On this day in Motor Racing's past

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#1111

Post by erwin greven »

Bottom post of the previous page:

Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
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#1112

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

Jumping back a day....

6th May
Rene Dreyfus was born on this day in 1905


During the 1930s, he found himself at the centre of the geopolitical power struggle which would soon engulf Europe and then the world. For the Nazis, German dominance of motorsport in the '30s was full of symbolism.

But at Pau in 1938, the Delahaye of Dreyfus stubbornly prevailed. Ironically he was a Jewish driver ......

In 1933, Adolf Hitler, announced that the Third Reich would dominate the Grand Prix. After the government poured funds into Mercedes and Auto Union, their top drivers Rudi Caracciola and Bernd Rosemeyer swept the field in their supercharged Silver Arrow race cars.

An Irish-American heiress with a Jewish name (who grew up and lived in France) named Lucy Schell decided that something had to be done—so she launched her own racing team. A fine driver in her own right, Lucy had cash to spend, reasons of her own to challenge the Nazis, and the will to claim her place in a world dominated by men.For a driver, Lucy recruited René Dreyfus. Once a meteoric up-and-comer, he had been excluded from competing on the best teams in the best cars, all because of his Jewish heritage. For a car she chose a struggling French automaker, Delahaye. The old French firm was known for producing sturdy, staid vehicles, mostly trucks.... they all banded together to defeat the might of the German team and all it stood for, on the racetrack.

My understanding is that Hitler later tried to have the entire event erased from the historical record. I will leave it to others with more knowledge of events of the era to verify that or otherwise.


William Cash recalls a day of national pride in France, and deflated egos in Stuttgart: From the archives of Motorsport Magazine.

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René Dreyfus' French resistance

On a cold New York winter evening in February 1954, Rudi Caracciola stepped stiffly from a taxi outside Le Chanteclair restaurant at 18 East 49th Street, between Fifth and Madison. Anybody looking up as the 53-year-old legend walked through the glass doors in his well-cut dark grey suit would have noticed his limp.

He was in town with his wife, Baby Hoffmann, to help launch the gullwing Mercedes 300SL Coupe at the New York Auto Show. Le Chanteclair was a chic new French restaurant whose walls had just been freshly decorated with cartoon murals of great racing drivers and their cars. Its owner was Rudi’s old friend and rival, René Dreyfus. Before the war, René had been the gritty French captain of Ecurie Bleue, the private team founded in 1936 by the bulldog-loving, speed-mad, expat American heiress Lucy O’Reilly Schell of New York, along with her Wall Street investor husband Laury.

What none of the diners knew as they watched the maitre d’ ushered the distinguished couple to a discreet corner table was that, as the clouds of war had loomed over Europe in 1938, these two men had waged an epic battle around the narrow streets of Pau, deep in France’s Armagnac country. The result of this battle was one of the greatest upsets in motor-racing history.

On Sunday April 10, 1938, a month after Hitler had marched into Austria, their two team bosses — SS Korpsfuhrer Major Adolph Huhnlein of Berlin and Mrs Schell — were chasing the same dream for their teams: to become champions of Europe. Their style of competition, however, could not have been more different.

For Hitler, 1938 was to be the culmination of his Nazi sporting conquest plan, and the Grand Prix de Pau’s grid, on Avenue Lacoste, in front of the railway station, was where his humourless Korpsfuhrer, a pair of binoculars hanging off his swastika-emblazoned uniform, had chosen to unveil the latest silver Mercedes racing car — built to the new 1938-40 Grand Prix formula — to the world. After four years of almost total German dominance in the 750kg formula, the countries that made up the International Grand Prix Federation had conspired to come up with a new formula. Based on a minimum, heavier, chassis weight and reduced engine size, it was designed to limit speeds and get French and Italian ‘sports’ racing engineers back to building competitive GP cars. More specifically, the plan was to curb the unstoppable run of German victories.

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Pau 38 start
The Pau Grand Prix gets underway – Dreyfus is on the front left, next to Caracciola

Or so they hoped. The new formula limited supercharged engines to three litres, and unsupercharged engines to 4.5 litres. Not unsurprisingly, Mercedes technical director Rudolf Uhlenhaut chose the former. His engineers had been secretly developing supercharged aero-engines for the reborn Luftwaffe. His new W154 cars, delivering 468bhp, were designed in a barbed wire-surrounded compound at the Unterturkheim Mercedes plant in Stuttgart. They were tested at a misty and cold Monza in March, and the results indicated to Huhnlein that the W154 would act as final proof that German technical might would triumph against any ‘foreign’ opposition.

But Huhnlein had underestimated the determined Mrs Schell and her team, which she ran from a mews garage near her luxury Paris townhouse. Nor had he counted on the grit of her gourmet, half-Jewish, team leader René Dreyfus. Blacklisted from test driving for the German teams on account of his Jewish-sounding name, the gutsy 33-year-old son of a linen salesman from Nice was out for revenge.

For the first race of the 1938 season, Mrs Schell wanted to assert Ecurie Bleue as a new force in GP motor racing. She also wanted to level the score with Germany following the Korpsfuhrer’s crushing defeat of the Americans at the 1937 Vanderbilt Cup in New York.

Apart from excellent research in a few chapters of Antony Blight’s The French Sports Car Revolution, no biography exists of her remarkable life as the Amelia Earhart of the European pre-war motor racing world. But the tough-talking, fiery-tempered, blue-eyed American millionaire was one of the most formidable characters of the 1930s.

On that spring day in April 1938, there was more at stake than wounded national pride, or a mere motor race. The duel between Mercedes and Ecurie Bleue had heavy political symbolism. Mrs Schell, who sought no publicity for her team, epitomised the dedicated wealthy amateur who raced for the fun of it; Huhnlein was a ruthlessly professional Hitler puppet, whose motives were propaganda and the furtherment of technology with a view to military use.

One thing that Huhnlein and Mrs Schell had in common was almost unlimited funds. The German teams were funded with the help of state reichmarks; Ecurie Bleue was financed out of her $5 million fortune. She was the only daughter of Patrick O’Reilly, a poor Irish immigrant who achieved the American dream by becoming one of the steel barons who built New York’s subway.

But she was no racing dilettante. She was the first American woman to drive in an international grand prix. And following the announcement of the new 1938 formula in 1936, she walked with her bulldogs into the Paris office of Charles Weiffenbach, the elderly MD of Delahaye, and informed him she wanted to order a couple of new V12 GP cars (which hadn’t even been designed yet) for the 1938 race season. Before her 1935 inheritance, she had already impressed Monsieur Charles (as Weiffenbach was known) by racing as a member of the Delahaye rally team, first as a private entrant, and then forcing her way through the ranks to become a works driver. Her husband Latuy, a meek figure who belongs in the pages of a Somerset Maugham novel, also raced, and was an occasional driver for Ecurie Bleue.

The new 4.5-litre V12 Delahaye Type 145 was first tested by Dreyfus was at Montlhery, without fanfare or invited press, in June 1937. On its first public outing, the appearance of this pug-nosed two-seater came as something of a shock to the few Ecurie Bleue friends and guests present Later, Dreyfus himself was to confess that, “It was the most awful-looking car I ever saw”.

Certainly the Germans were not unduly concerned. A sharp illustration of just how seriously Huhnlein took his orders from Berlin to ensure Nazi supremacy on the track was revealed a month later, on August 27, when Dreyfus’s Delahaye was battling it out at dusk on the Montlhery track with Bugatti’s star driver, Jean-Pierre Wimille, for the much-hyped Prix du Million. So anxious were the French to create a racing car capable of beating the Germans, after endless humiliating defeats, that the government had put up a lottery prize of a million francs for any car that could average 146kph for 16 laps or 200km at Montlhery (this being the speed Louis Chiron achieved in 1934 driving a Tipo B Alfa Romeo while outperforming the Germans under the old formula).

