Goffredo Zehender

Goffredo Zehender (right) 1929

The Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 owned by Goffredo Zehender and Attilio Marinoni in Le Mans in 1931

Conte Goffredo "Freddie" Zehender (born February 27, 1901 in Reggio Calabria ; † January 7, 1958 ) was an Italian racing driver .

Career

Sports car

Zehender, who also took part in Grand Prix races for monoposto racing cars, achieved his greatest successes in international motorsport in sports car races . He made his first international appearance in 1925 at the Spa-Francorchamps 24-hour race . Together with Giulio Foresti , he finished 19th in the overall standings and third in his class on an OM 665 Superba . In 1927 he drove back to Spa and this time was sixth overall. In 1928 he made his debut at the 24 Hours of Le Mans on a Chrysler 72 , but retired after just five laps after a radiator failure. In Spa , at the 24-hour race there, he achieved his first podium with third place overall. The restored Chrysler 72 served as the vehicle.

In 1929 Zehender became a works driver at Alfa Romeo . In the legendary triple victory of the Italian works team at the Spa-Francorchamps 24-hour race , he drove his Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 SS with partner Louis Rigal to third place. This was followed by victories at the Guipozcoa Grand Prix and the Circuit des Rouges Pavées and another third place overall in Spa 1930 .

In 1931 , after three podiums, he won in Spa, which he achieved in the Mercedes-Benz SSK of the exiled Russian Prince Dimitri Djordjadze , who was also his team-mate. At this point, Zehender was already active as a Grand Prix driver and his involvement in sports car races was decreasing. He entered his last major races after the Second World War , at the Mille Miglia in 1953 and 1956 at Le Mans, where he was eliminated as a partner of Jean Lucas due to an accident.

Monoposto

Through the works contract with Alfa Romeo, the Italian came into contact with Grand Prix racing in 1929 and became a regular starter in monoposto races from 1930 . At the 1933 Tunisian Grand Prix , Zehender was third behind Tazio Nuvolari and Baconin Borzacchini and in the same year sixth at the Monaco Grand Prix , albeit on a Maserati . After some successes for Maserati, he finished third at the French Grand Prix in 1935 , and at the end of 1935 he was hired as a demonstration driver by British Mercedes importers. This subsequently led to a contract as a test and replacement driver with the Mercedes-Benz works team under the leadership of Alfred Neubauer . However, Zehender had only a few races; His only placement was fifth at the 1937 Monaco Grand Prix . In 1939 he resigned from Grand Prix racing.

Team boss

After the end of the Second World War, Zehender only competed sporadically in sports car races and became team boss of the Gruppo Inter. This was a racing team that was founded in 1948 by the two nobles Prince Igor Trubetzkoi and Conte Bruno Sterzi . The team rented three Ferrari 166 from Enzo Ferrari to compete in races. A first outing was the Mille Miglia in 1948 , where Troubetzkoy and Sterzi drove the cars. But soon there was a conflict between the team owners and the team boss. The agreement with Ferrari stipulated that the three cars would be serviced by Ferrari and used only by Gruppo Inter. With the knowledge of Enzo Ferrari, but without informing the team owners, Zehender also rented the cars to other drivers. Zehender was dismissed in the dispute and the Gruppo Inter eventually acquired the three cars. Zehender started racing again, was active as a driver until 1956, and thus had one of the longest driver careers in international motorsport.

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1928	Grand Garage Saint-Didier Paris	Chrysler 72 Six	Jacques Ledure	failure	cooler
1931	Soc. Anon. Alfa Romeo	Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 LM	Attilio Marinoni	failure	Power transmission
1956	Automobiles Talbot	Talbot-Lago Sport 2500	Jean Lucas	failure	accident

Individual results in the sports car world championship

season	team	race car	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th
1953	Aga Khan III.	Alfa Romeo 1900	SEB	MIM	LEM	SPA	ONLY	RTT	CAP
				DNF

Web links

Commons : Goffredo Zehender  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Leif Snellman, Felix Muelas: Goffredo "Freddie" Zehender (I). www.kolumbus.fi, November 30, 2016, accessed June 11, 2017 . 
• Goffredo Zehender at Racing Sports Cars
• Goffredo Zehender in the Internet Movie Database (English)