British Racing Partnership
| Surname | British Racing Partnership |
|---|---|
| Companies | |
| Company headquarters | Tring , UK |
| Team boss | Alfred Moss , Ken Gregory |
| statistics | |
| First Grand Prix | Morocco 1958 |
| Last Grand Prix | Mexico 1964 |
| Race driven | 43 |
| Constructors' championship | 0 |
| Drivers World Championship | 0 |
| Race wins | 0 |
| Pole positions | 0 |
| Fastest laps | 2 |
| Points | 24.5 |
British Racing Partnership , also known as BRP , was a British motorsport team that competed in the Formula 1 World Championship with its own designs in 1963 and 1964 .
history
British Racing Partnership was founded in November 1957 by Ken Gregory and Alfred Moss . Both were closely related to the British racing driver Stirling Moss , Ken Gregory was his manager and Alfred Moss was his father. Moss ensured the team's funding, Gregory acted as team manager. Alfred Moss had trained as a dentist before the Second World War and was active as a racing driver. In 1924 he was sixteenth in the Indianapolis 500 mile race . After the war he bought a farm in Tring , where the new racing team found its home in a garage.
At the time of its establishment, Stirling Moss was an established and successful racing driver. After joining Mercedes-Benz , he drove for Maserati in 1956 and signed a two-year contract with Vanwall in early 1957 . Both the 1956 season and the 1957 drivers' championship he finished second.
BRP was set up for two reasons. On the one hand, the various works engagements of Stirling Moss resulted in a lot of free time with Gregory and Alfred Moss, who at the beginning of Stirling's racing career had taken care of its advancement. On the other hand, Stirling wanted to drive a lot of races, and his works contracts were almost limited to use in world championship races. This deficiency should be remedied with your own racing team. However, this objective was only on paper and was an idea. Another driver was hired for the very first racing car.
Another important person at BRP was the mechanic Tony Robinson. Robinson had worked as a mechanic for Stirling Moss in 1953 and was very familiar with his idiosyncrasies. In the fall of 1957, Robinson worked for Bruce Halford and was quickly poached.
Monopostor racing
First races in 1958
The first race car BRP was a Formula 2 - Cooper , the T45 . The first driver at BRP was the 27-year-old British driver Stuart Lewis-Evans , a teammate of Stirling Moss at Vanwall. Lewis-Evans was supposed to take part in Formula 2 races with the T45. However, he had just as little free racing times as Stirling Moss, as the dates of Formula 1 and Formula 2 races often overlapped. Therefore, the young driver Tommy Bridger , who came from Formula 3 , was hired as the second driver.
BRP contested the first race on April 7, 1958. Lewis-Evans drove the T45 to the Lavant Cup in Goodwood . He narrowly missed a first podium in the first race. Lewis-Evans and Cliff Allison crossed the finish line with the same race time. Allison was third, Lewis-Evans fourth. Tommy Bridger with a Cooper T43 also appeared on the registration list ; however, the team never owned a T43. On the same day, the Glover Trophy took place in Goodwood , a Formula 1 race that is not part of the world championship. In the 1950s, it was not uncommon for races in different single posto classes to take place at the same time. Lewis-Evans contested this race for Bernie Ecclestone's team , so Bridger came to his first race, where he seriously damaged the new T45 in an accident.
In May 1958 Bridger drove a BRP racing car into the top three for the first time. At the Crystal Palace Trophy , he came second behind Ian Burgess' works Cooper . At the finish he was only two tenths of a second behind. The first race victory followed two weeks later. At Brands Hatch , Lewis-Evans won the race ahead of Dennis Taylor in a Lotus 12 and Ian Burgess, who drove a privately registered Cooper T43.
The racing team had its first start in a Formula 1 race that was part of the World Championship at the 1958 Grand Prix of Morocco . The race, which took place on the Circuit d'Ain-Diab near Casablanca on October 19, 1958, was advertised for both Formula 1 and Formula 2 racing cars. The race ended in a fatal accident that had an impact on the further development of the team. Stuart Lewis-Evans had to retire on lap 41 due to engine failure on his works Vanwall VW4 . Leaking fuel ignited on the hot engine and the driver suffered life-threatening burns from which he died five days later. The BRP-T45 was driven by Tommy Bridger, who was eliminated on the 20th lap due to an accident, but was uninjured. It was Bridger's only start in a Formula 1 world championship run.