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Caracciola heads Maurice Trintignant during the race

Although the German teams were busy preparing for the Italian GP in Livorno on September 12, Huhnlein took the trouble to ensure the huge crowd of press and photographers that witnessed this memorable Ecurie Bleue / Bugatti duel (which Dreyfus narrowly won) included a spy from the Mercedes technical department. Despite the Delahaye victory, the spy told his superiors they had nothing to worry about for the 1938 season.

To be honest, when the two Ecurie Bleue transporters set off for Pau, nobody in the motoring press thought Lucy Schell had any chance against a lineup that included the exciting W154, the new monoplace supercharged 3-litre Bugatti, or Tazio Nuvolari in one of two new eight-cylinder Alfa Romeos (Tipo 308) managed for the new Alfa Corse team by Enzo Ferrari. Against this opposition, Ecurie Bleue was entering a pair of outdated-looking, two-seater ‘bathtub’ road cars — more of a sportscar than a GP car. They were painted duck-egg blue, with red trimming.

Auto Union, who had lost number one driver Bernd Rosemeyer in January during a Nazi speed record attempt, had decided their new cars weren’t ready to race. But the arrival in Pau of the multi-truck Mercedes convoy, after a winding journey through France supervised by manager Alfred Neubauer, was described by the normally unfazed Dreyfus in his autobiography as “awesome”.

Mercedes boasted a team of 25 mechanics, a truck-load of spares, and no less a reserve driver than Dick Seaman (who, much to his annoyance, did not get to race). The Schell equipe comprised Dreyfus, his French wife Chou-Chou, who doubled as timekeeper, his banking brother Maurice, who doubled as part-time team manager, Laury, Gianfranco Comotti, the number two driver, and a handful of Delahaye mechanics headed by technical director Jean Francois.

Lucy was absent although, after consulting a fortune-teller near Nice the day before the race, she rang the Noutary Hotel in Pau and spoke to René. “I know you will do well,” she told him. It turned out she had been told her team was going to win although the clairvoyant thought she owned a stable of racehorses rather than cars.

After the practice session, fortune did seem to be smiling on Ecurie Bleue: the Bugatti team did not show up; Nuvolari, having sliced four seconds off his old 1935 lap record in the first practice run, suddenly found his Alfa on fire. Unable to stop and by now smothered in flames, the Italian jumped for it while his driver-less car headed off into the bushes. Although his legs were quite badly burnt, he was ready to race in the second Alfa (to have been driven by Luigi Villoresi) in the grand prix two days later. An investigation, however, found the same accident — due to a leaking petrol tank — could occur again, so the ‘sister’ car was withdrawn. The appalled Nuvolari admitted he’d finally had enough of Italian engineering. He swiftly transferred to Auto Union.

The twisting 2.7km Pau circuit was no stranger to Dreyfus, and he planned on using his expertise of its hairpins and narrow straights to his advantage. In practice, pushing his foot “to the floor”, he found his unsupercharged Delahaye “sticking to the road”, while he noticed even the great Caracciola — whose Mercedes W154 boasted around 200 more horsepower — was sliding all over the place. Hermann Lang had the same had the same problem, spinning in practice. At dawn, on the Sunday of the race, Uhlenhaut tested Lang’s car, on which the mechanics had been working all night. Acting on his advice, the car was withdrawn.


Dreyfus had matched Caracciola in practice with a time of 1min 48sec, and Mercedes now had just one car. But the German squad was still an overwhelming favourite.

As the engines fired up, with Mercedes’ secret formula alcohol fuel (shipped over in barrels from Stuttgart) blackening the spring mountain air, excited spectators leant out of the small hotels and apartment buildings overlooking the track.

Charles Faroux, the great French race reporter, dropped the flag and newsreel film dearly shows the extra power of Caracciola’s Mercedes pushing him around the first corner just before Dreyfus. They roared uphill along Avenue Bonaparte before the hairpin at Pont Oscar, and then another quick sharp right before passing the Real Tennis court and the Casino gardens in the Parc Beaumont. The course then wiggles past a convent and a statue of Marshal Foch before drivers open the throttle in the final downhill straight towards the pits.

Neubauer knew his supercharged Mercedes would have to stop and refuel, whilst the Delahaye could manage on one tank, so Caracciola’s plan was to establish a sufficient lead to allow for a single stop. For the first few laps, this seemed to be working, with Dreyfus dropping back behind (Dreyfus claims this was to avoid inhaling the noxious Mercedes exhaust fumes). The problem, however, came when Dreyfus began to challenge Caracciola around the twisty track, where the five-speed gearbox and extra power of the Mercedes proved a liability. According to Dreyfus, who never needed to use his fourth gear throughout the race, he was able to pass Caracciola “easily” on the seventh lap, only to then allow the German to overtake him as he knew that when Rudi came in to refuel he “had the race made”.

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Caracciola would eventually park his Mercedes once he realised the game was up

Caracciola’s only chance was to push his car beyond the limit, which Neubauer urged him to do from the pits, the oversized Mercedes manager, in his usual dark suit and trilby, frantically waving the red-and-black flag which meant ‘Faster!’

After 25 laps of this round-the-houses circuit, Caracciola led by eight seconds. The bad news, however, was that the Mercedes was gobbling fuel at 2.75 mpg; the Delahaye was averaging ‘7.9mpg. After 50 laps — half distance — Caracciola led Dreyfus by just six seconds, having established what was to be the fastest lap of the day in 1min 47sec (57.90mph).

But it was not enough. And Rudi knew it. Coming in to refuel, he stepped but of the car, muttered something about his hip hurting (if he had a sniff of victory he blocked out the pain from his horrific 1933 Monaco crash) and suddenly handed over the wheel to Lang, who wasn’t even in his racing overalls. He duly hopped in, but after losing 50 seconds to refuelling, made even less of an impression on Dreyfus, who was increasing his lead.

From then on, the race belonged to Mrs Schell’s team. Dreyfus won by 1min 50sec, with Lang second and Comotti six laps back in third. What should have been a routine propaganda victory for Huhnlein turned out to be a public humiliation, with the Marseillaise played at extra loud volume for good measure.

This win — the only time the Germans were beaten in either 1938 or 1939 — had a deep significance. Lucy Schell’s victory over Hitler’s Nazi motor-racing chief provided a final moment of sporting and human glory before war broke out – only five months later came the Munich Crisis. But it was the newspaper headlines following the Grand Prix de Pau that reminded hundreds of thousands across Europe that no matter how improbable the odds seemed, victory against a seemingly superior foe was always possible.
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... sistance-2


A few extra pics from that race:

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#1113

Post by erwin greven »

Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
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#1114

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

Gilles Villeneuve, by Jody Scheckter

There is perhaps no name more charismatic in motor racing than that of Gilles Villeneuve. He was taken from us too soon but while he was at the top just one man was truly in a position to judge his abilities: his friend and team-mate Jody Scheckter.

Again, this article is from the Motorsport Mag archives (1999)I thought others might enjoy this as much as I did.

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Jody Scheckter leans over his Ferrari team mate Gilles Villeneuve to discuss the set-up during a practice session for the South African Grand Prix at Kyalami, 3rd March 1979. Villeneuve won and Scheckter came home second.


Jody Scheckter and Gilles Villeneuve enjoyed a straightforward relationship as Ferrari team-mates. This is as the title says, Gilles talking about Gilles.


How good was Gilles?

Well, he didn’t win the World Championship. He was capable of it, no question but he was always trying to be the fastest, not worrying about winning the title, and he paid for it. If he wanted to be World Champion and concentrated on that, he would probably have lost this image of being a daredevil.

Gilles might have won the title in 1982, and Ferrari was certainly capable. But you never can tell; he was still at that early stage of his career. At one time I was more aggressive, but as you grow older you realise you’ve got to finish races. The way the points work, that’s how you become Champion. Some people never lose that stage. Gilles thought fastest laps were important and, in a way, they were; the press loved it when he put on qualifiers and went quickest.

I guess I wasn’t surprised by what happened to his popularity after he died. People liked his image and I suppose if you get killed in the middle of it all, you get bigger, not smaller. But I think it’s gone away a little recently, especially since Jacques has come along. Gilles is getting more forgotten now, and Jacques has achieved more than his father ever did.

