short-lived (tech downturn, we got booted from Autostrada, etc.). Dave then pursued FCA affiliation and the rest is history.
Back to the genesis of the club: Growing up in the 1980s, I had become enamored of Ferrari cars after seeing them on shows like Magnum P.I. and Miami Vice. But living in small town Texas, Ferrari was something that seemed somehow to exist only in another world or alternate reality. Seeing a car in person was just not in the realm of possibility. On one trip to California in 1987, I got to see my first Ferrari, a Testarossa, parked on Rodeo Drive and it just seemed so surreal that I had my dad park so I could get out and take a bunch of pictures of it on my Kodak Disc. Fast forward to the 1990s, and I got to know James Legg in grad school at Texas A&M. He seemed about the coolest guy I knew because he had an early 70s Barracuda. And also, before I had met James, one of the other guys in our office of grad students had told me James would beat me up if I messed with anything on his desk. Which later, after getting to know him better, I knew was probably true. After grad school, James and I had both started working together at Motorola here in Austin. One day, James came to work and said he had bought a car and showed me a Ferrari key. That just about blew my mind. We went to lunch in his 1992 348. The experience really expanded my mind in a way, because if James could have a Ferrari, so could I.
In mid-2000, James was on to his second used Ferrari, an F355. I went down to Barrett Jaguar in San Antonio (the closest Ferrari dealer back then) with him one day at lunch to pick it up. James had gotten to know one of the sales guys at Barrett. At some point in 2000, Aymen left Barrett and partnered up with Bo Rivers to start an exotic (mostly Ferrari) used car dealership known as Autostrada. It was in the location on Lamar that later became home of Ferrari of Austin. The Ferrari market in Austin was kind of nascent in those days; but Ayman, being a good salesperson, realized that we just needed to create a little passion around it. And one of the best ways to do that was to form a club where folks would get together and coalesce over their passion for Ferrari. Ayman started an entity known as Modena, Inc., now long-defunct, that would serve as a chapter of the Ferrari Owner’s Club. I didn’t have a Ferrari quite yet, and to officially be in the Ferrari Owner’s Club you had to provide your VIN, but somehow Ayman assigned me a car at the time that I didn’t own and I was drafted in along with James. I agreed to be the secretary, so Ayman gave me the corporate record book for Modena, Inc., which I later repurposed to hold the records for our business. I still have it after all these years.
At some point, after some drama with Bo, Ayman was asked to leave Autostrada in 2001. I’m not sure what the disagreement was about. Bo Rivers and Dave Scott were friends, and so in 2001 Dave decided to resurrect the club idea but within the Ferrari Club of America versus the FOC. I stayed on the mailing list and attended informally some of the club events, but didn’t officially join the FCA until I bought Dave Scott’s car (my 550) in May 2007. Actually, I believe it was 2008 when I officially joined the FCA after Scott encouraged/scolded me into officially joining.
I don’t exactly remember how I first met a few other Ferrari enthusiasts in the Austin area, after I took delivery of my 550 in July 2000. Perhaps it was through Barrett, the dealer, or perhaps it was through David Moore at Moorespeed. Regardless, I began to think that this small group of owners could only grow as Austin did. I met James and we began to talk about some sort of club affiliation, as others have noted. After some stops & starts with Autostrada, etc., we finally aligned with FCA and were given the OK to create our own Hill Country chapter. This led to meeting a huge number of other owners & enthusiasts across Texas, And then the FCA annual event was held in Texas, and we were off to the races, so to speak. My goal was to come up with simple activities that would bring a bunch of us together on a regular basis and let us enjoy our cars. I came up with the idea of the 4th Saturday Breakfasts, which we held at La Madeline & other places, and which were usually followed by some sort of hill country drive. I reached out to the then-president of the local Porsche Club chapter and we agreed to do these events together. This left to amazing turn-outs & amazing camaraderie. We (FCA) did rallies & drives & breakfasts with our PCA friends, and PCA did wine tastings and rallies and drives with us. It was a wining formula open to everyone & with essentially zero costs. This definitely helped to rapidly build our local memberships! Over time, I got to know Al DeLauro, who was the regional VP down in San Antonio, and we started doing multi-chapter events that were lots of fun and very well attended. Eventually, my daughter was born in 2006, and I was doing more and more racing, so the 550 was driven less and less, and I sold it to Jason as he said (with first right of refusal to buy it back!). I endorsed Scott as the next president, and the rest is history.
We moved to Austin from New Jersey in 2000, to a new home custom designed and built to accommodate our vintage Ferraris (275 GTS, 330 GTC, GT 2+2, and fiberglass 308 GTB). We still have all of them plus a couple of slightly newer additions (575M and 456M). Our many years as FCA members in New Jersey—participating in concours, designing rallies, assisting in club events—left us eager to do the same in Texas.
Before moving to Austin, one of our earlier moves with AT&T was to Dallas, where we very involved with the Ferrari community. So, when we moved to Austin we volunteered to get involved in the 2001 FCA National Meet in Dallas. This was a major event for us and for the club, centered around honoree Sergio Scaglietti, who had designed and built the bodies for many of Ferrari’s race cars. The weekend also included such luminaries as Phil Hill and Denise McCluggage. At the banquet headlining the meet, we were lucky enough to have dinner with Phil Hill, and asked if Scaglietti really was as revered in Ferrari circles as he was said to be. “Nah,” said Hill, “he was just the body guy.” That was his take on one of the icons of Ferrari history.