World Championship of Formula 1 and Formula 2 races in 1959
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With the death of Lewis-Evans, BRP had lost its top driver and the team leadership had to reorient itself for 1959. With Vanwall's withdrawal, the original idea of preparing racing cars for Stirling Moss was reactivated and Moss agreed to race for BRP in addition to his involvement with the Rob Walker Racing Team . As more pilots were IVOR BUEB , the 1955 and 1957 , the 24-hour race in Le Mans had won, and the rookie George Wicken committed. The team bought two new Cooper T51s and fitted them with 1.5-liter Borgward engines.
Since Formula 1 vehicles were still permitted in the 1959 Formula 1 season and BRP also competed in an abundance of Formula 2 races without championship status, the team was faced with a decent task. The decision in favor of the engines turned out to be problematic. The small engines shone through their low fuel consumption, but were not as powerful as the engines from Climax and BRM , which were also used in the T51. There were therefore no major successes in the first half of the season. Bueb achieved some top placings, but the young Wicken fell significantly behind the established class driver and was replaced by another young driver - Chris Bristow - in the middle of the season . Bristow justified the commitment with success at the John Davy Trophy at Brands Hatch. It was the only racing success this year. A few days before that, the team had suffered a heavy loss. Ivor Bueb had a serious accident at the Trophée d'Auvergne and died of serious injuries two days before Bristow's victory. In order to be able to compete in the races for the Formula 1 World Championship and to be able to provide Stirling Moss with a car capable of winning, Gregory and Alfred Moss acquired another racing car - a BRM P25 . In making this purchase, the owners had taken a significant risk as their financial resources were as good as exhausted.
Moss had his first Grand Prix start with the BRM P25 at the 1959 French Grand Prix in Reims . After the car was pushed into the pit lane during the race, the race management declared a disqualification. In addition to Moss in the P25, Bristow and Bueb in the Cooper T51 competed at the British Grand Prix . In retrospect, this race was the most successful Formula 1 race in team history. After crossing the finish line, Stirling Moss, who finished second, was 22 seconds behind the race winner - Jack Brabham in the factory Cooper T51. Bristow was tenth and Bueb 13th.
At the German Grand Prix on the AVUS , the German Hans Herrmann drove the BRM. Its accident and the photos it took went down in motorsport history. When braking on the south bend, the car had a brake failure and overturned several times. Herrmann was thrown out of the car and miraculously remained unharmed.
The 1960 season
The investments made in the previous year had significantly restricted the owners' financial possibilities. More extensive budgeting from own resources no longer seemed possible for the new season. Gregory managed to get a financier to take over the payments from the racing team. Willam, Paul and Fabian Samengo-Turner ran a finance house and spent a lot of money on their passion for motorsport. The team was renamed and given the company name of the three brothers: Yeoman Credit Racing Team . But to associate this team name exclusively with BRP does not go far enough. Because in later years Reg Parnell also had a sponsorship connection with this company and started under the name Yeoman Credit Racing . However, there was no connection between BRP and Reg Parnell Racing. Only 1960 is clearly BRP Yeoman Credit. The team leadership remained in the hands of Gregory and Moss.
As the new top driver - Chris Bristow stayed in the team - the American Harry Schell was signed . Schell had a fatal accident in a sports car race in May, and the team was again without top drivers. After some back and forth it was decided to purchase a third T51 chassis and equip the three cars with 2.5 liter versions of the Coventry Climax FPF . Tony Brooks joined the team alongside Bristow to replace Schell . The third car was driven alternately by Henry Taylor , Bruce Halford, Olivier Gendebien and Jack Sears . Gendebien came second at the French Grand Prix and third at the Belgian Grand Prix , where Chris Bristow was killed in an accident.
