John "Skip" Barber III (born November 16, 1936) is an American retired racecar driver who is most famous for previously owning and founding the

Skip Barber Racing School The Skip Barber Racing School is an American racing and driving school. Skip Barber founded the school in 1975. History In 1975, Skip Barber started the Skip Barber School of High Performance Driving at Riverside International Raceway. In 1976, ...

Driving career

Barber started racing in 1958 while studying at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

, where he earned a degree in English. In the mid-1960s, he won three

SCCA The Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) is a non-profit American automobile club and sanctioning body supporting road racing, rallying, and autocross in the United States. Formed in 1944, it runs many programs for both amateur and professional r ...

national championships in a row and finished third in the 1967

United States Road Racing Championship The United States Road Racing Championship (USRRC) was created by the Sports Car Club of America in 1962. It was the first SCCA series for professional racing drivers. SCCA Executive Director John Bishop helped to create the series to recover ra ...

. Later, Barber won consecutive Formula Ford National Championships (1969 and 1970), a record tied only recently. At the start of the 1971 season he purchased a March 711, which he planned to take back to the United States and race in the U.S.

Formula 5000 Formula 5000 (or F5000) was an open wheel, single seater auto-racing formula that ran in different series in various regions around the world from 1968 to 1982. It was originally intended as a low-cost series aimed at open-wheel racing cars tha ...

series. Before he did so, he took part in the

Monaco Grand Prix The Monaco Grand Prix (french: Grand Prix de Monaco) is a Formula One motor racing event held annually on the Circuit de Monaco, in late May or early June. Run since 1929, it is widely considered to be one of the most important and prestigiou ...

Dutch Grand Prix The Dutch Grand Prix ( nl, Grote Prijs van Nederland) is a Formula One motor racing event held at Circuit Zandvoort, North Holland, the Netherlands, from 1950 to 1985 and from 2021 onwards. It was a part of the World Championship from 1952, ...

United States Grand Prix The United States Grand Prix is a motor racing event that has been held on and off since 1908, when it was known as the American Grand Prize. The Grand Prix later became part of the Formula One World Championship. , the Grand Prix has been held ...

, and

Canadian Grand Prix The Canadian Grand Prix (french: Grand Prix du Canada) is an annual motor racing event held since 1961. It has been part of the Formula One World Championship since 1967. It was first staged at Mosport Park in Bowmanville, Ontario, as a sports ...

in a privately funded

March March is the third month of the year in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars. It is the second of seven months to have a length of 31 days. In the Northern Hemisphere, the meteorological beginning of spring occurs on the first day of Marc ...

. He returned to the U.S. and Canadian races in 1972. After that, he raced GT cars.

Retirement leads to Skip Barber Racing

When his racing career ended, Barber's belief that auto racing was "coachable" in the same manner as any other sport—at the time, a distinctly minority position—led him to create the eponymously named racing school, and a year later the equal-car race series. In 1975, with two borrowed Lola Formula Fords and four students, Barber started the Skip Barber School of High Performance Driving. In 1976 it was renamed the "

", and that same year he created the Skip Barber Race Series. Barber divested from the racing school in 1999. Barber was the owner and operator of

Lime Rock Park Lime Rock Park is a natural-terrain motorsport road racing venue located in Lakeville, Connecticut, United States, a hamlet in the town of Salisbury, in the state's northwest corner. Built in 1956, it is the nation's third oldest continuously ope ...

, a road-racing venue in Connecticut. In April of 2021 he sold the facility to Lime Rock Group, LLC. He maintains a minority stake. He lives in the nearby town of Sharon, CT with wife Judy. Barber was inducted into the

SCCA Hall of Fame The SCCA Hall of Fame is a Hall of Fame dedicated to enshrining those who have contributed the most to the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) auto racing. The Hall of Fame was announced in 2004, and the first 10 people were inducted in 2005. List ...

on March 2, 2013.

Racing record

SCCA National Championship Runoffs

Complete Formula One results

(

key Key or The Key may refer to: Common meanings * Key (cryptography), a piece of information that controls the operation of a cryptography algorithm * Key (lock), device used to control access to places or facilities restricted by a lock * Key (map ...

)

References

*''Lime Rock Park: 35 Years of Racing,'' by Rich Taylor, Sharon Mountain Press, 1992, page 153, {{DEFAULTSORT:Barber, Skip 1936 births American Formula One drivers SCCA Formula Super Vee drivers Harvard College alumni Living people Racing drivers from Philadelphia SCCA National Championship Runoffs winners Germantown Friends School alumni