I signed for Ferrari at the end of 1978 and at the time it wasn’t clear who’d be leaving the team. Carlos Reutemann was driving with Gilles. I met Carlos in France, and I said, “I’m going to be number one, because that’s my agreement. If you stay that’s fine with me, we can work together.” I think after that meeting he ran away and signed for somebody else! So my team-mate was Gilles.

The team orders were simple. Whoever was in front stayed there as long as you weren’t going to lose a place. If you were first and second and the third guy was a long way back you’d stay there, and if you were fifth and sixth and nobody was trying to pass, you would stay there. In other words you didn’t fight when it wasn’t necessary, and we stuck to that.

I didn’t really know Gilles at the start of ’79, and in fact I don’t remember the early races. Quite often you get people that come in to F1, and you don’t really notice them until they start to beat you. I suppose the first time I really paid attention was when he beat me in South Africa.

I should have won very easily, but he ended up winning it. It was painful. I went out on dry tyres, and it was slightly wet. It was the right decision, and I was 30 seconds ahead. He started on wets then changed to dries. But my dries went off – the Michelins weren’t very solid – so the car became undrivable at the end.

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Scheckter Monaco 79
In a close ’79 title fight with Villeneuve, Scheckter ultimately won out by four points from the Canadian

He caught me up so I went in and put on a new set of tyres and started catching him again, but it was all over by then. It was at that stage that team orders came into being. He then won in Long Beach. So all of a sudden I was under massive pressure; I was the number one, but he’d won two races. This was tough stuff.

However, I always worked very well with Gilles. We had an honest and open relationship, which was part of our success. There was no bullshit: if he made an adjustment and went quicker, he’d tell me and I would tell him. That’s what kept us in such a good relationship, and was part of us winning the championship.

Ferrari drivers were traditionally always fighting each other, and that’s what the press liked. Part of our skill was to keep working as a team. Gilles had a good relationship with Enzo, and would say it was friendlier than mine. He certainly had a lot of respect for Enzo; I never remember anything other than that.

We spent a lot of time together in Monaco. He liked to dance and he liked girls. He was fun, intelligent and he was a mate. But more than anything, there was mutual respect between us.

But I always felt he didn’t care about the tifosi. I think in his part of Canada they looked down on Italians, and I think he had that attitude. I always used to think it was funny that they liked him so much. Perhaps he was putting it on, and inside he did like them a lot, but outwardly he would make the odd remark…

One story sums him up – he had air-conditioning and a fire so he put both on. He wanted to do photography, and bought thousands of pounds worth of equipment he hardly used. Then he wanted tools, because he used to work as a mechanic. He went to Beta and bought a whole garage full of the best stuff, and never used them!

I then won in Belgium and Monaco, which put me back on track but he was dominant over me was Dijon. I battled like mad, but he was quicker, and I couldn’t really work out why. That was the race where he had the fight with Arnoux. I thought what they did was stupid. I told Gilles, and I think he knew it was stupid.

I was the President of the Grand Prix Drivers Association at the time, and Gilles really worked with me. From a safety point of view he was very responsible. I think we both wanted to make it as safe as possible. That didn’t mean to say we were driving carefully; you still drove with aggression. But you felt that if something happened, you wanted to have a chance.

I don’t think he tried to do things that put him in uncalculated danger. I think from that point of view he was a responsible driver. He always had this image of being crazy, and he wasn’t really. He was only crazy when he wanted to be, it was his image. I always tell the story about driving from Monaco with him. I didn’t want to do it, because I hated to be a passenger. But the whole time he drove perfectly, until we got just outside Modena, and soon the wheels were spinning and he started sliding around and everything. That was the proof of what I felt.

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Villeneuve 79 Long Beach
Scheckter struggled with the ’80 Ferrari, but Villeneuve occasionally made it fly

I also remember going with him in his helicopter, and again once we got over Modena he started his tricks again. I stopped that really quickly. I hated flying. He was going down and then up. I said you better stop now or I’ll wring your neck. He knew I meant it.

Zandvoort was really the turning point that year. I messed up the clutch at the start, and dropped to the back. He was at the front, and then his tyre went down, which was pretty spectacular. I went through the field and came second behind Alan Jones, and that really put me into a dominant position.

I had it under control in Monza. What gave me confidence was I knew Gilles was doing these silly things to keep his image up and that gave me comfort. He was testing qualifiers and getting the quickest times, and I was sticking to hard tyres and testing bits of the car I knew would help me in the race. In qualifying I think that was the biggest gap between us all year, and in the race I was quicker. As soon as Jacques Laffite dropped out, I cut my revs back and sat ahead of Gilles. Only on the last lap did I accelerate away again. Although I trusted him, I didn’t want to take a chance; it was too important a thing to take a chance with!

I think we were professionals. We tried as hard as we could and the one who came out in front, won. There were lots of times when he was faster than I was, and times when I was faster than he was.

We raced hard, and I beat him. I won the Championship because in the races that counted I got out in front, and was in front when it settled down. At that stage there was no point in fighting. There were no circumstances where he had to give up a place to me, so I don’t think it was frustrating for him.

The 1980 car was a disaster. Gilles had very good performances in it. I didn’t. I was more advanced in my career, and found it very difficult racing for tenth place, whereas he just drove. He brought it near the front a few times, which I couldn’t do. I announced my retirement halfway through the year, and felt out of place soon after I did that. The cause wasn’t there, like it had been before. You were retiring, you were last year’s driver.


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Gilles Villeneuve
Scheckter says the Imola incident with Pironi brought himself and Villeneuve closer together once more

After I retired there was talk of Gilles starting a team. I don’t think he ever felt tied to Maranello. Gilles would have left Ferrari if he felt he could go where he would win races. From that point of view I don’t think he was particularly sentimental. There was supposedly a sponsor – a cigarette company – that had masses of money to help him start this team. I think he would have liked his own team, and he was quite excited doing something like that, and the idea was that I was going to be team manager.

I volunteered to look into it, and found out this guy was nobody, a bullshitter basically. I came back to Gilles with the news. If the sponsor was real, it could have happened. Later we had a bit of an argument over something personal, and I didn’t see him for a year. However, after Didier Pironi overtook him at Imola in 1982 to steal the win, he called and we went to Modena in his helicopter. I suppose a relationship is worth more than one argument; at least that’s what I felt.

We talked a lot. He hated what had happened at Imola. He realised what a good relationship we’d had, and that we never double-crossed each other, and we were very honest and open, and that Pironi hadn’t been that way with him. I don’t think he ever thought that it could ever happen.

Gilles was a really genuine, honest guy, and in fact if he had a weakness he was honest to the point of being naive. He trusted Pironi. It would have affected him badly for quite a while, and I say that because very honest, naive people are shocked when something like that happens to them. Crooks think that’s the way it should happen. If he had not trusted Pironi, could he have avoided that situation? Probably.

I think at Zolder he was under massive pressure to beat Pironi, who had been faster than him in early qualifying. In F1 we all had problems with that sort of situation; I well remember nearly smashing into a TV cameraman at Monaco, because I thought Gilles was quicker than me, but it turned out I had been quicker. You’re trying so hard, you get so aggressive.

I certainly got angry in a racing car a lot of times. You get to the end of practice and are so wound up and wanting to go for it, you do stupid things. I don’t know exactly what happened at Zolder, but it seems to me that’s the most likely reason for the accident. Gilles took a chance that didn’t pay off. He went for a gap that wasn’t there, and he got caught. I’ve done it myself, and got away with it.

That weekend I was in Monaco, and had just had an operation. I got a call from Zolder, I went straight to see his wife, Joanne. My wife went to Belgium with her. A couple of days later we all went on a Canadian Air Force plane to Montreal for the funeral.

I spent a year after he died working on his sponsorship deals, getting all the money I could for his family. I suppose I took it upon myself as my task. I had a cause and negotiated with Ferrari for a massive amount of money and got rather more money than I really should have done, by putting pressure on them.

