Erich Bitter

Erich Bitter at the classic meeting in Rüsselsheim (2018)

Erich Bitter with the "Bitter Insignia" (2011)

Erich Bitter (born August 11, 1933 in Schwelm ) is a German car designer and former cyclist and automobile racing driver .

Cycling career

Erich Bitter's father ran a bicycle shop with several branches. The son wanted to become a professional cyclist from an early age. After he had some successes as an amateur, he left school after high school and initially worked in his father's company. In 1954, at the German Road Championship in Dingolfing , he became the youngest German professional at the age of 21. For two years, from 1954 to 1956, Bitter started for the Bismarck cycling team , then for two years for Torpedo . He drove mainly as a noble domestique for Hennes Junkermann and Klaus Bugdahl , but no major successes of his own. In 1958 he ended his cycling career for health reasons.

Automobile racer

From 1959 to 1968 Erich Bitter drove car races, mainly circuit and long-distance races such as the Targa Florio or races on the Nürburgring . At first he drove NSU Prinz , later also Saab , Volvo , Porsche , Ferrari , Mercedes , Opel and Abarth . In 1965 he was on his Abarth, behind Manfred Schiek and Gerhard Bodmer , third in the German circuit championship . During his races he suffered three serious accidents; After the third accident on the Nordschleife of the Nürburgring in the 1000 km race in 1969 , he stopped racing, also because many of his colleagues had fatal accidents at the time. Bitter's Group 4 Abarth had strayed from the train shortly before the bridge in the Brünnchen section, hit the guardrail, was thrown several meters high into a tree and caught fire.

Merchant

During his work as a racing car driver, Erich Bitter expanded numerous commercial activities. In 1960 he opened a car dealership in his hometown for NSU and later also for Saab , Volvo and Abarth . As the “Rallye Bitter” auto accessories dealer, he was the first to import fire-retardant racing overalls from Great Britain since 1964. Bitter later developed its own flame-tested substance, Nomex, together with DuPont . To introduce “Nomex”, he personally stood in a flame-tested overalls in an oil pan from which the flames came up. He also imported automobiles from the small Italian manufacturer Costruzione Automobili Intermeccanica . From 1987 to 1997 he ran the "Bitter Automobile Company" in Santa Monica , until his business friend Lee Miglin fell victim to the serial killer Andrew Phillip Cunanan , who also killed Gianni Versace .

Car designer

His dissatisfaction with Intermeccanica products prompted Erich Bitter to design his own car. He founded Bitter GmbH & Co. KG (today: Bitter Automotive GmbH) and built several car models from 1971, most of them based on Opel. The cars have cult status to this day: The owners of Bitter automobiles meet annually for the “Bitter Meet”.

From 1986, Erich Bitter built various prototypes. From 1997 to 2005, Bitter worked with a team for research and development at Volkswagen . In 2010 he presented his “Bitter Insignia” based on an Opel Insignia .

Erich Bitter was nominated in the category Person of the Year in the 2013 award for The Golden Classic Steering Wheel by the magazine Autobild Klassik .

Private

Erich Bitter was married three times and is the father of three daughters. He is an avid runner and has completed 30 marathons. Further hobbies are dressage riding and painting.

statistics

Individual results in the sports car world championship

season	team	race car	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	11	12	13	14th	15th	16	17th	18th	19th	20th	21st	22nd
1963	Erich Bitter	Fiat-Abarth 850	DAY	SEB	SEB	TAR	SPA	MAY	ONLY	CON	ROS	LEM	MON	WIS	TAV	FRE	CCE	RTT	OVI	ONLY	MON	MON	TDF	BRI
																				11
1964	Erich Bitter	Ferrari 250 GT Saab 96	DAY	SEB	TAR	MON	SPA	CON	ONLY	ROS	LEM	REI	FRE	CCE	RTT	SIM	ONLY	MON	TDF	BRI	BRI	PAR
									26th								12
1965	Abarth	Fiat-Abarth 1000	DAY	SEB	BOL	MON	MON	RTT	TAR	SPA	ONLY	MUG	ROS	LEM	REI	BOZ	FRE	CCE	OVI	ONLY	BRI	BRI
																				12
1966	Abarth	Abarth 1300 OT	DAY	SEB	MON	TAR	SPA	ONLY	LEM	MUG	CCE	HOK	SIM	ONLY	ZEL
								17th						DNF
1967	Abarth	Abarth 1300 OT	DAY	SEB	MON	SPA	TAR	ONLY	LEM	HOK	MUG	BRH	CCE	ZEL	OVI	ONLY
								DNF		3				8th		5
1968	Caltex Racing	Porsche 906	DAY	SEB	BRH	MON	TAR	ONLY	SPA	WAT	ZEL	LEM
								11
1969	IGFA	Abarth 2000S	DAY	SEB	BRH	MON	TAR	SPA	ONLY	LEM	WAT	ZEL
						DNF	8th

literature

• Matthias Göbel, Lutz Keiss: Erich Bitter - racing, automobiles, life. A biography for the 80th birthday. ("... just write your name on it!") (= Series of publications of the Central Library of Sports Sciences of the German Sport University Cologne. Special volume 2). Sportverlag Strauss, Cologne 2013, ISBN 978-3-86884-161-9 .

Web links

Commons : Erich Bitter  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Erich Bitter in the Radsportseiten.net database
• erich-bitter.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ auto motor und sport , issue 13/1969, p. 86.
2. ↑ "Opel Insignia by Bitter - When Erich strikes, it becomes individual" on carpassion.com
3. ↑ "The Golden Classic Steering Wheel 2013" on autobild.de