Brooks best result was fourth place at the Monaco Grand Prix . The team was again unplaced in the constructors' cup, as the points scored were allocated to the respective constructor - in this case Cooper.
The 1961 Formula 1 season
Even before the end of the previous season, there had been a rift between the Samengo-Turner brothers and the BRP team leadership. Three dead racing drivers within a year - Schell had had an accident in a team owned Cooper sports car - were clearly too many for the brothers and they terminated the sponsorship contract prematurely. Gregory had to start looking for a new financier. He quickly found what he was looking for. The United Dominions Trust took over the financing and the team started in 1961 under the name UDT Laystall Racing Team .
Gregory contacted Colin Chapman and purchased three Lotus 18s , three Lotus 19s and one Lotus Elite . The Lotus 18 were driven in the Formula 1 World Championship, the Lotus 19 and the Elite were sports cars. In Formula 1, Cliff Allison and Henry Taylor competed. Lucien Bianchi , Masten Gregory and the Argentine Juan Manuel Bordeu contested individual races . The year was unsuccessful because the racing team did not achieve a single place in the points.
The 1962 Formula 1 season
The team remained virtually unsuccessful in monopostor races in 1962. Even Innes Ireland , divorced from Colin Chapman in the dispute , could not change this trend. The best finish was Ireland's fifth place in the South African Grand Prix .
1963 and the BRP Mk1
After permanent unsuccessfulness, the sponsorship agreement was terminated by UDT Laystall at the end of 1962. The search for a new racing car was also difficult. Lotus had the Lotus 24 - which was used by BRP in the previous year - followed by the Lotus 25 , which however was reserved for the works team. BRP therefore decided to develop its own racing car - the BRP Mk1 . The vehicle was not completely redeveloped, but was largely based on the Lotus 24. The BRM V8 engine was also taken from the Lotus. Innes Ireland finished fourth in the 1963 Dutch Grand Prix and the Italian Grand Prix with the Mk1 .
1964 and the BRP Mk2
In 1964 the BRP 1 was replaced by the BRP Mk2 .
Sports car racing
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In contrast to the team’s formula activities, little has been published about BRP’s sports car operations. In the descriptions about BRP, for example, it is almost never mentioned that the team won a race for the sports car world championship in 1962 - the RAC Tourist Trophy 1962 . The victory was won by Innes Ireland at the wheel of a Ferrari 250 GTO . The team also competed in the 24 Hours of Le Mans that year . There Ireland shared the cockpit of the GTO with Masten Gregory. For the duo, the race ended with damage to the battery after 165 laps.
Before the race there was a scandal because the ACO officials refused to participate in the two Lotus 23s that were reported by the works team and BRP. The works car had a 1-liter Ford engine, the BRP car had a 0.7-liter Climax engine (drivers Les Leston and Tony Shelly ). The cars were considered favorites in their classes, and hours after acceptance it leaked that the ACO had given in to pressure from the French teams and that the Lotus 23 was unsafe. Chapman left and carried out his announcement that he would never return to Le Mans in a works car.
The year before , Cliff Allison and Mike McKee failed after 102 laps due to engine failure on their Lotus Elite.
Results
Victories in the sports car world championship
| year | run | vehicle | Driver 1 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1962 | RAC Tourist Trophy | Ferrari 250 GTO |
 Innes Ireland
|
literature
- David Hodges: Racing cars from A to Z after 1945 , Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1994, p. 68, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ To acquire the first BRP racing car, see fourth paragraph
- ^ Lavant Cup 1958
- ↑ Glover Trophy 1958
- ↑ Crysral Palace Trophy 1958
- ^ Brands Hatch 1958
- ↑ 1958 Grand Prix of Morocco
- ^ John Davy Trophy
- ↑ 1959 French Grand Prix
- ^ Grand Prix of Great Britain 1959
- ↑ Hans Herrmann's accident on the Avus in 1959
- ↑ on the Yeoman credit connection see the eighth paragraph
- ↑ Successes in the sports car world championship in 1962 ( Memento from June 24, 2003 in the web archive archive.today )
