1925 French Grand Prix

Race winner Robert Benoist

Race start

The XIX. French Grand Prix ( XIX Grand Prix de l'Automobile Club de France ) took place on July 26, 1925 at the Autodrome de Linas-Montlhéry in France .

The race was a valuation run for the first automobile world championship , it was held according to the provisions of the international racing formula (displacement limitation to 2 liters, minimum weight 650 kg, two-seater with at least 80 cm body width; race distance at least 800 km) over 80 laps of 12.50 km, which corresponded to a total distance of 1000.00 km.

The winners were Robert Benoist and Albert Divo , who took turns at the wheel of a Delage Type 2 LCV . During the race there was a fatal accident involving Alfa Romeo driver Antonio Ascari .

run

With the Autodrom in Linas-Montlhéry, the French Grand Prix was held for the first time on a specially designed “artificial” race track. With 14 participants from four teams, the field was much stronger than at the previous Belgian Grand Prix . The favorite was again Alfa Romeo with the excellent Alfa Romeo P2 eight-cylinder and the successful driver trio Giuseppe Campari , Antonio Ascari and Gastone Brilli-Peri , but the three Delage Type 2 LCV twelve-cylinder, which are now also all equipped with compressors were, with their pilots Albert Divo, Robert Benoist and Grand Prix veteran Louis Wagner, were serious opponents. After they had previously left Belgium, Sunbeam and Bugatti now intervened in the action. For Sunbeam, Henry Segrave , Giulio Masetti and Caberto Conelli started on supercharged six-cylinder models that were almost unchanged compared to the previous year, while Bugatti with the team Jules Goux , Bartolomeo Costantini and the brothers Ferdinand and Pierre de Vizcaya continued to use the vehicle out of concern for reliability Compressors waived. With their performance disadvantage of around 50 to 90 hp, the Bugatti were already a whole minute per lap slower than their competitors during training and also lined up at the end of the field during the race.

According to the usual method at the French Grand Prix, the start was rolling. Alfa driver Ascari immediately took the lead and after two laps his team-mate Campari had overtaken Divo (Delage), Masetti (Sunbeam) and Wagner (Delage), who were initially in between. While the two Alfas were fighting for the lead, Delage driver Benoist worked his way through the field over the course of the first racing quarter and was even able to take second place for a short time during the refueling stops that were due until he had to stop and take the wheel handed over the already retired Divo. In the meantime it had started to rain and the leading Ascari misjudged a curve and hit a fence on the inside, whereupon his car overturned. Ascari was thrown out and run over by his own car and died of his injuries on the way to the hospital. Out of respect, Alfa Romeo immediately withdrew its remaining cars from the race, so that the lead now passed to Divo without a fight. Not much happened in the second half of the race. Only Paul Torchy , who had taken over the Delage from Wagner, was able to overtake Costantini, the best Bugatti driver, and Masetti from fourth place, while Divo at the front gave the steering wheel back to Benoist at the last refueling stop, so that Benoist finally after a total time was the first to cross the finish line of almost nine hours with a clear lead over his teammate. More than eleven minutes behind, Masetti took third place in front of all five Bugattis that started, which at least underlined the reliability of the Type 35 .

Results

Registration list

team	No.	driver	chassis	engine	tires
Sunbeam-Talbot-Darracq Motors	01	Henry Segrave	Sunbeam GP	Sunbeam 2.0L I6 compressor
	02	Ernest Eldridge
	07th	Giulio Masetti
	11	Caberto Conelli
SA Ital. Ing.Nicola Romeo	03	Giuseppe Campari	Alfa Romeo P2	Alfa Romeo 2.0L I8 compressor	P
	08th	Antonio Ascari
	12	Gastone Brilli-Peri
Mathis	04th	François de Brémond	Mathis
Usines Bugatti	05	Pierre de Vizcaya	Bugatti T35	Bugatti 2.0L I8	M.
	09	Jules Goux
	13	Meo Costantini
	15th	Ferdinand de Vizcaya
	17th	Giulio Foresti
Automobiles Delage	06th	Albert Divo	Delage 2 LCV	Delage 2.0L V12
	10	Robert Benoist
	14th	Louis Wagner
	16	Paul Torchy

Race result

Item	driver	constructor	Round	Stops	time	begin	Fastest lap	Failure reason
01	Robert Benoist Albert Divo	Delage	80		8: 54: 41.2 h	8th
02	Louis Wagner Paul Torchy	Delage	80		+ 7: 46.2 min	14th
03	Giulio Masetti	Sunbeam	80		+ 11: 34.0 min	5
04th	Meo Costantini	Bugatti	80		+ 13: 57.2 min	11
05	Jules Goux	Bugatti	80		+ 20: 30.0 min	7th
06th	Ferdinand de Vizcaya	Bugatti	80		+ 26: 07.2 min	13
07th	Pierre de Vizcaya	Bugatti	80		+ 46: 20.4 min	3
08th	Giulio Foresti	Bugatti	80		+ 54: 56.8 min	14th
-	Giuseppe Campari	Alfa Romeo	40		DNF	2		withdrawn
-	Henry Segrave	Sunbeam	31		DNF	1		Engine failure
-	Gastone Brilli-Peri	Alfa Romeo	31		DNF	10		withdrawn
-	Caberto Conelli	Sunbeam	22nd		DNF	9		Brake defect
-	Antonio Ascari	Alfa Romeo	22nd		DNF	6th		deadly accident
-	Albert Divo	Delage	7th		DNF	5	5: 48.0 min	Compressor damage
-	Ernest Eldridge	Sunbeam			DNS			Car not ready to run

Web links

Commons : French Grand Prix 1925  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• XIX Grand Prix de l'ACF www.teamdan.com, accessed on April 4, 2015 (English). 
• Leif Snellman, Hans Etzrodt: GRAND PRIX DE L'AUTOMOBILE CLUB DE FRANCE. www.kolumbus.fi, August 29, 2019, accessed April 30, 2020 (English). 

Remarks

1. ↑ The first race organized as the Grand Prix de l'ACF took place in 1906. In the 1920s, however, the “big” city-to-city races of the early years between 1895 and 1903 were also awarded these titles, although the ACF was founded after the Paris-Bordeaux-Paris 1895 race. This counting method made the event from 1906 the official ninth Grand Prix de l'ACF. This numbering was after the 1968 renaming of the Grand Prix de l'ACF for Grand Prix de France continued further throughout.