1930 Grand Prix season
For the 1930 Grand Prix season , the World Automobile Association ( AIACR) announced another automobile world championship for which seven international Grand Prix races were to be classified. However, with the race at Indianapolis , the Grand Prix of Belgium and Europe in Spa-Francorchamps and the French Grand Prix in Pau this only three Grandes Épreuves were performed and only for the race in Belgium Grand Prix racing formula International applied the world title could not be awarded for the third time in a row. After that, the AIACR stopped trying to keep the World Cup alive.
In contrast, the numerous other Formula Libre races that were not constrained by the AIACR's set of rules offered particularly spectacular motorsport this year. This was especially true for Italy, where the fascist regime actively promoted car racing and again announced its own national championship. Both the Targa Florio and the races in Rome and Monza presented impressive fields of participants. In addition, races such as the Monaco Grand Prix , the Masaryk Race in Brno ( Czechoslovakia ) and the San Sebastián Grand Prix in Spain were an expression of the ongoing internationalization of Grand Prix sport.
Regulations
Despite the fact that there was still hardly any interest from automobile companies, the Grand Prix racing formula of 1929 was retained almost unchanged. Although the design was otherwise largely free, the racing cars were not allowed to use more than 14 kg of fuel (petrol and oil) per 100 km of racing distance in 1930, although, in contrast to the previous year, 30% benzene was permitted in the otherwise commercially available fuel. The minimum displacement was 1100 cm³, the minimum weight 900 kg. Two-seater vehicles had to have a chassis width of at least 100 cm and a maximum of two mechanics were allowed to work on the car with the driver during pit stops . In addition, a minimum distance of 600 km was specified for the races.
In practice, however, the racing formula remains completely irrelevant, as it did not meet with support from either race organizers or automobile companies. Rightly - as was confirmed by the example of the Belgian Grand Prix , where the formula was used for the only time during the season - it was assumed that such races were too unattractive to be able to prevail in the long run.
Teams and drivers
With the successes of René Dreyfus in the Monaco Grand Prix , Louis Chiron in the Belgian and Philippe Étancelin in the French Grand Prix , Bugatti was able to re-enter the winners' lists of the nominally highest-ranking events, but the sporting value of the two Grandes Épreuves in particular was rather limited . Significantly, Dreyfus and Étancelin were also private drivers who were able to prevail over the official works cars in their successes . The only two serious encounters with the Italian teams at the Targa Florio and the Premio Reale di Roma went for the team around team captain Chiron, “W. Williams “(pseudonym for William Grover-Williams ), Albert Divo , Guy Bouriat and Caberto Conelli lost - albeit only on the last few kilometers that could hardly be surpassed in drama. Although the Bugatti Type 35 in its various variants with 1.5 to 2.3 liters displacement was still on a par with its Italian rivals in terms of maneuverability and stability, it was now slowly falling behind in terms of engine power and top speed. However, the plant did not succeed in accelerating the development of the successor model T51 with the new dohc engine before the end of the season and after the two defeats did not enter into a direct confrontation with the Italians.
The official return of Alfa Romeo to Grand Prix racing initially caused the greatest stir . The plant was now very much under state influence and was dependent on armaments contracts from the Mussolini regime, which saw motorsport as an ideal instrument for mass entertainment and for promoting national feeling. After the success of 1929 , the team officially took care of the two Alfa Romeo P2s previously used privately by Achille Varzi and Gastone Brilli-Peri . On this occasion, the cars were also subjected to a comprehensive modernization by converting them to the front end (front axle and radiator) of the sports car model Alfa Romeo 6C . After Varzi's initial success in Alessandria and his sensational victory over Bugatti at the Targa Florio, however, the P2 fell increasingly behind with the appearance of the new Maserati, which was not affected by the partial outsourcing of racing operations to Scuderia Ferrari , which Enzo Ferrari did with his Partners Alfredo Caniato and Mario Tadini had been founded at the beginning of the season.