“I felt good for Jacques. His father would have been proud.”
For a long time I really didn’t keep in touch with Joanne and the family and I had no contact with Jacques until I met him in Monaco when he was doing Formula Three. He was complaining about how difficult everything was and I thought to myself, “You’ll never make it!” The next time I remember seeing him is on TV in America, after he won the Indy 500. I thought, “Boy, that is incredible.” I felt good for him. His father would have been proud.

I think poor Jacques is completely run out on questions about Gilles. It’s nearly become a complex for him, or at least that how it seems from the outside. There’s nothing that really stands out in terms of similarities between them; you wouldn’t know they were father and son. In a way it almost seems that Jacques is trying to do the opposite to his father.

I wouldn’t have thought that Gilles would like Formula One in 1999. He was a racer, and he probably would have got into the grooved tyre argument. But if he had the same spirit he would probably have still made holes in places where there weren’t any…

Jody Scheckter was talking to Adam Cooper
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... /30/gilles

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


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#1115

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this Day, 12th May 1957

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The Madcap Marquis

Alfonso de Portago was killed on this day in 1957 at the Mille Miglia.

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Alfonso de Portago arrived in motor racing as an aristocratic amateur, but eventually established himself as a serious contender

Alfonso de Portago was killed on this day in 1957 at the Mille Miglia, after a tyre blew on his Ferrari 335 S whilst he was running in third. Seen by many as the ultimate playboy racing driver, he initially entered races as an aristocratic amateur but eventually came to be seen as a serious contender. Few lived as hard – or drove as fast.

For any who admire the days when drivers were fat and tyres were skinny, the name ‘Fon’ de Portago will have particular resonance. Not because he was tubby – another Fangio or Gonzalez; far from it but because his name stands tall among those who burnished that special charisma which is Ferrari’s.

One of the real characters of Motor Racing back in the day. I enjoy reading of their antis and thought others might enjoy it too.

Few playboys lived as hard as Spanish marquis `Fon' de Portago — or drove as fast. From the Motorsport Magazine Archives, Doug Nye on how Ferrari's most dashing driver earned Enzo's respect
Born on October 11, 1928, Alfonso Antonio Vicente Bias Angel Francisco Borjia Cabeza de Vaca y Leighton, Grandee of Spain, Count of Mejorada, Count of Pemia, Marquis de Moratalla, Marquis de Portago and Duke of Alagon became one of Ferrari’s most celebrated racing drivers of the 1950s...

He was educated in Britain, France, Spain and the USA but hated academia and loved sport. He won his pilot’s licence at 17 and lost it almost immediately by flying under a narrow bridge to win a $500 bet.

He played a ferocious game of Jai-Alai (Pelota), swam competitively, won a tennis title and took up top-level polo, yachting and shooting. He was a tremendous, fearless, horseman, winning three successive French amateur titles. He rode twice in the Grand National, in 1950 and ’52, but spun off both times. He lived at a frantic pace, rode in as many as 150 races a year and in one week at Pau was said to have saddled 32 winners from 36 rides.

A born gambler, he was renowned at roulette playing several tables at once. Like James Hunt later, he flouted all dress codes. Where Hunt preferred T-shirt and jeans, ‘Fon’ was seldom without his favourite grubby leather jacket, thick black hair habitually uncut, dark-shaven, a cigarette pasted to his lower lip.

Portago Argentina 57
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Driving his Ferrari / Lancia D50 at the 1957 Argentine GP

Raffish, insouciant wealth was underlined by his home address in ‘Millionaire’s Row’: 40 Avenue Foch, Paris. Yet he was also virtually teetotal and would obsessively play pinball in a favourite cafe, his ambition to win free games and play all day, buckshee.

Some friends maintain he also sharpened his reflexes by having them throw knives at him. He’d catch them all by the handle. Don’t try this at home kiddies; de Portago was formidably well coordinated. One party piece was to juggle raw eggs, another was sleight-of-hand.

One former girl-friend frankly described to me his spectacular sex life as “fully acrobatic”. It was certainly very complicated, but he married a wealthy American girl named MacDaniel and they had two children.

Winter sports became a particular forte.

The Cresta Run at St Moritz led to strong friendship with established ‘bobber’ Edmund Gurner Nelson a quiet American from Honolulu, 12 years his senior. I’m told “they hunted as a pair”. As ‘Fon’ grew too heavy for the turf, Nelson suggested dirt-track racing amongst the peasantry, in Paris, Strasbourg and Metz. ‘Fon’ shone, loved it and moved up-market, into road racing.

At the 1953 New York Motor Show, Ferrari importer Luigi Chinetti invited him to the Mexican Carrera Panamericana. ‘Fon’ recalled: “That involved sitting next to him while he drove I was terrified!” Their Ferrari 340MM failed on day two but de Portago was utterly hooked.

Established Franco-American driver Harry Schell latched on. ‘Fon’ bought a second-hand Ferrari 250MM which they co-drove in the ’54 Buenos Aires 1000km and Sebring 12-Hours. A new Maserati A6GCS/53 followed and factory tester Guerrino Bertocchi spent time tutoring ‘Fon’ on how to drive it. He was enthralled, privy now to the art of heel-and-toe. At Le Mans he led the 2-litre class before retirement and then scored his first road-racing win at Metz.

His mother subsequently bought him a sports OSCA which he took to the German GP meeting at Nürburgring, where in practice Maserati’s driver Onofre Marimon crashed fatally. De Portago had counted him as a friend. Badly shaken, ‘Fon’ still raced next day but crashed, and was scooped into an ambulance. ‘Fon’ objected, thumped the driver, dumped him in the back, and drove back to the paddock with the seat hanging out of his trousers. His crash? ‘The Porsches were bumping me in the corners. Of course I bumped them back. It worked very well until I got behind Herrmann the leader… that’s how I went off.” Typically, that night found him in the casino at Bad Neuenahr, his bruises developing nicely. He won $10,000 which he invested in a new sports-racing Ferrari Monza, which was promptly shipped to Mexico for the Carrera.

There, bad fuel burned pistons. At Nassau in the Bahamas Speed Week he then won two races and placed second in a third. Enzo Ferrari paid extra attention – this client could drive. He was duly “permitted” to order a Ferrari 625A F1 car for the 1955 season and earned a quasi-works drive at Sebring. But in wet practice for the Silverstone May meeting, the 625A understeered into the bank and he broke a leg. That sidelined him until September when he co-drove a Monza with Mike Hawthorn in the Goodwood 9-Hours. It was a chastening experience: “Hawthorn is five seconds a lap faster!” But Mike liked him, coached him, and drank and womanized with him. ‘Fon’s lap times improved.

The British Grand Prix; Silverstone, July 14, 1956. Alfonso de Portago pushing his Ferrari-Lancia around Woodcote Corner to the finish line. (Photo by Klemantaski Collection/Getty Images)
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Getting his Ferrari / Lancia over the line at Silverstone in ’56

At Caracas, Venezuela, he was second behind Fangio. And then, back at Nassau, he won again by way of introducing the first Ferrari 250GT Berlinetta, solidly founding that fantastic bloodline. At winter sports time, de Portago created a Spanish bob team for the Winter Olympics trained by Ed Nelson and missed the two-man bobsleigh bronze by just 0.014sec. In the following Swiss Championships he finished second in the four-man bob, third in the two-man. So he missed the Argentine races in ’56 but was given works-backed drives at Sebring, and in Germany, France, Sweden and Italy. Mid-season, Enzo Ferrari offered him a works F1 ride to keep the team’s spare Lancia-Ferrari D50A in the hunt during the French GP at Reims.

In the British GP he was called in to hand over to Peter Collins, then limped Castellotti’s ruined D50A to the finish. In Germany he was again called in, but didn’t object: “One day someone will be asked to hand over to me”. Ferrari valued the gentlemanly side of ‘Fon’ “which always managed to emerge from the crude appearance he cultivated”.

