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Francois Cevert at the 1973 French Grand Prix. (
Image source: The Cahier Archive; grandprix.com)
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Although this milestone has nagged at me for
awhile, (for reasons unknown) nevertheless I missed posting upon the 40th
Anniversary of his most unfortunate death, when sadly Francois Cevert was
rudely taken from us upon his horrific shunt at Watkins Glen during practice
for that year's Formula 1 race at the Glen...
VIDEO: Cevert's crash
Yet I must confess I know very little about
this aspiring Formula 1 driver sadly cut short of his impending promise at the
tender age of 29. As I was unaware that his father Charles Goldenberg (and parents) had
fled Russia to escape persecution of the Jews (prior to the Holocaust) settling
in Paris and then marrying Huguette
Cevert. Yet with Hitler's unquenched penance for
the extinction of Jews, naturally the couple gave their three children their
mother's name to help escape persecution by the German's upon occupying France...
thus, Albert François Cevert Goldenberg
was born on February 25, 1944 and interestingly his elder sister Jacqueline became
romantically involved with a man named Jean-Pierre Beltoise, an aspiring French
racing driver of his own right who'd ultimately succeed to the very top level
of motorsport, i.e.; Formula 1. As Francois's sister's husband Jean-Pierre ultimately
was responsible for inspiring the younger Cevert to become intrigued in motor
racing, while ironically Beltoise
would precede the younger Francois as Jackie Stewart's
teammate at Matra in 1969 before turning to Sports Cars, with Beltoise's crowning
moment coming in 1972 upon winning the Monaco Grand Prix, ultimately BRM's
final glory in Formula 1.
Cevert began racing Scooters on the streets
and then racing karts in his teens before completing his mandatory military
service. Francois got serious about his racing in '66 and entered the Volant Shel competition
where he beat another future French F1 star named Patrick Depailler
with the prize being a fully sponsored season in French Formula 3 in an
Alpine-Renault.
Approached about a factory drive at the end
of his first season in single seaters, Francois declined and took up refuge
with rival manufacturer Tecno instead, winning the French F3 title in 1968.
Next the upcoming racer made his debut in
Formula 2, also with Tecno, winning at Reims later that season before making
the leap to the B-I-G CARZ in the summer of '69, making his F1 debut at Nurburgring
in the F2 class of that year's German Grand Prix.
Cevert raced Matra Sports Cars with Tecno in
1970 before Johnny Servoz-Gavin's
unexpected retirement from Tyrrell and "Uncle Chopper" (Ken Tyrrell)
promptly inserted Francois into the deserted F1 seatt alongside de facto team
leader Sir Jackie, also known as JYS or soon to be double world champion Jackie
Stewart. And the rest as they say is history!
The promising Frenchman made his Formula 1
debut in that year's Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort, retiring with engine
failure while his brother-in-law Beltoise finished fifth for Matra.
He followed up his promising beginnings by
following Stewart home to give Tyrrell a 1-2 in the French Grand Prix and then
won his lone F1 race ironically at Watkins Glen in October, 1971 two years
prior to his unexpected death, as Cevert was being groomed to replace Jackie as
team leader in 1974 and in-turn, another future F1 world champion named Jody
Scheckter would inherit the French driver's vacated seat the following year
instead...
And why am I so intrigued by Cevert's death
and perhaps, not Depailler's,
who after all had a superior career statistically over Cevert, winning twice as
many races, including the prestigious Monaco Grand Prix to François's sole
victory? Uhm? I'm guessing perhaps because I find Cevert more flamboyant? As Depailler''s claim to
fame for Mwah is simply being the pilot of one of those striking Tyrrell P-34
Six-wheelers...
