Écurie HOBA

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The Écurie HOBA was a short-lived Swiss motorsport team that took part in formula and sports car races in the early 1960s. The racing team was organized by the future car manufacturer Peter Monteverdi , who also competed as a racing driver for the team.

Company history

Organizer and driver of the team: Peter Monteverdi (bust in an automobile museum in Binningen)

Born in 1934, Peter Monteverdi had been running an automobile workshop in the Swiss city of Binningen since 1954 and was a concessionaire for Ferrari branded street sports cars . In his spare time, Monteverdi took part in over 80 automobile races. These were mainly hill climbs , but occasionally he also competed in round and long-distance races such as the 1000 km race on the Nürburgring in 1959 .

After a private Formula 1 test in a Maserati 250F in January 1959 was unsuccessful, Monteverdi initially turned his interest to Formula 2 . When a used Lotus racing car was offered for sale in Lörrach in spring 1959 , the opportunity arose to enter international formula racing.

Peter Monteverdi then founded the Ecurie HOBA racing team together with the Swiss businessman Alfred Hopf, a customer of his automobile dealership. The team name was an acronym from the first two letters of Hopf's last name and those of the canton of Basel ( HO pf BA sel). Hopf financed the purchase of the Lotus and was supposed to pay for the transport and accommodation costs during the race weekends, while Monteverdi acted as a racing driver and was supposed to maintain the vehicle with the mechanics of his Binningen company.

The Formula 2 project failed early. After only one race, HOBA gave up participation in this racing series. Instead, the team turned to Formula Junior in 1960 . Here Peter Monteverdi competed with self-designed racing cars from the MBM brand . After individual successes, Monteverdi developed a Formula 1 vehicle for the 1961 season which, with the participation of the HOBA team, was launched in some races outside the Formula 1 World Championship. HOBA finally stopped racing after Peter Monteverdi had a serious accident at the Hockenheimring .

Races

Formula 2

The core of HOBA's Formula 2 program was the Lotus 12 , which Hopf and Monteverdi bought as a used vehicle in the spring of 1959. It was the one that the Swiss racing driver Charles Vögele had used in a number of hill climbs in 1958. It was equipped with a 1.1 liter four-cylinder Coventry Climax engine. After the takeover, Peter Monteverdi overhauled the engine in his workshop and replaced the standard body of the Lotus with a self-designed aluminum structure, the style of which was based on that of the Maserati 250F, which Monteverdi greatly appreciated. Peter Monteverdi was quoted as saying: “ This is what a monoposto should look like!” Monteverdi also redesigned the exhaust.

After the team had carried out private test drives in Monza , HOBA registered the Lotus 12-Climax for the airfield race in Zeltweg , Austria , which took place on August 23, 1959. Here the Lotus suffered from engine problems throughout the weekend. During training, the performance of the engine, which was revised by Monteverdi himself, did not come close to the level of the Climax engines that had been prepared in the factory. Peter Monteverdi retired early in the race after his car sustained an engine failure on lap 47.

Team owner Hopf, who had hoped for a better result, was not prepared to invest additional funds in what he believed to be a futile further development of the Lotus, and immediately ended his team's Formula 2 involvement.

Formula Junior

MBM Type B for Formula Junior in the livery of the HOBA team

Instead of using a vehicle from an established manufacturer, Peter Monteverdi designed his own Formula Junior racing car for HOBA. The first vehicle was given the project name Bamosa for Ba rarely Mo nteverdi- Sa uter and was a reference to the temporary participation of the Swiss racecar constructors Sauter , who retired but early because he considered the technical solutions for Monteverdi's not competitive. The other vehicles were given the designation MBM (Monteverdi-Basel-Mantzel), which referred to the engine tuner Mantzel.

In the literature, Monteverdi's first formula junior car, the Type A, is described as very simple ("very poor"). The debut was followed by a type B, which was technically improved in details. Monteverdi used various high-volume components: the front suspension, for example, was taken over by Volkswagen , the steering came from a Renault 4CV . The cars were regularly powered by a two-stroke three-cylinder engine from DKW , which was installed in a mid- engine position and which the German tuner Mantzel had revised. Depending on the source, the engine developed 85, 95 or 110 hp.