But he really shone in his 250GT, winning at Oporto and Castelfusano (Rome), then winning the Tour de France, where, navigated by Nelson, he was able to beat Stirling Moss/Houel’s Mercedes SL `Gullwing’ and earn the Ferrari its ‘Tour de France’ title. He won in it again at Montlhery, where two friends, the Swiss Benoit Musy and French veteran Louis Rosier, both crashed fatally. Rosier had asked ‘Fon’ to drive his car, but changed his mind at the last moment. The Marquis took Musy’s Spanish wife to the hospital and what he saw horrified him. He emerged harder, matured, tempered: “Every driver believes it can’t happen to him. Inside I just know that it won’t happen to me.”

His third visit to Nassau then added a second and third to his record, but no victory, then it was back to the Alps for the winter sports season. On the Cresta Run the record from The Stream to the finish had stood for 25 years. ‘Fon’ broke it, then went to Argentina where, with Gonzalez, he shared fifth in the Grand Prix and, with Collins and Castellotti, third in the 1000km.

In February at Havana, Cuba, he led Fangio fair and square in his 860 Monza until a fuel line failed. He hurt himself at St Moritz before the Bobsleigh World Championships, but recovered to share seventh at Sebring with Luigi Musso.

By this time he was an international celebrity, plastered as much across the social columns and tabloid front pages as he was in the sports sections. His marriage failing, he was linked with movie actress Linda Christian, former wife of Tyrone Power. He revelled in his lurid image, declaring: If I’d lived 600 years ago I’d have been killing dragons or helping maidens in distress, but nowadays the only man who can help a maiden in distress is a doctor.”


Spanish aristocrat and racing driver Alfonso de Portago, the Marquis of Portago (1928 - 1957) and his co-driver Edmund Nelson in their Ferrari at Peschiera in Italy during the Italian Mille Miglia road race, 12th May 1957. Shortly after the picture was taken, they were both killed, along with several spectators, when their car crashed into the crowd. (Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

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Portago and Nelson shortly before their fatal crash at the Mille Miglia

He was 28. ‘Ed’ Nelson was 40, and they now prepared to run the trusty 250GT in their first Mille Miglia. But ‘Fon’ bent it in reconnaissance. Ferrari then called him into his office and entrusted him with the most powerful works car he’d ever driven – a 4.1-litre four-cam V12-engined 335S.

He drove it well. He lay fourth at the Rome control, then inherited third. Enzo Ferrari was at the Bologna depot to see his boys blast through: veteran Piero Taruffi (who would win), Wolfgang von Trips second, De Portago/Nelson third, Olivier Gendebien/Jacques Wascher fourth in their special 250GT. Ferrari recalled: “The difficult parts were over, the game was played.”

But ‘Fon’ and his soulmate did not finish. After 975 miles, near Guidizzolo and near maximum speed, their Ferrari’s left-front tyre burst and they died instantly in the ensuing crash which claimed hapless spectators, too. Five of the dead were children. The paparazzi rushed to the scene, and let rip. On May 14 all car and motor-cycle races on public roads were suspended in Italy and the mighty Mille Miglia was dead.

Next day ‘Fon’ de Portago was interred at San Isidoro, Madrid, in the vault of the related Linares family. The vault of the adventurous de Portagos was full.
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... de-portago


Some other photos I have dug out.... this first one just prior to his fatal accident at the 1957 Mille Miglia.
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1956 French Grand Prix. Reims, France. Alfonso de Portago (stream-lined Lancia-Ferrari D50) in the pits


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Le Mans 1956, the Ferrari F625LM "Fon" shared with Duncan Hamilton. He got involved in some one else's accident on lap 2 and the car was a DNF.

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Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
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#1117

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On this day 5 years ago, rising road racing hope Malachi Mitchell-Thomas got killed during the Northwest 200 road races. Malachi had won in the Manx Grand Prix the year before and just had signed a deal with John Burrows' Cookstown Engineering team for TT 2016 when desaster struck at Black Hill.

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#1118

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

Andy wrote: 2 years ago On this day 5 years ago, rising road racing hope Malachi Mitchell-Thomas got killed during the Northwest 200 road races. Malachi had won in the Manx Grand Prix the year before and just had signed a deal with John Burrows' Cookstown Engineering team for TT 2016 when desaster struck at Black Hill.
Wow I remember that clearly (I know because I have a friend called Malachi, and not being a common name....) Time flies, as I thought it was much more recent than that.
RIP Malachi Mitchell-Thomas

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#1119

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On this day 13 years ago, Stephen Robert Dunlop, the wee rab, brother of Joey and dad to Michael as well as the late William, got killed in a freak accident at Mather's Cross, an ultra fast right hand bend in practice to the Northwest 200 road races. The engine of Roberts Honda got stuck and in reaction he tried to pull the clutch but instead hit his modified thumb brake, which he did invent following his heavy 1994 TT accident.
Robert got thrown off at roughly 150 mph and succumbed to his injuries at Coleraine hospital in the process.

I've got a faint memory of this very day. Where I was working at the time, they just had set up a computer for future apprentices and I would use it to watch the live streaming from Norn Iron, as BBC NI provided a stream for either the first or second year. At one point I went for the run home but when I arrived home and had the stream on again the BBC only would show a pic of the Irish Sea and the sun setting. I knew something was wrong and soon would find out. What happened 2 days later though, would go down as one of the greatest moments in motorsports. If it ain't the greatest it is right up there, as Roberts son Michael beat Christian Elkin in a thriller of a 250 race to the line for victory. Even writing this, and therefore remembering that day, it sends chills down my spine.

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Nine and a half years later, I did travel to my 2nd Isle of Man fortnight. My photography was still shite, although a few bright moments appeared. 'Even a blind hen finds a corn sometimes', how I would put it.
The first race day after a week of qualifying was on schedule, featuring the Classic Senior as well as the Classic Lightweight races. That day, my photography took a real step forward and it would start with a pic of Roberts boys on the first lap of the Classic Senior at Keppel Gate.
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Past the Classic Senior there was another qualifying for the Classic Superbike race to be held on Monday. There and then I would manage my very first near mint wheelie shot at Keppel Gate - James Hillier aboard Roberts 1993 Oxford Ducati.
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Ride in peace, Robert & William :rip:
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How the tragedy of Elio de Angelis changed F1

Thirty-five years ago Elio de Angelis lost his life after a fiery accident at Paul Ricard that should have had a less serious outcome – and from which the sport learned valuable lessons.

The death of Elio de Angelis after a crash at Paul Ricard in May 1986 demonstrated that, despite much improved car safety standards, little had changed since Roger Williamson perished in the Dutch GP some 13 years earlier.

But while the Zandvoort tragedy played out on live TV around the world, de Angelis crashed on a Wednesday morning at a quiet test day. That explains why the awful story of the chaotic circumstances that followed the accident received relatively little publicity.

Indeed in the rush to judgement after Imola 1994 many observers referenced the deaths of Gilles Villeneuve and Riccardo Paletti on race weekends in 1982 as the last tragedies that Grand Prix racing had seen, as if an accident in testing was a footnote, and somehow of less significance.

That was an injustice not only to the memory of de Angelis, but also to those who bravely fought to save him on that sad Wednesday morning in France.

A promising rookie

Brought up in a wealthy Roman family, de Angelis first arrived on the F1 scene in 1979 with the Shadow team, shortly before his 21st birthday. He had won the previous year's Monaco F3 event – an achievement regarded at the time as a passport to the top.

"He was a lovely guy," says his Shadow teammate Jan Lammers. "I considered him a gentleman, one of the nicest people in F1. He had an incredible amount of class."

De Angelis concluded his '79 rookie season with a superb drive to fourth in a wet US GP at Watkins Glen. He then joined Lotus for 1980, and impressed with runner-up spot on only his second race with the team in Brazil. He was to learn much as Mario Andretti's understudy.

Forever fighting his image as a rich kid, he soon began to establish a reputation as a quick driver. There were moments of petulance in the early days, but he also won people over with his easygoing charm. He had interests outside racing, and the evenings he enjoyed a cigarette and a glass of whisky.

