Martin Birrane

Martin Birrane's blue Lola T70 before the start of the 2007 Silverstone Classic

Birrane celebrated his best result in sports car racing on a Chevron B36

Martin Birrane (born August 19, 1935 in Knockmore ; † June 9, 2018 ) was an Irish entrepreneur, the last owner of Lola Cars and a racing car driver .

Entrepreneur

Martin Birrane graduated from St. Muredach's College in Ballina . After that he had a variety of alternating jobs . Among other things, he was a porter in a London hotel and a butler at the Canadian embassy in Turkey .

In 1958 Birrane went to Canada for a few years and worked there in the real estate industry . Back in Great Britain, he founded his own companies in the 1960s. From Birrane & Company later Birrane & Partners and the owner a successful and wealthy real estate dealer. In 1983 he became chairman of the board of the Peer Group , a London investment firm , and brought in Birrane and Partners .

Lola

Eric Broadley , the owner of Lola Cars, planned to enter the Formula 1 World Championship in 1997 . The engagement with the Lola T97 / 30 turned into a financial disaster and had to be broken off after the first race of the season, the Australian Grand Prix . A debt of six million pounds sterling made it impossible for Broadley to continue running the company and he sold it to Martin Birrane.

Birrane invested in staff and equipment in the factory and reorganized the company in the years that followed. For the time being, monoposto vehicles were built for the Auto GP and the Champ Car series . A return to Formula 1 aimed for in 2010 was quickly dropped.

With the development of the MG-Lola EX257 , Birrane began intensified construction work for sports car racing . In the 2000s, Lola developed LMP prototypes for the Le Mans 24-hour race as well as the European and American Le Mans Series . In 2012, the company ran into financial difficulties again and went bankrupt .

Mondello Park

Martin Birrane owned the Mondello Park Circuit , the only permanent motorsport circuit in Ireland.

Racing career

Martin Birrane was active as a touring and sports car driver between 1972 and 1988 . The Irish competed 46 times and celebrated a class win. His first appearance in an international race was the 24-hour race of Spa-Francorchamps in 1971 , where he retired. His professional career ended 17 years later at the Spa-Francorchamps 24-hour race . His best placing in a sports car was second in the 1983 Thundersports Race of Snetterton . Teammate in the Chevron B36 was James Weaver .

Birrane entered the 24-hour Le Mans race nine times . He made his debut in 1977 . In 1985 he won the Group B class together with Edgar Dören and Jean-Paul Libert in a BMW M1 . It was his best result at Le Mans.

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1977	Dorset Racing Associates	Lola T290 / 4S	Ian Harrower	Richard Down	Ernst Berg	not classified
1978	Dorset Racing Organization	Lola T294S	Bob Evans	Richard Down	Richard Bond	failure	broken chassis
1980	Dorset Racing Associates	Lola T297	Peter Clark	Nick Mason		Rank 22
1981	Alain de Cadenet	De Cadenet-Lola LM	Nick Faure	Vivian Candy		failure	Gearbox damage
1982	Chevron Racing Cars	Chevron B36	John Sheldon	Neil Crang		failure	Gearbox damage
1983	Peer Racing	Ford C100	Dave Kennedy	François Migault		failure	no fuel pressure
1985	Helmut Gall	BMW M1	Edgar Dören	Jean-Paul Libert		15th place and class win
1986	Lucky Strike Schanche Racing	Argo JM19 C2	Martin Schanche	Torgjer Kleppe		failure	Engine failure
1988	Chamberlain Engineering	Spice SE86C	Richard Jones	Nick Adams		failure	Gearbox damage

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
1972	Alain de Cadenet	Duckhams LM	BUA	DAY	SEB	BRH	MON	SPA	TAR	ONLY	LEM	ZEL	WAT
													DNF
1974	Escuderia Montjuich	Lola T294	MON	SPA	ONLY	IMO	LEM	ZEL	WAT	LEC	BRH	KYA
											DNF
1977	Dorset Racing	Lola T294S	DAY	MUG	DIJ	MON	SIL	ONLY	VAL	BY	WAT	EST	LEC	MOS	IMO	SAL	BRH	HOK	VAL
												DNF
1980	Dorset Racing	Lola T297	DAY	BRH	SEB	MUG	MON	RIV	SIL	ONLY	LEM	DAY	WAT	SPA	MOS	ROA	VAL	DIJ
											22nd
1981	Alain de Cadenet Dorset Racing Associates	De Cadenet-Lola LM Lola T297	DAY	SEB	MUG	MON	RIV	SIL	ONLY	LEM	BY	DAY	WAT	SPA	MOS	ROA	BRH
										DNF							7th
1982	Chevron Cars Frox Clothing Limited	Chevron B36	MON	SIL	ONLY	LEM	SPA	MUG	FUJ	BRH
				DNF		DNF	16			20th
1983	Peer Racing	Ford C100	MON	SIL	ONLY	LEM	SPA	FUJ	KYA
						DNF
1985	Helmut Gall Jens Winther Chevron Cars	BMW M1 URD C83 Chevron B62	MUG	MON	SIL	LEM	HOK	MOS	SPA	BRH	FUJ	SEL
						15th	14th				DNF
1986	Schanche Racing	Argo JM19 C2	MON	SIL	LEM	NOW	BRH	JER	ONLY	SPA	FUJ
					DNF
1988	PC Automotive Chamberlain Engineering	Argo JM19 Spice SE86C	JER	JAR	MON	SIL	LEM	BRÜ	BRH	ONLY	SPA	FUJ	SAN
					DNF		DNF		DNF

literature

• Christian Moity, Jean-Marc Teissedre: 24 hours of mans . 1923-1992. 2 volumes. Édition d'Art JB Barthelemy, Besançon 1992, ISBN 2-909-413-06-3 .

Web links

Commons : Martin Birrane  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Information about Martin Birrane
• Martin Birrane at the Driver Database
• Martin Birrane at Racing Sports Cars

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Birrane and Partner Ltd.
2. ↑ Birrane and Partners and the Peer Group ( Memento of the original from May 22, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
3. ↑ On the bankruptcy of Lola Cars
4. ↑ Thundersports Races from Snetterton 1983