At Maserati, on the other hand, after the rather disappointing results of previous years, it was recognized that under the conditions of the free formula the easiest way to success was to increase the engine size. The Maserati V4 , powered by two coupled eight-cylinder engines , which, due to its excessive weight, could only be used on high-speed slopes with few curves, turned out to be a dead end, but with the 2.5-liter engine of the Maserati 26M , the factory set one Displacement spiral in motion, which the other companies soon had to follow. So the balance between the brands that had prevailed since 1928 got more and more out of balance. As a result, the driver carousel also got going, because the top pilots were aiming for the team that had the upper hand. After the victories of Maserati drivers Luigi Arcangeli and Luigi Fagioli at the races in Rome and Livorno, it was not long before Varzi, who was increasingly dissatisfied with Alfa Romeo - possibly also because of the inclusion of his arch-rival Tazio Nuvolari in the team - into the Maserati camp changed. He promptly won the last three races in Pescara , Monza and finally in San Sebastián, Spain . In return, however, Baconin Borzacchini , who at the very beginning of the season had won the poorly manned Tripoli race with the Maserati V4, had to vacate his cockpit and immediately took the vacated place at Alfa Romeo or Ferrari. Varzi's behavior in Monza, where he snatched the victory away from his completely surprised team-mate Arcangeli in the last few meters, did not necessarily improve the mood in the team. Nevertheless, 1930 was the most successful season so far for Maserati with a total of six successes.
The third Italian team, however, suffered another serious setback. After Gastone Brilli-Peri's accident in training right at the start of the season in Tripoli, after team founder Emilio Materassi , the second financier of the Scuderia Materassi had a fatal accident. Racing director Scaletti kept racing operations afloat with regular driver Clemente Biondetti , but the development potential of the earlier Grand Prix Talbots was now largely exhausted.
Season report
The Formula Libre races of the 1930 season surpassed almost everything that the Grand Prix world had seen before. For the Monaco Grand Prix , participants gathered from nine countries, under which local hero Louis Chiron was on the Bugatti factory as the clear favorite. Victory went to René Dreyfus, an independent Bugatti driver - much to the annoyance of Ettore Bugatti , who would have preferred to have seen the impressive prize money in his own box office. Dreyfus owed its success not least to the trick that, in contrast to the works racing car, thanks to an additional tank mounted on the passenger seat, it was able to drive through without a refueling stop.
At the Targa Florio , where Bugatti last won five wins in a row, Alfa Romeo officially returned to Grand Prix racing. Achille Varzi, who, unlike the experienced Bugatti drivers, set out on the winding track on unpaved roads through the Sicilian mountains for the first time, had his Alfa Romeo P2 approved by the factory, which is a flawless Grand Prix racing car given the track conditions was actually considered impassable. Throughout the race, he fought a spectacular duel with Bugatti's top driver Chiron, in which they left all competitors far behind. In a cinematic finale, Varzi had to make a pit stop at the beginning of the last lap because of a leak in the tank, which meant that Chiron's victory now seemed certain. The Bugatti driver lost the race after all because he had to change two wheels on the track after colliding with a wall. So Varzi was able to pull past again, although his mechanic had to refill gasoline from a canister while driving and the car had even caught fire for a short time.
At the subsequent Premio Reale di Roma on the triangular course at Tre Fontane, there was another dramatic clash of the assembled Grand Prix elite. After a short time, a leading group of four drivers from three brands had formed - Luigi Arcangeli in the new Maserati 26M in front of Tazio Nuvolari (Alfa Romeo), Luigi Fagioli (Maserati) and Louis Chiron (Bugatti) - who were at a distance for almost the entire race remained together for about a minute, with the lead changing between Arcangeli and Nuvolari several times. While Nuvolari had to give up the fight for the top a few laps before the end due to an impending engine failure, I was finally able to put Chiron ahead of Arcangeli in another great finale at the beginning of the last lap. The Italian, however, could not be shaken off and pulled the slightly more powerful Maserati past the very last corner on the outside lane to cross the finish line with a lead of around 80 meters.
The contrast between the official Grand Prix sport and the flourishing Formula Libre scene has seldom been as clear as at the first Grande Épreuve of the season, the Belgian and European Grand Prix in Spa-Francorchamps. Under the official consumption formula, half the field consisted of comparatively tame sports and touring cars, which, alongside the three Grand Prix Bugattis from Chiron, Bouriat and Divo - despite the appearance that was somewhat destroyed by the sealed standard tanks - made an almost unreal picture. For a long time, the Bugatti drivers drove their laps at a steady pace, without being challenged, always paying attention to fuel consumption. Nevertheless, in the final phase of the race, Chiron and Divo had to make two unscheduled pit stops one after the other due to minor problems, which threw them back to Henri Stoffel , who had kept up the whole time with an older, long-legged Peugeot 174 S designed for long-distance races . This got the route set by race director Jean Bugatti in disarray, because the team had actually wanted to see number 1 driver Chiron as the winner of the race. Instead, Stoffel was even able to work his way up to the leading Bouriat up to about five seconds, but then remained lying about 10 km from the finish with an empty tank, so that the stable management at Bugatti could still intervene. To the indignation of the audience, Bouriat had to stop his car for a full two and a half minutes in front of the line and wait so that his team captain could cross the finish line in front of him.