"He was an extremely talented driver," says former Lotus team manager Peter Collins. "Beautiful style and technique, very safe, and very quick."

"Of all the drivers I worked with he was probably the one I liked the most," recalls Lotus engineer Peter Wright.

In four years at the team alongside Nigel Mansell de Angelis frequently overshadowed the Briton, taking his first victory in Austria in 1982 when he beat Keke Rosberg by a few metres.

Famously earlier that year he'd entertained his peers with his piano playing during the Kyalami drivers' strike.

In 1983 de Angelis took his first pole for the European GP at Brands Hatch, although it was a largely disappointing year with the unreliable new Lotus-Renault combination.

The 1984 season proved to be much better. He took another pole in Brazil and with regular top six finishes he earned third in the World Championship, behind only McLaren drivers Niki Lauda and Alain Prost. He logged four podiums, and comfortable outscored Mansell. Within the Lotus camp he was regarded as team leader.

The challenge of Ayrton Senna

For the 1985 season Mansell was gone, and de Angelis had a new teammate in the form of Ayrton Senna. Inevitably he often struggled to match the mercurial Brazilian's one-lap pace – although he secured a third career pole in Canada, and qualified ahead of the other Lotus at two other races.

He also earned his second Grand Prix win at Imola after Prost was excluded because his McLaren was underweight. Consistent scoring helped him to fifth in the championship, only five points behind Senna.

Approaching 28 and with seven years of F1 experience behind him de Angelis was by now established as one of the leading drivers of the era, someone who could be relied on to bring home points, and who on his day could fight with the best.

In 90 starts with Lotus he had finished in the top six on an impressive 42 occasions – and this at a time when reliability was poor, especially in the turbo days.

However, he felt that the Hethel team had switched most of its attention to his teammate. It was time to move on, so he signed to replace Nelson Piquet at Bernie Ecclestone's Brabham team for 1986, joining his countryman Riccardo Patrese.

A fresh start at Brabham

The late Charlie Whiting, who had moved from his longtime Brabham chief mechanic role to become Patrese's race engineer, recalled that the newcomer fitted in well.

"He hadn't been there long, but Elio was very much liked in the team," Whiting told me in 2014. "He was a lovely guy, and got on well with everybody. He was always a pleasure to talk to, and was generally a very nice chap. But the BT55 was a huge disappointment."

Gordon Murray's new car, with its distinctive low-line look and awkward cockpit position, promised much – but the reality proved to be disappointing.

"It should have been brilliant," former Brabham team manager Herbie Blash recalls today.

"I do remember sitting in the pub with Bernie, Gordon, Elio and Riccardo. We were going to toss a coin as to who was going to win the first race, we were that confident. We were just going to walk it with this one…"

Even Brabham veteran Patrese couldn't do much with the difficult car, and after finishing eighth in Brazil de Angelis suffered three successive mechanical retirements.

In the previous two seasons he'd started in the top 10 at nearly every race – his best grid position in those four Brabham outings was 14th.

After a frustrating weekend in Monaco the team went straight to the official pre-French GP test at Paul Ricard. Only recently had the race been switched from its originally scheduled venue at Dijon.

May 14th 1986 – a needless waste

On the second morning de Angelis was the only driver on the track when he suffered a rear wing failure at the high speed S-bend after the pit straight – later a detached endplate was found on the track at the point where he first lost control.

"It was the almost flat, but not quite flat, series of kinks after the pits," Gordon Murray told me 10 years after that bleak day. "We had a huge off before there with Francois Hesnault. And Elio had exactly the same shunt at exactly the same place."

This being a test day, nobody witnessed the whole incident, although two Benetton mechanics manning a speed trap caught the final stages.

The car became airborne and then flipped into a series of rolls that pitched it over the guardrail, before it eventually came to rest inverted. The survival cell was intact, but the rollhoop atop the fuel tank had been damaged as the car bounced over the barrier, and fuel was leaking out. De Angelis himself had suffered only a broken collarbone.

Whiting, who didn't attend the test, recounted the story: "Despite the high-speed nature of the accident, and its severity – he went end over end and over the barrier and landed upside down – he was almost uninjured.

"Fuel tanks and breather systems and those sorts of things weren't nearly as good as they are these days. Fuel got out and presumably ignited on some of the very many hot bits that there were on turbo engines in those days.

"There were only four gallons of fuel in the car, which by some standards was very little. You know what sort of fire you can get with even just that amount of fuel."

Alan Jones, on his way out of the pitlane to start a run, was the first driver on the scene, and he immediately parked and ran across. Alain Prost, who was following the Beatrice Haas, also stopped.

Initially there was only some smoke. With little official help – Jones said later that he was joined by two marshals wearing shorts "who just didn't have a clue" – attempts to turn the car over proved fruitless.

Gradually a fire took hold. Meanwhile crew members from Brabham and other teams began to arrive from the pits. It was all too apparent that, this being a test day, there was insufficient safety cover – there was no Prof Sid Watkins, no fire vehicle and, it soon emerged, no helicopter.

"My guys shot down in a hire car," Murray recalled. "The main problem was not being able to turn it over. Because he was not badly injured he could have been pulled out pretty quickly, had the fire been kept down a bit.

"I arrived much later than the mechanics., and we couldn't get near the car because of the fire. When the fire truck did eventually arrive, which was miles too late, the hose blew off. It was pretty needless, that's the terrible thing."

There was a lot of confusion at the scene, and reports suggest that some of those present believed that de Angelis was already beyond saving, and that there was nothing they could do.

Drivers began to walk away, leaving guys in shirtsleeves to try to right the car. The fire kept flaring up, fed by the leaking fuel.

When recalling that day some years later Tyler Alexander, then part of the Beatrice team's management, made clear his feeling of helplessness.

"There was a big pall of black smoke," he told me. "Nobody seemed to be doing anything, so we grabbed a couple of extinguishers in the pits, and drove down there.

"A couple of drivers were walking back. They had walked away, because it was quite a big fire. But the fire was in the back of the car.

"Robin Day [of Brabham], John Barnard and I tipped the car back over. I almost got poked in the eye with a bit of the suspension, I got a black eye, and we were all covered with that goddamn powder. And Elio was just sitting in the car."

"I just remember standing there watching the car go up in flames," former McLaren designer Barnard recalls today. "I did help to turn the car over after the fire was out, but there still wasn't anyone there to help Elio, like a doctor or medic of any sort.

"Once we got the car to tipping point it went down with a bang, which wouldn't have done poor Elio's neck much good.

"When I think back to those days and ponder on how little safety requirement there was for testing I wonder we didn't have more horrors like that day. There is nothing I can add except that it was the worst scene I have ever witnessed. I've tried to block it out."

Video footage shows some very brave men in normal clothing standing close to and even on the Brabham, despite the very obvious risk that the fire could take hold once more.

Eventually de Angelis was removed from the car. He'd been starved of oxygen by the flames, and it was discovered that he had no heartbeat.

"We took his helmet off, and we really weren't sure of his condition," said Alexander. "Here was this guy with absolutely nothing wrong with him as far as we could see – there was no blood, nothing.

"There was a young medical guy there with us, who didn't speak English, and in the end he got out a big syringe and stuck it in his chest.

"Eventually a helicopter came, with some paramedics. They checked his pulse and stuff, and the line was moving. We carried the stretcher over to the helicopter."

Having been resuscitated, de Angelis was transferred to the same hospital and seen by the same doctors who had treated Frank Williams after his road accident just a few months earlier.

Brabham team manager Blash was back at base in Chessington, but he soon received a call from his crew. He hurriedly booked a flight and flew straight to Marseilles.

"I was going through the airport and the first person I saw was Nigel Mansell," he recalls. "He looked at me, tears were in his eyes, and he just said to me, 'It's bad.' I jumped in a hire car went over to Ricard. Then I stayed at the hospital until the end."

The rescue had come too late for de Angelis, and he died the following day in hospital, a victim of asphyxiation.

The lessons learned

Had the car been righted, and the fire put out quickly, there's little doubt that the outcome could have been different.

