Riccardo Agusta

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Riccardo Agusta contested his last Le Mans 24-hour race in a Kremer K8 Spyder in 1998

Count Riccardo Giovanni "Rocky" Agusta (born October 21, 1950 in Milan ; † January 10, 2018 in St. Moritz ) was an Italian entrepreneur, car racing driver and racing team owner.

Family and origin

Riccardo Agusta was born into the wealthy Italian industrialist family Agusta . His grandfather was Giovanni Agusta , born in Parma in 1879 , who founded the aircraft manufacturer Agusta in Palermo in 1908 . His father was Corrado Agusta , one of the four sons of the company founder. After the death of their grandfather, who died in 1927 of complications after an operation, Corrado's brothers Domenico and Vincenzo took over the company. MV Agusta was founded in 1945 under Domenico's leadership as an independent motorcycle manufacturer. Domenico died in 1971 and the management went to Riccardo's father Corrado.

The history of the Augusta family is pervaded by private scandals, inheritance disputes and unknown causes of death. His uncle Vincenzo was found dead in his Milan apartment in 1958. Shock was given as the cause of death, but what triggered it remained unexplained. Domenico suffered a stroke on January 29, 1971 while visiting the company with the Finnish President Urho Kekkonen , of which he died four days later. After his father became the head of the family and thus took control of the group of companies, there were considerable inheritance disputes with Domenico's widow, her son and daughter Giovanna Agusta . This caused a scandal in the 1960s when her relationship with the Brazilian footballer José Germano de Sales , who was involved with AC Milan , became public. Sales was still married and although his daughter was pregnant, the father refused to consent to the marriage after his divorce in Brazil . The couple fled hastily to Belgium and married in Liège . After only three years, the marriage ended in divorce and Giovanna returned to Italy.

Another family scandal also affected Riccardo Agusta, at least indirectly. Father Corrado had married the model Francesca Vacca Garfagni Agusta in the 1980s as a second marriage. After Corrado's death in 1989 there was a dispute over the inheritance here too. Riccardo and Vacca Agusta fought in court about the villa in Portofino , properties in New York , Mexico City , London and St. Moritz , as well as several 1,000 billion Italian lira in cash. In the event of a settlement, the legacy was shared between the parties to the dispute. Among other things, the widow received the villa in Portofino. Vacca Agusta ran into problems with the Italian judiciary in the 1990s. In the course of Mani pulite and the investigation into Bettino Craxi , Vacca Agusta was also charged. The accusation: You laundered enormous sums of money for Craxi abroad . She fled to Mexico, where she was arrested, extradited to Italy and sentenced to two years in prison, but was released on bail. In 2001 she died under mysterious reasons. After she disappeared from her villa, her body was found a few weeks later on the French coast. The cause of death could never be completely clarified.

Riccardo Agusta was close friends with Vito Roberto Palazzolo . In 1980, MV Agusta stopped producing motorcycles. The brand name was sold to Claudio Castiglione and Cagiva in 1992 .

Marriage and entrepreneur

In the 1970s, Riccardo Agusta went into the stock market with his own company and married Monica Consorti in 1979 . Cosorti's father owned what was then Italy's largest television production company . Agusta also worked as a winemaker .

Racing career

At the beginning of the 1990s, Agusta entered motorsport as a driver and racing team owner. Since he had enough of his own capital, he handled his sports car sports with his own team. Over the years he has acquired a number of racing cars with which he competed in the BPR Global GT Series and the FIA GT Championship . The first cars came from Venturi Paris : a 500LM , a 600LM and a 400 GTR .

He had his first racing appearance in 1993 at the 24 Hours of Le Mans , where he finished 23rd in the overall standings together with Onofrio Russo and Paolo Mondini in the Venturi 500LM. He had most of the races on a Callaway Corvette. In 1994 he was tenth overall in the Paul Ricard 4-hour race and eleventh overall in Le Mans in 1995 .

With the end of the 1997 season he ended the activities of his racing team and in 1998 entered into a partnership with Kremer Racing . With the eighth place with Almo Coppelli in the Kremer K8 Spyder in the RAC Tourist Trophy he celebrated his greatest success in the service of Kremer Racing. At the end of the year he also resigned as a driver. In 2004 he tried a comeback, which was unsuccessful.

statistics

Le Mans results

year team vehicle Teammate Teammate placement Failure reason
1993 ItalyItaly Agusta Racing Venturi 500LM ItalyItaly Onofrio Russo ItalyItaly Paolo Mondini Rank 23
1994 ItalyItaly Agusta Racing Team Venturi 600LM ItalyItaly Almo Coppelli FranceFrance Michel Krine failure Wagon fire
1995 ItalyItaly Augusta Racing Team Callaway Super Naturel Corvette United KingdomUnited Kingdom Eugene O'Brien United KingdomUnited Kingdom Robin Donovan Rank 11
1996 United KingdomUnited Kingdom Agusta Racing Team Ltd. Callaway Corvette ItalyItaly Almo Coppelli FranceFrance Patrick Camus failure Clutch damage
1997 United KingdomUnited Kingdom Agusta Racing Team Ltd. Callaway Corvette LM-GT ItalyItaly Almo Coppelli FranceFrance Eric Graham failure Ignition damage
1998 GermanyGermany Kremer Racing Kremer K8 Spyder ItalyItaly Almo Coppelli FranceFrance Xavier Pompidou Rank 12

literature

  • Christian Moity, Jean-Marc Teissèdre, Alain Bienvenu: 24 heures du Mans, 1923–1992. Éditions d'Art, Besançon 1992, ISBN 2-909-413-06-3 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rocky Agusta passed away
  2. ↑ Domenico Agusta (in the middle with a white coat) between Giacomo Agostini (left) and Mike Hailwood (right)
  3. ↑ Vincenzo Agusta (1915-1958)
  4. ↑ The Agusta-de Sales scandal (Italian)
  5. ↑ About Giovanna Agusta (Italian)
  6. ↑ Francesca Vacca Garfagni Agusta
  7. ↑ The Agusta Villa in Portofino
  8. ↑ The Agusta inheritance dispute (Italian)
  9. ↑ The Disappearance of Countess Agusta Part 1
  10. ↑ Part 2
  11. ↑ picture of the wedding ceremony
  12. ^ About the wedding of Monica Consorti and Riccardo Agusta
  13. ↑ Riccardo Agusta sells his winery
  14. ↑ Paul Ricard's 4-hour race in 1994
  15. ^ RAC Tourist Trophy 1998
personal data
SURNAME Agusta, Riccardo
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Agusta, Count Riccardo Giovanni (full name); Agusta, Rocky (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian entrepreneur and racing car driver
DATE OF BIRTH October 21, 1950
PLACE OF BIRTH Milan
DATE OF DEATH January 10, 2018
Place of death St. Moritz