Sergio Scaglietti, by the way, was wildly enthusiastic about American Spaghetti Westerns, and knew all about popular television shows like “Dallas”. We equipped Sergio with a holster and revolver so he could feature in a shoot-out on Main Street at South Fork Ranch. He had a memorable, once in a lifetime experience that none of us will forget.
At the meet, we also discovered that another couple, Al and Claire DeLauro, had also recently moved west from the East Coast to San Antonio. We quickly became fast friends, and have remained so to this day. Al and Claire are enthusiastic Ferrari owners and drivers – which led to Al becoming president of the Ferrari Club of North America. Al was instrumental in leading the restructuring of the club to make it the success it is today. Over the years, we have been involved in helping plan many club activities here in Austin. These included organizing and hosting Monday Happy Hours at Barton Creek Country Club, organizing a club Christmas dinner party at Barton Creek, and heading a fundraiser for the Austin Symphony at the Four Seasons, which consisted of a Ferrari concours plus rally with space for eight passengers in Ferraris (including an Enzo and our 275 GTS). Only one participant got carsick and had to be off-loaded.
We also helped organize popular “Garage Mahal” tours of private garages—Paul Dehnert’s, Tom McMurry’s, Scott and Tricia Reid’s. and ours. One of the guests at our house was Michael Dell, although Scott scared him off by taking his photo!
There were a couple of other memorable Ferrari events we were lucky enough to participate in during those early days. In 2004, a group of members from Austin and San Antonio ventured to Midland, Texas to visit Jim Hall’s Chaparral Museum. To our amazement, Jim took us to his workshop at Rattlesnake Raceway and spent a couple of hours with us talking about his career as a racing driver, constructor, and automotive researcher and innovator. What a wonderful, creative person!
Another outstanding event occurred when the then chapter president, Mike Lambert arranged for our club to attend a special Shell Oil event in conjunction with the 2015 F1 race at COTA. Since Shell wanted to reinforce their position as the primary fuel supplier to Ferrari, they brought their VP of Fuel Technology plus six fuel scientists to an event at Driveway Austin. Members of our club were invited along with F1 TV personalities Jason Swales and Will Buxton, Ferrari F1 driver Sebastian Vettel and numerous journalists. Ferrari provided an F12 for Vettel drive on the track with journalist passengers. A great day. Such memorable occasions have continued over the years. Our chapter is larger and more formal than previously, but always under the proud banner: “Forza Ferrari”.
Andiamo Austin: a regional event hosted by our chapter. It was ramrodded by Mike Lambert in 2011. Fourth Saturday Breakfast meetings were a staple for our chapter when I was president. We often met at 360 Uno and LaMadeleine. Tried to alternate between north and south Austin at coffee shops/restaurants with outdoor seating and good parking lots. Sometimes drives followed.
Moorespeed Tech Sessions; numerous during the early days when his shop was on Theo Drive near Airport and Manor Road.
Christmas parties at club member’s homes. Fiesta Ferrari hosted by Ferrari of San Antonio and Hill Country Chapter before the San Antonio (Alamo) Chapter split off. Al DeLauro and the Harrods did a most of the planning for that. Around 2006 or so.
COVID put a halt to most Club activities for a few months in early 2020. Bob Bianconi took over from Tim Cronin and began organizing the team that would help manage the Club. The team consisted of Glynn and Karen Bloomquist, Scott & Tricia Reid, Ed and Terri Pensock, Rex and Lisa Butterfield and Ferrari of Austin General Manager Keith Humphries. For the next 4 years the team planned two events a month, one breakfast and a drive. Other notable team accomplishments included a new weekly newsletter using Constant Contact, the use of RegFox to accept payments, the use of Smartwaiver to record driving event waivers, the use of 2-way radios during drives, placing membership applications at the dealership and indy service centers, establishing a robust treasury and increasing membership.
Several legacy events continued including the Hangin’ at the Hangar weekend in Fredericksburg each spring, Enzo’s birthday party, the annual Christmas party and the F1 Gala at the Austin Country Club. In 2023 the Gala was discontinued because of COTA adding evening events that conflicted with the Gala.
Besides those events, this leadership team organized annual lunches (2020-2024) with the Houston Chapter in Roundtop Texas, the first ever Go-Kart challenge with the San Antonio/Alamo chapter at the Circuit of the Americas go-kart track, a 2022 trip to the George Bush Library in College Station where Austin met the Houston Chapter. Official White House photographer David Valdez led a hilarious behind-the-scenes lecture for Club members. In 2022, Club members took an overnight trip to Jefferson Tx to view a private collection of Ferraris and car memorabilia. Each spring the Club participated in Ferrari Day at Mozart’s on Lake Austin – a hugely popular event for Club members and the public. With Moorespeed, the FCA team in conjunction with the Austin Porsche club held the Porsche vs Ferrari Annual Concours D’Elegance three years in a row. In 2023, Fire trucks led Club members into Gonzalez, TX where the Ferraris were a main attraction at the annual “Come and Take it” Festival.
Another team win was to solidify the relationship with Ferrari of Austin and Moorespeed to the benefit of Club members. Moorespeed hosted the Concours and FoA hosted multiple events for Club members from breakfasts at the dealership to hosting lunch at Trattoria Lisina and Horseshoe Bay. In return, each year the Club spearheaded an annual toy drive at FoA to benefit Dell Children’s Medical Center.
During this presidency, the history of the Hill Country Chapter was compiled from interviews with the first president (Dave Scott) and early chapter members (James Legg & Jason Stoneberg) along with submissions by subsequent presidents. As a complement to the history, photos from the early years were obtained from Scott Reid.
All told, Hill Country Chapter members participated in over 120 events between 2020-2024.