In the aftermath of the crash there much talk about safety standards, especially at testing. The lack of an official requirement to always have a helicopter on site suddenly seemed like a tragic oversight.

However as is so often the case, the momentum for change faded over the years. It was only after Imola 1994 and on Max Mosley's watch that it was rebooted. The FIA developed a laser sharp safety focus, one that continues to this day.

Along with Sid Watkins, Whiting played a key role in that process. He left Brabham for a technical role at the FIA a couple of years after the accident, and while his remit didn't expand to include safety matters until several years later, he would never forget the circumstances that surrounded the de Angelis accident.

The tragedy was a bitter blow too for Brabham owner Ecclestone, who had previously lost his close friends Stuart Lewis-Evans in 1958, and Jochen Rindt in 1970.

"It wasn't good obviously," he recalled. "Elio was a super guy, and he was very quick. Losing people that you are friends with is never nice. I was closer with Jochen than anybody. Thank God these things don't happen anymore."

Indeed the legacy of Elio de Angelis is that the sport became safer.

"These days people get annoyed because the helicopter hasn't arrived for testing, whatever the reason, and nothing can start without it," says Barnard. "They need to see what happened that day. Then they wouldn't get annoyed."
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/how- ... 1/4792608/
Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
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#1121

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Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
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#1122

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

erwin greven wrote: 2 years ago
If anyone is interested or not seen it, I wrote more of Villoresi in this thread regarding another "On this day" event a couple of weeks ago, here:

http://www.the-fastlane.co.uk/forums/vi ... 80#p402780

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Location: Just moved 3 klms further away so now 11 klms from Albert Park, Melbourne.

#1123

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this day 16th May 1976

Niki Lauda led Clay Regazzoni home for a 1-2 at the Belgian Grand Prix on this day in 1976.

A masterclass by both the Austrian and Scuderia as a whole, it was one of their most dominant performances from that era.

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Niki Lauda claimed a third win of 1976 at Zolder

Here is the race report from that day, written by Denis Jenkinson of Motorsport Magazine, from their archive..
It is interesting how time heals and you can get used to anything, for the Belgian Grand Prix was making its third visit to the little Zolder circuit in the Province of Limburg, yet it was only in 1973 that everyone stormed off from the circuit hoping never to return. The following year the “circus” settled happily at Nivelles-Baulers, but that great edifice subsided in financial ruin and a return was made to Zolder. Second time round everything was much better and all went well, so that everyone was happy to return to the little track once more, even though it resembles a Go-Kart circuit for 500 b.h.p. Formula One cars, in contrast to somewhere like Nürburgring or Monza. Its stop-startstop characteristics are very hard on brakes, even though there is no really heavy braking from ultra-high speed. It is not so much that there is anything particularly wrong with Zolder, it is just that there is not very much right with it, from the point of view of Grand Prix racing. For Formula One entertainment it is adequate and about all that some drivers and cars deserve, and if they do not know any better it is their loss, but there are better places for Grand Prix cars to run and for Grand Prix drivers to show their skill and ability. It is not the sort of place to set the adrenalin flowing in driver or spectator, but as it was warm and sunny it was enjoyable.

Qualifying
Some of the teams had already been “testing” at Zolder, while others were new to the place but it did not take long for everyone to get into the swing of things and the “roundy-round” of practice, though some did not go for very long. Lauda’s T2 Ferrari swallowed part of its injection system so he spent the rest of the day driving the uprated T1 car and similarly, Tom Pryce spent most of the day in the spare Shadow after his Cosworth engine broke in his normal car. With repositioned oil coolers on his McLaren, Jochen Mass was being troubled by overheating and Watson had the second Penske, with “chisel” nose cowling, die on him with fuel-feed trouble, so he continued in the spare older car with March-like front cowling. The Fittipaldi team had not really recovered from their Spanish debacle and a shortage of spare engines meant they could only run one car for Emerson Fittipaldi, keeping Hoffman’s car as a stand-by. The Ligier-Matra was going well and Laffite was on good form, while Hunt was out to make amends for his Spanish disqualification and was setting the pace, ending the morning session in a class of his own with a time of 1 min. 26.74 sec., no-one else being in the one-twenty-six bracket. The two six-wheeled Tyrrell cars were demonstrating that the idea was serious, Scheckter getting into the feel of the car very quickly and with Depailler one-hundredth of a second behind him he was third fastest of the morning session, behind Regazzoni who was upholding the Ferrari honours while his team-mate was in trouble. The Brabham team were experimenting with different types of air box, without making much apparent improvement, but Amon, running the new Ensign without an air box, was up among the front-runners.

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Clay Regazzoni put his Ferrari second behind team-mate Lauda on the grid


A break after the morning hour-and-a-half of practice was very welcome on this busy little circuit with its overcrowded and cramped pit area, and during the hour of afternoon practice a pattern began to appear that surprised no-one, though it upset some who had hoped to change the pattern. Regazzoni led the Ferrari onslaught, closely followed by Lauda still in the spare car, but Depailler and Brambilla joined them in the elite 1min 26sec group. Hunt was in trouble with gear selection on his Hewland/McLaren sixspeed gearbox and did hardly any laps at all and could not repeat his morning performance, while the overheating and oil cooler troubles on Mass’ car kept him in the pits for most of the time. The leading group of pacesetters was clearly moving into a class of its own, while the hard-triers were in the onetwenty-seven bracket. There were some hopefuls in the one-twenty-eights, a lot of medium runners in the one-twenty-nines and one minute thirty seconds or over had to be for the “no-hopers”, especially as the starting grid was limited to 26 cars and there were 29 drivers practicing. Down in this bottom group was Gunnar Nilsson for no clearly definable reason other than minor irritating troubles with the Lotus and an inability to get into the rhythm of the circuit.

Next day, Saturday, it all started up again for an-hour-and-a-half in the morning and with a new engine in his T2 Ferrari Lauda got himself up to the front. This was an untimed session, principally for scrubbing in tyres ready for race day and doing suspension adjustments for running with full fuel loads and generally getting prepared for starting the race in the right conditions. On the previous day Pace had crashed the Brabham-Alfa Romeo BT45/3 and crumpled the monocoque against the catch-fence posts, so he was settling into the spare car. Hunt was having a bit of a go to make up for lost time and found the absolute limit on one of the right-hand bends as he spun backwards off the track and into the catch fences. He was unhurt and not even shaken, knowing full well why it had happened, and was soon out again in the spare McLaren, which was not really race-worthy as it had been robbed of various bits for Mass’ car.

In the final hour of practice, on Saturday afternoon, there was a bit of a mad scramble, with little hope of anyone getting a clear run, for those near the front were hoping to oust the Ferraris from the front of the grid, those at the back were trying desperately not to be the last three, and those in the middle were trying not to get left behind by the leaders or caught up with by the tail-enders. From a combination of overcrowding, limited-time panics, various troubles and a continual use of the track (for when the F1 cars were not out hordes of Renault R5 saloons and Renault-engined single-seaters were practising or racing) the overall pace was getting slower, even though weather conditions were getting better all the time. Consequently, Lauda was the only one to do an “elite” time and poor Hunt could do nothing to challenge him because the engine in the spare McLaren refused to rev over 10,000 r.p.m. and was troublesome to start. It was the one he used to finish first in Spain and it was doing service as an emergency spare before its next overhaul.

