The racing world lost a true enthusiast yesterday

I just received the sad news that a good friend from racing cicles passed away yesterday.

"This from Eagle Eye on the motorsport.com forum:

The world lost a great friend today with the passing of Earl Ma, known by many
as The
Unions. Architect, writer, artist, photo journalist, and just the nicest person
you could ever
meet lost his battle with cancer. Most have seen or read his work, as he was a
devout
motorsports enthusiast, covering Champcar, IRL, Grand Am, NASCAR and anything
with
wheels.

It sounds like a cliché to say he was a kind and nice individual, but Earl
touched everyone
who was lucky enough to cross his path. He was warm, kind, intelligent and never
hurt
anyone his entire life, though we are all hurting now through no fault of his
own.

He tended to favor the under dog, first following his native lands Danny Ongias,
and
reporting on and becoming friends with every young driver he met. Those who knew
him
well were treated with unique holiday gifts (island coffee, Simpson DVDs, and
even ice
cream shipped with dry ice!), and he presented many drivers with models that
were
detailed down to the last decal.

Despite being in a wheel chair, Earl flew out from his native Hawaii to attend
the Indy 500
this past month. Even though he knew his body was loosing the battle, Earl's
spirit and
smile touched all of us who were lucky enough to spend time with him. He
generally spent
the last month of his life, doing what he loved, with those that loved him.

The world needs more people like Earl, and we will miss him dearly."

I couldn't have said it any better if I tried.

I logged on to briefly check up on a few things this afternoon
before going out and this post knocked me for six. Earl was a good
friend whom i met through the GPMA model group about 5 years ago, when he
posted a request looking for Panoz reference material. He wanted it
so he could build a model to present to Johnny O Connell. I posted
him my photos, and from that moment a friendship was born.

Over the years since Earl and I exchanged e mails and driver cards
and photos. Earl would send me prints of his pictures, he would
always send two. One to get signed for myself and one to get signed
and send back to him. This worked both ways, and i would send him
ALMS / Le Mans driver cards and he would send me Grand Am, IRL and
Champ car cards.

I would always looked forward to receiving the surprise packages
from him at various times during the year. I will miss watching his
self produced DVD's from the events he went to, which usually
provided a good insight behind the scenes. His interviews with the
drivers were always a highlight I enjoyed watching. Most recent ones
included Ryan Briscoe, Sarah Fisher.

Earl produced some amazing models, he would take a base model and
produce whole new decal sheets for them, or he would remove the
Tampo graphics from diecasts and repaint them or decal them to
represent the cars of his friends, he would then present them to
driver friends.

Earl was also a fantastic photographer and as mentioned, his work
can be found on Motorsport.com

Earls courage fighting the cancer that effected him for the last two
years of his life, was an object lession to anyone who is inflicted
by the diease.

He never once gave up hope, and always had a positive outlook,
always setting himself goals, like which race he was going to next.

After an 18 day spell in hospital, he still made it his mission to
attend Indy and he got there. I am happy that he managed to get to
his favourite race one more time before going to the big race in the
sky.

I knew that this news would come some day, but its hard to take when
I bare in mind that we last communicated via e mail only on
Wednesday.

In January, I posted him an internet phone so that we could chat
with each other at the other side of the world for free. The time
zone difference made it real difficult to find a time when we were
both available, and i usually ended up sitting up till about 4 am so
that we could chat.

Earl, I am really going to miss you buddy in so many ways. Sadly I
never had the pleasure of meeting you in person, as you were always
going to different races than me, and that is my only regret. I
should have tried harder at talking you into going to Sebring
instead of the Rolex at Daytona.

To Earls, many friends and family, I pass on my condolences. I know
was a very good friend of Memo Gidley, so my thoughts are with him
too.

Regards
Chris Clark