Andrea Sassetti

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Andrea Sassetti (born February 14, 1960 in Monte San Pietrangeli , Marche , Italy ) is an Italian entrepreneur who was temporarily active in the fashion industry. Sassetti achieved international fame in 1992 through the Formula 1 racing team, Andrea Moda Formula , which he directed , whose use was associated with scandals and a lack of sporting success.

Entrepreneurial activity

There are different details about Sassetti's biography. According to one source, Sassetti had made his fortune by winning a large poker game . According to other information, he is related to Silvano Sassetti, the founder of the eponymous manufacturer of high-priced women's and men's shoes based in Monte San Pietrangeli. Still others suspect that Sassetti was doing illegal business and had links with organized crime.

A transcript of an interview that Sassetti allegedly gave over the phone in spring 2012 is circulating on the Internet. It describes biographical details and details of the development of Andrea Moda Formula. Sassetti portrays himself as the son of poor farmers who won 3 million lire playing poker in the early 1980s . From the profit he allegedly bought machines for the manufacture of shoes, which he sold under the Andrea Moda brand. His fortune resulted from this business.

Fashion industry

In 1985 Andrea Sassetti founded the Morrovalle- based trading company Andrea Moda , named after him , which for 20 years sold, among other things, fashion items such as overknee boots and cowboy boots . The description of his role in the fashion industry varies. Some sources refer to him as a “shoe magnate”, others as “the head of a company in the shoe industry”, and a French publication gave him the title “Italian king of prêt-à-porter ”. Sassetti also ran a discotheque on the east coast of Italy, which burned down in the spring of 1992 after an arson attack. While trying to escape from the burning building, Sassetti was shot at by unknown shooters with firearms.

Motorsport

Logo of the Andrea Moda Formula team

In September 1991, Sassetti bought Enzo Coloni's Formula 1 racing team Coloni Racing , which was one of the weakest teams in recent years and after two completely unsuccessful years was technically and “financially on the ground”. Referring to the name of his fashion company, he renamed the team the Andrea Moda Formula for the 1992 season .

In the world of Formula 1, Sassetti “always dressed in black” was perceived as a foreign body. Some media picked up Sassetti's emphatically fashionable appearance and referred to him as a playboy and a "seedy figure". Even 20 years after the closure, numerous documentaries on Andrea Moda still refer to the fact that Sassetti's racing team attracted attention more through the "illustration of a naked saxophonist in the team brochure" than through professional performance.

In fact, Andrea Moda did not achieve any sporting success. Without providing funds to increase competitiveness, Sassetti, who had no experience in motorsport, continued racing in the 1992 season with outdated equipment and inadequately equipped structure. Andrea Moda Formula became “ the flop of the 1992 Formula 1 season”: The team only competed in nine of the first 13 races of the season and only achieved one single race participation. The report had to be withdrawn at several grand prizes because Andrea Moda's racing cars were not ready for use or not compliant with the rules, and at two events the team had no engines available - either because logistical errors by the transport company or a truck driver's strike prevented the engines from being delivered on time or According to the reports, because the engine manufacturer had withheld deliveries due to unpaid invoices. Andrea Moda Formula was the only team in the history of Formula 1 to be excluded from participating in world championship races twice: once at the start of the season because Sassetti had not paid the required registration fee, and again in September 1992 on the grounds that the team's behavior likely to damage the reputation of Formula 1. The end of Sassetti's Formula 1 involvement was the 1992 Belgian Grand Prix : Here he was arrested by the Belgian police at the racetrack on suspicion of check fraud and held in custody for one night.

There were and are numerous speculations about Sassetti's motivation to take part in Formula 1. There is agreement that Sassetti is denied a serious interest in motorsport. Some sources see Andrea Moda Formula as the - unsuccessful - attempt, based on the development of Benettons, to use the publicity of motorsport for advertising purposes for his fashion company, others consider it possible that the Formula 1 involvement served the purpose of money laundering have.

Later activities

In later years Sassetti ran restaurants and nightclubs in Italy and was involved in construction companies. In March 2015, he was sentenced to prison for fraudulent bankruptcy.

literature

  • Adriano Cimarosti: The century of racing , Motorbuch Verlag Stuttgart 1997, ISBN 3-613-01848-9
  • Alan Henry: Autocourse 1992/93 London 1992 (Hazleton Securities Ltd.), ISBN 0-905138-96-1 .
  • David Hodges: A – Z of Grand Prix Cars 1906–2001 , 2001 (Crowood Press), ISBN 1-86126-339-2 (English)
  • David Hodges: Racing Cars from A – Z after 1945 , Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-613-01477-7
  • Perry McCarthy: Flat Out Flat Broke. Formula One the hard way! Haynes Publishing, Sparkford 2008 ISBN 978-1-84425-0189
  • Pierre Ménard: La Grande Encyclopédie de la Formule 1 , 2nd edition, St. Sulpice, 2000, ISBN 2-940125-45-7 (French)
  • motor sport aktuell , a weekly trade magazine from Switzerland, with various articles and notes about Andrea Moda in the 1992 issues.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. a b c d Short biography of Andrea Sassettis on the website www.oldracingcars.com (accessed on May 28, 2014).
  2. ^ Perry McCarthy: Flat Out Flat Broke. Formula One the hard way! Haynes Publishing, Sparkford 2008 ISBN 978-1-84425-0189 , p. 194.
  3. Interview with Andrea Sassetti from 2012 (accessed on June 2, 2014).
  4. Entry on the website www.treccani.it (accessed on June 2, 2014).
  5. a b c d story of Andrea Moda Formula on the website www.f1rejects.com (accessed on May 28, 2014).
  6. David Hodges: A – Z of Grand Prix Cars 1906–2001 , 2001 (Crowood Press), ISBN 1-86126-339-2 , p. 18.
  7. Patrice Buchkalter, Jean François Galeron: "Formula 1 - a complete guide to 1992", Surrèsnes (Taillandrier) 1992, ISBN 2876361078 , p. 120.
  8. ^ Pierre Ménard: La Grande Encyclopédie de la Formule 1 , 2nd edition, St. Sulpice, 2000, ISBN 2-940125-45-7 , p. 605
  9. Coloni failed to qualify or pre-qualify at every World Championship run in 1990 and 1991. A documentary describes Coloni as the "King of the Unqualified". See overview of the most unsuccessful teams in Formula 1 history on the website www.f1rejects.com (accessed on May 28, 2014).
  10. ^ David Hodges: Rennwagen from A – Z after 1945 , Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 , p. 58.
  11. a b c Alan Henry: Autocourse 1992/93 London 1992 (Hazleton Securities Ltd.), ISBN 0-905138-96-1 , p. 88.
  12. ^ Alan Henry: Autocourse 1992/93 London 1992 (Hazleton Securities Ltd.), ISBN 0-905138-96-1 , pp. 147, 171
  13. ^ Pierre Ménard: La Grande Encyclopédie de la Formule 1 , 2nd edition, St. Sulpice, 2000, ISBN 2-940125-45-7 , p. 605
  14. Motorsport aktuell, issue 25/1992.
  15. ^ Report on the 1992 Belgian Grand Prix on the website www.grandprix.com (accessed on May 28, 2014).
  16. Motorsport aktuell, issue 49/1992
  17. Message from May 26, 2015 on the website www.corriereadriatico.it (accessed on August 27, 2017).