Unlike the always very principled Belgian RACB , the Italian Automobile Club RACI recognized the signs of the times in good time and canceled its official Italian Grand Prix for the second time since 1929. Instead, the event was given the title of the Monza Grand Prix , so that it was no longer bound by the specifications of the International Grand Prix formula . The result of this was another respectable field of participants, which, following the format that had proven itself in the previous year, initially had to contest separate preliminary runs according to displacement class. As Alfa Romeo struggled with tire problems on the fast track, the joint final race soon became a clear matter for Maserati. Arcangeli, who had safely controlled the race before Ernesto Maserati the whole time, therefore no longer expected an attack from his stable mates, but the ambitious Varzi, who had since joined the team, caught the surprised and bitterly disappointed Arcangeli in the final meters before the goal. This was the fourth race of the year that was not decided until the last lap, albeit under completely different circumstances.
The Grand Prix de l'ACF should actually have been held under the International Grand Prix formula that is mandatory for all Grande Épreuves . However, when three months after the announcement there was still no participant in the entry lists, the Automobile Club de France had no choice but to switch to a formula-free race. In the almost entirely French-occupied field, the official Bugatti team failed again because “Williams” and Chiron / Bouriat (who shared a car together) were too reckless with their material in the battle for victory and after several punctures finally had to give up with technical defects. Philippe Étancelin, on the other hand, owed the greatest success of his career to a carefully prepared strategy - in order to protect the tires and save fuel, he had given his privately used Bugatti a particularly long gear ratio and was able to get through the race without a pit stop with a correspondingly gentle driving style.
With the Masaryk race on a nearly 30 km long road course near Brno, an internationally important automobile race took place in Czechoslovakia for the first time. Once again the course of the race was curious: At the beginning there was a three-way battle between Rudolf Caracciola and a mighty Mercedes-Benz SSK in front of the German Bugatti driver Heinrich-Joachim von Morgen and Tazio Nuvolari in the Ferrari team’s Alfa Romeo P2. However, all three got into problems one after the other, first Nuvolari with a crack in the crankshaft housing, then Caracciola with an over-revved engine, because his car from a previous hill climb had a completely unsuitable drive ratio. Finally, the Bugatti, who remained lonely at the top, began to suffer from engine damage, so that von Morgen exchanged cars with his team partner Hermann zu Leiningen , which was not well thought out , which led to an unnecessarily large loss of time for him. Nuvolari also continued the race in the second Alfa Romeo of his friend and stable colleague Baconin Borzacchini, but this car also suffered from overheating problems and Nuvolari had to stop every lap to refill the cooling water. At Leiningen, his team-mate's ailing Bugatti was still way ahead, but had no prospect of actually reaching the goal. After his retirement, the race was decided once again this season, literally on the last kilometers, because Nuvolari had for some inexplicable reason refrained from topping up the cooling water before the last lap. Tomorrow finally won, even though his switch to his team-mate's car had actually been a serious tactical mistake.
Grandes Épreuves
| date | run | route | winner | statistics | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 05/30 |
 Indianapolis 500
|
Indianapolis Motor Speedway |
Billy Arnold ( Miller ) |
statistics |
| 2 | 07/20 |
 Belgian Grand Prix
|
Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps |
 Louis Chiron ( Bugatti ) |
statistics |
| 3 | 09/21 |
 ACF Grand Prix
|
Grand Circuit permanent de Pau |
 Philippe Étancelin ( Bugatti ) |
statistics |
More races
.svg){kind=small}
.svg){kind=small}
.svg){kind=small}
Web links
- Leif Snellman, Felix Muelas: Detailed history of the 1930 Grand Prix season. Www.kolumbus.fi, November 15, 2012, accessed on April 6, 2015 .
- 1930 Grand Prix. www.teamdan.com, accessed April 6, 2015 .