Endorsements
Automotive historians, collectors, authors, and industry experts share their thoughts on Heroes of the Forest: The Complete History of the Pebble Beach Road Race.
Featured Endorsements
The Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance traces its origins to the Pebble Beach Road Races. Without the races, the concours wouldn’t exist.
Heroes of the Forest preserves not only our history and our legacy but also that of hundreds of racing greats, including the many cars and drivers who left a mark on history at Pebble Beach. This book details the race records of a multitude of individual models and one-off specials, as well as the amateurs or soon-to-be-professionals who piloted them, including Phil Hill, Carroll Shelby, Ken Miles, and Richie Ginther among others.
Heroes of the Forest also offers a host of never-before-seen images that visually bring the past to the present.
Sandra Button
Pebble Beach Concours Chairman
The Pebble Beach Road Race was the preeminent West Coast racing event of the 1950s and launched the careers of many of America’s best-known drivers. Well respected author and my dear friend Mark Brinker’s new book, Heroes of the Forest, provides a deep dive into the people, cars, and races of Pebble Beach. The quality of his research, writing, and final product is simply epic. I just cannot put down this entertaining and revealing four-volume set. These books are a must have!
Bruce Meyer
Founding Chairman, Petersen Automotive Museum
Featured product
Heroes of the Forest: The Complete History of the Pebble Beach Road Race
Heroes of the Forest is a four-volume book set that passionately tells the story of the Pebble Beach Road Race, which was contested from 1950 through 1956 over the winding roads of the Del Monte Forest. The events were exciting and dangerous, and they launched the careers of many of America’s top drivers. Authored by automotive enthusiast, collector, racer, researcher, and journalist Mark R. Brinker, this engaging and entertaining book set chronicles the Pebble Beach races, competitors, and cars with a depth and detail never before assembled in a single work.
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Additional Praise
When one thinks of Pebble Beach, it is usually of the Concours d’Elegance, but it was the races that came first and created what is now one of the most, if not the most, famous automotive weeks in the world.
In writing Heroes of the Forest, Mark Brinker has created THE definitive history on these significant races. Not only fully, and I mean fully documenting each race with results, but each car, the politics, logistical challenges, each driver and their history with ties to Watkins Glen, Le Mans, and Sebring, the programs, advertisements, brochures, and magazine covers and articles from Road & Track. The photos have rarely, if ever, been seen before and feature every car ever entered, along with historical photos from other events where that particular car was raced.
To be honest, I found each volume to be mind boggling. If there is any author thinking of writing a book about the Pebble Beach races, forget it. There is nothing more to write or illustrate. It is all in Heroes of the Forest.
Bill Warner
The early postwar races were my father’s classroom, and he used what he learned at Pebble Beach to realize his dream of becoming a Formula One world champion. Author Mark R. Brinker is no stranger to large projects, and he has tackled the topic with passion, clarity, and deep research. There is absolutely no doubt that my father would have loved Heroes of the Forest. Hopefully, the library in heaven has a copy.
Derek Hill
I have a deep passion for vintage and classic competition cars and have enjoyed decades of racing and concours events. My favorite venue for these activities has been the Monterey Peninsula, and I have competed at Laguna Seca and the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance numerous times with great joy. I have loved competing at Laguna Seca in my Jaguar C-type against (and often losing to) Rob Manson (who co-produced this book) and his fleet of 1950’s American Specials.
The hot rodders who created them made some special and fast racers during a breakout period in American motor racing. The foundation of vintage racing on the West Coast is the Pebble Beach Road Race.
Heroes of the Forest puts the importance of the Pebble Beach Road Race on bold display with a dazzling presentation of the people, cars, builders, organizers, and races. This four-volume book is simply incredible and connects modern vintage racing with the earliest days of West Coast sports car racing.
Rob Walton
Enthusiast and Collector
Heroes of the Forest is a breathtaking book for an epic racing event.
Jim Sitz
Automotive Historian and
Pebble Beach Road Race Attendee
With his four-volume book, Heroes of the Forest, author Dr. Mark Brinker's surgeon’s precision and soulful depth of Pebble Beach Race history bring life again to this legendary California venue's drivers, cars, entrants, and races of fame, glory, and heartbreak that were also part of my own young adult life in the 1950s.
Being there in the day, I knew all of it firsthand. The Pebble Beach racers—Phil Hill, Carroll Shelby, Bill Pollack, Jack McAfee, Roger Barlow, Bob Drake, Pete Lovely, Cy Yedor, Richie Ginther, Ken Miles—were not just iconic names but friends, guys I actually knew. My father, John Edgar, was a leading entrant and team owner at Pebble Beach, as were fellows John von Neumann and Tony Parravano. Gifted with this special background, I co-authored with Michael T. Lynch and Parravano's son Ron an award-winning book about the 1950s era of American sports car racing.
The point is, with Mark Brinker's brand-new detailed narrative, participant profiles, copious period photographs, meticulous race data, and charted results, Heroes of the Forest, in its nearly 1,700 pages, is far more than another big and handsome racing history. It is a living experience putting readers right into that time and place of this freshly compelling and definitive Pebble Beach Race story.
William Edgar
Senior Motorsport Journalist
How many times did I say WOW! Let me count the wows.