Race

ImageThe cars head into Turn 1

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When the whirling-round eventually subsided and the timekeepers sorted out all their facts and figures Lauda and Regazzoni were on the front row of the grid, with the World Champion in pole position, and Hunt and Depailler were behind them. Hunt’s original car M23/8 was slightly crinkled so M23/6 was given a new engine and prepared for the race, taking its place on the second row thanks to the time recorded by M23/8. The hard-trying Depailler was alongside with the six-wheeled Tyrrell P34/2 and in row three were Laffite with the Ligier-Matra V12 and Brambilla with the orange March. It was beginning to look as if the “orthodox British kit-car” was finished and if you did not have 12 cylinders then you needed an innovation to add to your Cosworth/ Hewland kit-car to make it competitive, such as six wheels or six speeds in the gearbox (or you needed a hard-charger in the cockpit!). Ecclestone’s Brabham team were giving the others encouragement by showing that even with 12 cylinders you could not guarantee to be competitive. On the fourth row of the grid was Amon with the neat and unobtrusive Ensign, illustrating perhaps that if all the factors are above average, with no weak points and, equally, no strong points., you can be well placed without too much drama or expense. In contrast the Walter Wolf-financed Williams team were showing that sheer expense was no short cut to success, for they scraped one car on to the last row of the grid, driven by Leclerc, while Ickx did not qualify. A very dejected Emerson Fittipaldi was also o nonqualifier which was a surprise, unless you had noticed the way the car had been handling during practice, for it never Seemed to go where the driver wanted it to go or even thought it was going to go. The other nonqualifier was Guy Edwards with the Rent-a-Drive Hesketh, but that was no surprise to anyone, except perhaps the people who had paid for the car.

The race was not due to start until 3 p.m. on Sunday so a quick 20-minute whizz-round in the morning gave everyone time for lunch before the serious business began. Behind the main grandstands some 70 road-going Ferraris were arriving, from a Ferrari Clubs gathering, all the owners smiling happily when they saw the starting order for the race with Lauda and Regazzoni on the front row. An equally large number of “First National City Bank Travellers Cheques” guests were also arriving and the Penske team were relieved that their car was on the grid, even it if was difficult to pick out down in row nine. The Brazilian media men were sitting around gloomily, wondering how they were going to explain the demise of the Copersucar-backed ex-World Champion, who had packed up and gone home in despair. Jacky Ickx was in the paddock trying to keep a brave face in front of newshounds who could not understand why he was not in his own National Grand Prix and as 3 p.m. approached the skies were clear, a breeze was blowing as a headwind on the pits straight and all was set for a great race, providing you were a Ferrari enthusiast. The distance was 70 laps, which sounded a lot, but in fact would only represent 1 1/2 hours of racing, and well on schedule Lauda and Regazzoni led the field forward to the grid. The starter waited for the tail-enders to sort themselves out and then pressed his button! A rather undramatic set of red lights glowed on the bridge ahead of the start-line and after ten seconds they disappeared and a green set glowed and Lauda was gone. Hunt made a good start from the second row and was alongside Regazzoni as they raced for the first corner, which Hunt took from the inside and was into second place behind the World Champion. All 26 cars got away well and strung out round the big loop before reappearing up the back straight in the order Lauda, Hunt, Regazzoni, Laffite, Brambilla, Depailler, Amon with a jostling crowd behind them.

To the joy of the Ferrari enthusiasts Niki Lauda waited for no-one and before the dust of the start had settled he was already pulling out a visible lead. From his pole position he had only one objective-and that was to win the race, for himself and for “the Ferrari”, which means Enzo Ferrari, Mauro Forghieri, his chief mechanic Ermano Cuoghi, all the team members at the race and all those people back in Maranello who keep the team ping. As he drew steadily away driving smoothly and without flurry one was reminded of the great Ferrari era of Alberto Ascari, the opposition just melted away in his rear-view mirrors. If anyone was thinking that Lauda was unfit and would not stand the pace, they would have to think again. Uncomfortable he may still be, but not unfit, physically or mentally. Behind him Hunt was doing a good job leading Regazzoni in the second Ferrari, Laffite in the screaming Ligier-Matra, Depailler in a sixwheeled Tyrrell, Scheckter in a similar car. Amon in the works Ensign, the two Brabham-Alfas of Pace and Reutemann, then Peterson in the blue and yellow March, the black Shadow of Janet, the black and gold Lotus of Andretti, the white March of Stuck and the orange one of Brambilla. The Italian had been in fifth place in the opening rush but he got all crossed-up on lap 4 and dropped back to fourteenth place. Two-and-a-half laps later a rear hub shaft sheared as he was going into the chicane behind the paddock and he was off the track in a cloud of sand and out of the race. A short while later Nilsson stopped just before the pits with his throttle slides jammed shut with dirt after an excursion into the rough stuff, unfortunately parking the car on the opposite side of the track from any possible help from his mechanics. Just as this was happening Regazzoni decided he ought to support the flying Lauda, and took second place from Hunt and that was the end of anyone else getting a look in, the two Ferraris powered away into an unassailable lead.

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Jody Scheckter finished 4th in his six-wheeler Tyrrell

Hunt’s car was nothing like on form and he was having trouble keeping ahead of Depailler who had got past the Ligier. At 10 laps the order was Lauda, Regazzoni, Hunt, Depailler, Laffite, Scheckter and Amon, the queue for third place being nose-to-tail behind the McLaren. Then came Andretti, having passed Peterson, Reutemann and Pace and moving up into this group were Alan Jones and Jochen Mass. The Lotus disappeared into the pits five laps later with dust and dirt in the fuel injection and two laps later Reutemann’s Alfa Romeo engine lost all its oil pressure and as he slowed violently Peterson dodged to the wrong side and found himself having a private accident among the catch-fences! It was March A-team two down and the B-team with one to go, as Merzario was on his way out with a sick engine. Laffite forced his way by Hunt on lap 17 and collected a big black tyre mark on the right of the Ligier cockpit from the McLaren’s front wheel, for Hunt was not going to let “a frog” go by that easily, but on the next lap Depailler got his six-wheeler past the McLaren. We now had a flat-12-cylinder Italian car in the lead, another in second place, a V12-cylinder French car in third place and a six-wheeled British car in fourth place. and people think all Formula One cars are the same!

As Depailler went by the pits to start lap 29 his engine made an awful noise and that was the last we saw of him, the Cosworth V8 rout was complete. The two Ferraris and the LigierMatra sang their 12-cylindered way round the circuit, reeling off the laps with complete reliability, while behind them the British cars fell apart or failed to keep up. Hunt’s gearbox was losing oil and it was only a matter of’ time before his race was over, Scheckter’s rear suspension had a broken link-mounting due to a blow “from a kerb that stepped out” or a passing car, and Amon was in a worthy fifth place with the Ensign until the left-rear wheel came adrift on lap 52 and he crashed spectacularly but the strong roll-over bar saved him from serious injury. Andretti rejoined the race for a while, until a drive-shaft joint broke up, Stuck went out with damaged rear suspension, and Ertl’s Cosworth engine broke in the white Hesketh. Pace’s Alfa Romeo engine died on him with electrical failure as he passed the pits, and Lunger’s Surtees set itself on fire when the ignition rotor broke up and ignited a fuel leak in the injection system. All this time Jones had been circulating regularly, and moved up into fifth place, Mass had worked his way up into sixth and Perkins had battled his way past both the Shadows to take eighth place behind Watson.

Niki Lauda celebrate son the podium after winning the 1976 Belgian Grand Prix.
https://motorsport-magazine.s3.eu-west- ... um.jpg[img][/img]


Although the gaps between the first three cars varied now and then due to back-markers holding things up as they were lapped, the three 12-cylinder cars never missed a beat and had the race been another couple of laps longer the CosworthKit-Car annihilation would have been complete, for Lauda would have lapped Scheckter’s Tyrrell, which crossed the line to all intents and purposes a lap in arrears on the Ferraris, its pace slowed by the excessive lean-in of the right rear wheel. Scheckter had done well to finish.

A lot of Ferrari enthusiasts left the Zolder circuit with smug looks on their faces, as well they might, and there was great rejoicing in Modena.—D.S.J.
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... ts-delight







It was also the race where Niki offered James the opportunity to try on the Ferrari on for size in the paddock! :haha:

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Michkov
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#1124

Post by Michkov »

Never noticed the gearshift bubble in the Ferraris airbox
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Everso Biggyballies
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Location: Just moved 3 klms further away so now 11 klms from Albert Park, Melbourne.

#1125

Post by Everso Biggyballies »


* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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#1126

Post by erwin greven »

Brian Redman: "Mr. Fangio, how do you come so fast?" "More throttle, less brakes...."
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