In the 1960 season, the HOBA team entered nine continental European Formula Junior races with the MBM Type B. The driver was always Peter Monteverdi. In his racing debut at the Autodrome de Linas-Montlhéry , Monteverdi was ranked twelfth. At the traditional Grand Prix of Monaco, which was also held for Formula Junior, Monteverdi, on the other hand, missed the qualification as well as the Gran Prix du Midi-Pyrénées in Albi . The HOBA team achieved their best result in August 1960 at the Schauinsland race , which Peter Monteverdi finished third. He finished fifth at the Lotteria di Monza Grand Prix, and at the International Eifel Race on the Nürburgring's south loop , Monteverdi finished seventh.

At the end of 1960, Monteverdi tried to equip a further developed Formula Junior racing car (Type C) with a four-stroke engine from the Ford Anglia . Allegedly three vehicles were sold in this configuration; however, Ecurie HOBA did not use a vehicle with this specification. Another evolution called Type D came about in 1961.

In 1961 Peter Monteverdi only drove a few Formula Junior races for HOBA. In the 1980 biography of his company Automobile Monteverdi it is claimed that Peter Monteverdi finished eighth in the 1961 Monaco Grand Prix in the D-Type; in other statistics, however, he is listed as a non-participant (“DNA” = did not arrive). In addition, Heini Walter occasionally drove for HOBA in Formula Junior. However, following the interests of Peter Monteverdi, the team turned to Formula 1 this year.

formula 1

MBM racing car for the Formula 1 commitment of Écurie HOBA

In the course of 1961, MBM developed a racing car based on Formula 1 configuration; the vehicle was referred to as MBM Formula 1 without any further addition . It was powered by a 1.5 liter four-cylinder engine from Porsche and remained a one-off.

HOBA took over the vehicle and registered it for Peter Monteverdi for the Solitude Grand Prix , a car race near Stuttgart that was advertised for Formula 1 vehicles for the first time this year, but was not a race in the Formula 1 World Championship. Monteverdi qualified for last place on the grid. In the race he only got two laps, then he had to retire with engine problems. Some sources claim that HOBA registered Monteverdi for the 1961 German Grand Prix ; however, the team does not appear in the final entry list.

The car last appeared at the ASC circuit race on October 1, 1961, which was held at the Hockenheimring . Here Monteverdi had a serious accident. The car was damaged beyond repair. Monteverdi later made a replica for his automobile museum.

After the recovery, Monteverdi gave up active racing and parted ways with HOBA. The Swiss team gave up racing a little later.

literature

  • Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 82.
  • David Hodges: Racing cars from AZ after 1993 . Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 .
  • Mike Lawrence: Grand Prix Cars 1945-65 . Motor Racing Publications (London) 1998. ISBN 1-899-87039-3

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The team name was written in capital letters, s. Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 82 ff.
  2. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 82.
  3. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 84.
  4. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 83.
  5. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 86.
  6. ^ A b Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 93.
  7. ↑ Statistics from the Zeltweg airfield race in 1959 on the website www.formula2.net (accessed on February 21, 2014).
  8. ↑ a b Mike Lawrence: Grand Prix Cars 1945–64, p. 199.
  9. ↑ a b c David Hodges: Racing cars from AZ after 1945, p. 179.
  10. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 98.
  11. ↑ Statistics of the Freiburg-Schauinsland mountain record race in 1960 on the website www.formula2.net (accessed on February 21, 2014).
  12. ↑ Statistics of the Gran Premio del Lotteria di Monza 1960 on the website www.formula2.net (accessed on February 21, 2014).
  13. ↑ Statistics of the International Eifel Race 1960 on the website www.formula2.net (accessed on February 21, 2014).
  14. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 111.
  15. ^ Roger Gloor, CL Wagner: Monteverdi. The career of a Swiss car brand , self-published by Monteverdi Automobile, p. 115.
  16. ↑ Statistics of the Grand Prix de Monaco 1961 - Formule Junior on the website www.formula2.net (accessed on February 22, 2014).
  17. ↑ Brief description of the racing activities in 1960 and 1961 on the website www.heiniwalter.ch (accessed on February 22, 2014).
  18. ↑ Entry list for the German Grand Prix on the website www.motorsport-total.com (accessed on February 21, 2014).