You may not know my name, but hopefully you have seen my photographs, and I am the smiling one on the acknowledgement page of Heroes of the Forest, though a tad younger there. The first thing I totally admired about this “tome of tomes” is the size and layout of the photographs. I am a visual person and love to see these great photographers' work in a large size to study the details. Well done, Mark R. Brinker.
The races are covered magnificently, and the book doesn’t stop there. So much coverage of the atmosphere around the races, which greatly adds to the flavor and makes you think you are actually there.
Allen R. Kuhn
Automotive Photographer
Heroes of the Forest by Mark Brinker is by every measure the most fascinating treatment of the Pebble Beach road races ever published. The exhaustive research, data summaries, and biographical information are simple to understand, and the selection of photos is unexcelled both in quantity and content.
Brinker has created a suite of books that are both immersive and entertaining to read, an obvious labor of love that could not have been achieved without the author’s high professional standards and enduring passion. The books are not meant to be read in one sitting, but each volume is so engaging that one will want to immediately pick up the next, secure in the knowledge that even the highest of expectations will be far exceeded.
Leslie M. Kendall
Chief Historian, Petersen Automotive Museum
Mark Brinker's thorough and comprehensive history of the Pebble Beach Road Races is one of the most beautifully researched and presented works, not just on the subject of a particular event but on any facet of motoring history. Providing a thrilling retelling of the people, races, cars, and story.
The narrative is presented at first from a 35,000-foot view and then zooms in through histories and tables to a molecular level of each subject. The overwhelming number of details and information are thoughtfully organized into fabulous tables augmented by stunning period images and Brinker's inimitable storytelling throughout.
Whether you're a dyed-in-the-wool car enthusiast who regularly attends the Pebble Beach Concours and Monterey Car Week or a casual fan interested in learning more about a fascinating bit of American history, Heroes of the Forest is a must-have read box set.
Eric Minoff
Head of Department, Bonhams Cars United States
Dr. Brinker’s Heroes of the Forest represents an incredibly comprehensive account that has never been assembled in such detail. The photographs, tables, and text cover a vast amount of information that is impeccably presented. This book will serve as the gold standard recount of this fascinating period of road racing. This is clearly a labor of love, as is evidenced throughout each volume.
Jim Fasnacht
Today, the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance is universally recognized as a pinnacle of automotive events. The fact that it was created in the early fifties as a sideshow to the pioneering Pebble Beach Road Race is often buried in history.
In Heroes of the Forest, Mark Brinker resurrects the legend and the passion of these races in vast detail. Through reading this encyclopedic tome, I felt like I personally got to meet the racers, builders, team owners, and general characters who had the great foresight and fortune to create and experience these momentous events.
I also immediately started searching for cars with Pebble Beach Road Race history to acquire for my own collection! The amazing treasury of historic images and Mark’s infectious writing will hook you too.
Myron Vernis
If you're expecting another masterpiece from Dr. Mark Brinker after his superb, multi-volume books on "Japan’s Most Astonishing Automobiles" and “The Amazing Denzel Sports Car," then you won’t be disappointed.
The Pebble Beach Road Races, held on the twisty backroads of the scenic Del Monte Forest, from 1950 to 1956, attracted the top drivers and the best sports cars — both production cars and homebuilt specials -- in the country. It was a fabulous social event in a gorgeous location, with posh patrons hobnobbing with the likes of Phil Hill, Jim Kimberly, Masten Gregory, Ken Miles, and Carroll Shelby. The narrow course was wickedly fast, and with the towering pines and glacial rocks, scarily adjacent to the road, it could be deadly. Hundreds of cars competed until Ernie McAfee’s fatal crash in a Ferrari led to the establishment of the Laguna Seca Racetrack. But the Pebble Beach Road Races, while they lasted, were glorious.
Mark Brinker's highly entertaining, exciting and scholarly treatment brings you every car, every driver, every record, and every tiny detail. There are more than 1,500 photographs alone — many of which have never been seen -- along with historic catalogs, period advertisements, remarkably in-depth driver portraits, and detailed race result charts. But, there’s more to it than that.
In the early days of amateur racing in California, there was bravery laced with naivety, celebrities mixed with amateurs, and more than the hint of danger. It’s all here, expressed in four action-packed volumes that ensure that the excitement of the Pebble Beach Road Races will never be forgotten.
Ken Gross
WELL DONE! Heroes of the Forest: The Complete History of the Pebble Beach Road Race is outstanding.
As a childhood fan living in California in the 50s, I heard a lot about Pebble Beach along with the other races that followed through the years. I guess I could say I was aware of the scene but not the details. Fast forward to 2026 and I’m still around, covered a lot of ground, and really enjoyed and appreciate the stories and facts behind the scenes, so to speak, of those early days.
I have read many car books and have favorites, but I keep special books I look at from time to time (rainy days) as “refreshers” on my bookshelf. Heroes of the Forest will be THERE. My thoughts for others: Heroes of the Forest, a 4-volume set, The Story Begins, The People, The Cars, The Races, contains many (and I stress, many) photographs, fact sheets, entry lists, car lists, results, and “fun stuff.” It belongs on your bookshelf.
If there were a “Master Class” for Auto Enthusiasts, Heroes of the Forest would be required reading. Congratulations Mark Brinker!
Steve Earle
"The quality of the research, writing, and final product is simply epic. I just can’t put down this entertaining and revealing four-volume set. These books are a must have!"
Bruce Meyer | Founding Chairman, Petersen Automotive Museum