Gilberte Thirion

Gilberte Thirion (right), with Anna Maria Peduzzi and Enzo Ferrari 1956

Porsche 356 Coupé Gmünd

Gilberte Thirion (born January 8, 1928 in Brussels , † May 21, 2008 in Uccle ) was a Belgian racing driver .

Private

Gilberte Thirion was the daughter of Max Thirion , an entrepreneur and gentleman driver . Max Thirion represented the automotive supplier ACDelco in Belgium, founded by Albert Champion . The company was mainly due to the under the brand name Champion sold spark plugs known. Her mother Hèlene Houbiers was a well-known mannequin in Belgium in the 1920s . In 1932 the parents separated and ten-year-old Gilberte Thirion stayed with her mother. After the end of the Second World War , she trained as a secretary in 1947 and then worked in public relations for her father's company .

On April 30, 1957, she married the French lawyer Roger Merle in Cannes . The couple had three children, daughters Catherine and Laurence and son Bernard . In the presence of her three children, she died of Parkinson's disease in May 2008 in a nursing home in Uccle. Friends and old companions like Freddy Rousselle , Georges Harris , Georges Hacquin and two daughters of Paul Frère came to her burial in the Braine-l'Alleud cemetery , where she was buried in her mother's grave .

Career as a racing driver

Through the public relations work for Champion and her father's passion for racing, Gilberte Thirion quickly came into contact with motorsport. At the 1952 Brussels Motor Show, which she attended with her father, a 356 Gmünd with an aluminum body was on display at the Porsche stand . Max Thirion wanted to buy this car for his daughter immediately. To his regret, the car had already been given to the Auto Occidental sales manager . He was not happy with the Porsche and, after just one race, sold it to Max Thirion, who gave the car to his daughter and she started her career with it.

First she was her father's co-driver in rallies four times before she drove herself for the first time in the 1952 12-hour race in Casablanca . During her five years as a driver, she achieved some notable achievements. Together with Nadège Ferrier , she won the first Tour de Corse in motorsport history in a Renault Dauphine in bad external conditions in 1956 . Again and again she formed strong women's teams with other drivers. Ingeborg Polensky , the wife of the racing driver and racing car designer Helmut Polensky , usually sat by her side at rallies . With her, she won the Tour de France women's automobile championship three times . With her close friend Annie Bousquet she started in the Mille Miglia. In 1956 she achieved an outstanding performance in this 1000 mile race. She controlled one of the four factory dauphines. Your teammates were the Grand Drivers and Le Mans winners Maurice Trintignant , Paul Frère and Louis Rosier . At the end of the race she had left all three colleagues behind and was 28 minutes faster than her fastest male team-mate, Trintignant.

In 1954 she contested her only 24-hour race at Le Mans together with André Pilette . Her last job was at another long-distance classic , the Sebring 12-hour race in 1957 , where she finished 35th in the overall standings. The fatal accident of her former close friend Annie Bousquet at the 12-hour race in Reims in 1956 triggered her complete withdrawal from motorsport . The relationship between the two women had suffered from Bousquet's competitive character, which was described as merciless and did not stop at close friends. Her death was such a severe blow for Gilberte Thirion that Sebring was the last race of her young career.

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1954	Equipe Gordini	Gordini T17S	André Pilette	failure	ignition

Sebring results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1957	Renault Company	Renault Dauphine	Nadège Ferrier	Gabriele Spydel	Rank 35

Individual results in the sports car world championship

season	team	race car	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th
1953	Porsche	Fiat 1100 Porsche 356	SEB	MIM	LEM	SPA	ONLY	RTT	CAP
				64		DNF
1954	Thirion Bousquet Gordini	Gordini T15S Gordini T17S	BUA	SEB	MIM	LEM	RTT	CAP
					55	DNF
1955	Gilberte Thirion	Gordini T15S	BUA	SEB	MIM	LEM	RTT	TAR
					57
1956	Renault Gilberte Thirion Equipe Nationale Belge	Renault Dauphine Alfa Romeo Giulietta SV Porsche 550	BUA	SEB	MIM	ONLY	KRI
					82	16	12
1957	Renault	Renault Dauphine	BUA	SEB	MIM	ONLY	LEM	KRI	CAR
				35

literature

• Hans-Jörg Götzl: Mille Miglia. Motorbuch-Verlag, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-613-02562-0 .

Web links

Commons : Gilberte Thirion  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Gilberte Thirion at Racing Sports Cars
• About Gilberte Thirion

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Personal information about Gilberte Thirion (French)
2. ↑ Gilberte Thirion and the Porsche 356 Gmünd (French)
3. ↑ About Annie Bousquet (English)