SCCA’S STELLAR WORKERS FRONT LINE
t is often interesting to follow the
breadcrumbs of life and see what
led to what. When Bill Skibbe was
in college at the University of
Illinois in the mid-1970s he set off
looking for brake parts for his Mini
850 wagon. He eventually found
what he needed at a foreign car
repair shop where the owners
competed in the Midwestern
Council. One thing led to another,
and soon Bill was working Timing &
Scoring and hanging out with
people who raced Spitfires. He was
in heaven. “And I got a free lunch
to boot,” he laughs.
On his second date with LJ,
who would later become his wife,
they went to the 1978 24 Hours
of Daytona. Serendipitously,
friends asked them to come in
and help with Timing & Scoring.
Fortunately, his date was into it.
“It was all manual scoring back
then,” he points out. The room
was jammed full of tapers and
auditors. He remembers Peg
Bishop pushing a button for
every entry as they passed start/
finish. “I believe they started 65
cars that year,” he says. A lot of
things were harder back then,
including seeing the car numbers.
“This was before fluorescent
numbers. The cars drove through
a spotlight on the exit of Turn 1.
That experience really got me
hooked on endurance racing.”
As a geophysicist he moved
to Houston to work on off shore
surveying during the oil boom of
the late ’70s. He connected with
the SCCA and began working
events at Texas World Speedway.
“It was a time of stopwatches
and timecards with 15-20
people working Timing & Scoring
at every race,” he recalls. He
began working at the Runoffs
at Road Atlanta in 1980 and
he sharpened his skill levels and
was recognized as someone
who could get the job done.
He says he can’t honestly
remember how many times
he worked the National
Championship Runoffs in Atlanta
but that he was the Chief for
quite a few of them and the
Assistant Chief for others. Bill
says it was around 1985-’86 that
computers began to take over the
world of T&S. “It was a little rough
at first,” he says. “I remember
guys writing code in the
bathroom to keep things going.”
He says it is a bit of a different
world now. The advent of
computerization and automated
identification of racecars has
changed the T&S world, but for
the most part the people have
stayed the same. “Most folks
adapted to the new system, we
just have a lot fewer people doing
it,” he points out. “It is challenging
work, but it is a lot of fun, too.
It is all about getting accurate
results with a small staff. We are
very interested in attracting new
people and we are particularly
GOOD TIMING
From Spitfires to prototypes, Bill Skibbe has had many adventures
in Timing & Scoring | WORDS James Kearney | IMAGE Philip Royle
interested in young folks. I’d like
to think that someone might
read this piece and think that
they can do this. I started at a
basic level and it opened me
up to an entire new world.”
He embraced the next step
and kept climbing. He moved
up to working with the Pro
Formula Atlantic Series and
later became Chief of T&S there.
Atlantic was a support series for
the Championship Auto Racing
Teams, and when CART took T&S
in-house, they asked him to head
that. He manned the helm until
CART folded in 2008. Though
the years, Bill has also worked
with IMSA, Trans Am and World
Challenge Cup. It’s quite a jump
from timing some Spitfires.
“I’ve been blessed with
great opportunities for both
interesting work and extensive
travel,” he says. He is a little bit
of everywhere. I spoke with him
as he was traveling to VIRginia
International Raceway for a
U.S. Majors Tour with over 300
entries. Shortly thereafter he
was off to Sonoma Raceway
for the Shell Eco-marathon, an
outgrowth of the original Fuel
Economy Run. He has been in
charge of timing and scoring for
that event for the last 10 years.
While he is everywhere, he
was not on the scene at the
worker party when the T&S
Worker of the Year Award
was announced at the 2017
Runoffs – the award he won. He
smiles ruefully as he explains
that he was still on the job at
Timing & Scoring and that the
presentation was reenacted a bit
later in the evening. “I was totally
surprised, and it was amazing
to receive this great award at
Indy,” he says. “There are a lot
of good memories there.”
HARD AT WORK
Bill Skibbe received his Worker of
the Year award at the 2017 Runoffs,
but he missed the presentation as
he was still doing his job. Respect
from his peers was apparent when
SCCA staffers, including (left to right)
John Bauer, Deanna Flanagan, and
Claudine Stueve, jumped on stage
to celebrate once he arrived.