VIDEO: Cevert interview
And it's also funny how much I'd surmise that
one of Formula 1's cleverest, or diabolical? Racing drivers final world
championship's anniversary is being overlooked this year, undoubtedly
overshadowed by another nebulous character known here at No Fenders as
"TWINKIEBOY!" As ironically exactly 20yrs after "the
Professor" (Alain Prost) secured his fourth title for Williams-Renault, as
le 'Reggie (Renault) desperately wanted a French world champion... Seb' Vettel
was equaling Prost's tally for driver's crowns propelled by a Renault lump,
albeit missing two cylinders and being of smaller displacement, while Vettel's teammate
Mark Webber secured the record for
most poles for Renault at Japan with a staggering tally of 209! (To which
Vettel has since added onto...)
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| The Veyron's predecessor, the Bugatti EB110. (Image source: farm8.staticflickr.com) |
Meanwhile two other long forgotten French
racing drivers name remain a complete mystery to Mwah, having never heard of
either until earlier this year when snooping around Zed Internetz in pursuit of
more info upon where the Veyron Supercar name came from - after reading about
the rarest of rare special edition models, the Wimille edition Veyron, of which just three
examples were produced!
Jean-Pierre
Wimille ultimately made his name by winning le 24 Heurs
du Mans twice in the mid-1930's - appropriately winning aboard bugatti's with
some chap named Veyron.
Yet Wimille, who was born in 1908 actually began
his fame as a racing driver by winning various single seater Grand Prix races,
before the modern Formula 1 championship was even envisioned...
Reportedly Wimille caught the motor racing bug from his Papa who was the
Motoring correspondent for the French Newspaper Petit Parisien, as Jean-Pierre made his Grand Prix debut at the tender age
of 22 in the 1930 French Grand Prix held
at Pau.
His first noteworthy victory came two years later in a Hillclimb, followed by wins in the Grand Prix de Loraine and Grand Prix Doran. In 1934 he won the Algerian Grand Prix and then a further two years on, he was victorious in his home race, the French Grand Prix along with the tragedy marred Deauville Grand Prix - all of his victories in Bugatti's naturally, before capturing France's most prestigious endurance race twice - winning le 24 Heurs du Mans in 1937 with co-driver Robert Benoist and 1939, the latter co-driving with Pierre Veyron.
Interestingly,
Wimille joined England's Special Operations Executive (SOE) which aided the French
resistance during World War II along with fellow Grand Prix aces Robert Benoist (the
same driver he'd won his first Le Mans race with) and William Grover-Williams; all three being Grand Prix winners.
Sadly,
Wimille would be the only one of this trio to survive, the other two being executed
at the behest of the Gestapo in Concentration Camps towards the end of the
war...
Hmm? Perhaps
these Gran Primo Piloto's were the inspiration to Grizzled Journo' Joe Saward's
masterful book titled; The Grand Prix Saboteurs - of which I haven't obtained my copy of
yet, albeit perhaps after I finally finish labourisly reading my current tome
of fascination: the Life of Senna...
After
the war Wimille resumed motor racing as Alfa Romeo's No. 1 driver, winning
multiple races between 1946-48, including his second French Grand Prix before
dying behind the wheel of a Simca-Gordini during practice for the 1949 Buenos
Aires GP, while prior to his death he built a small production run of his own
automobiles appropriately named Wimille's...
And I suppose it makes sense that Monsir Pierre Veyron's last name was appropriately chosen for the world's fastest production Supercar, eh? After all Pierre was the handpicked test driver for the original Bugatti concern no less than by company founder Ettore's son Gene.
Veyron
scored success by winning the 1930 Geneva GP before catching the eye of the Bugatti's, becoming the marque's development
engineer and winning many races for the firm including the Berlin AVUS races
in1933-34, with his crowning glory being victorious in the 1939 Le Mans classic
endurance race just prior to the invasion of Poland that September, the
beginning of World War II.
and
like his co-driver Wimille, Pierre also fought in the French Resistance and was
subsequently awarded the Legion of Honour in 1945, before retiring from racing
in 1953 to focus upon his family and oil drilling business before passing away
in 1970...