Tommy Wisdom

Tommy Wisdom at the wheel of a Daimler Conquest at the 1954 Monte Carlo Rally

The restored Bentley 4 1/4 Paulin, with which Tommy Wisdom and Soltan Hay achieved sixth place in the overall standings at the 1949 24 Hours of Le Mans

A model of the Nash-Healey 3 liter with the starting number 10. Leslie Johnson and Tommy Wisdom achieved third place in Le Mans in 1952 with the original vehicle

Thomas Henry "Tommy" Wisdom (born February 6, 1906 in Brighton , † November 12, 1972 in Birmingham ) was a British racing driver and journalist .

Life and family

Tommy Wisdom was born in February 1906 as the eldest son of the journalist Thomas Bertram Wisdom (1879-1958) and his wife Annie May, née Attwater. The career of Wisdom, who was instrumental in the first steps in the career of Stirling Moss in 1950 , spanned almost four decades. He contested his first car race in the early 1930s; He had his last race start at the Targa Florio in 1964 . In the years in between he competed alongside the Targa Florio, especially in the Mille Miglia , the 24-hour race of Le Mans and the RAC Tourist Trophy . He combined his job as a motorsport journalist with his racing activities and thus provided readers with authentic first-hand accounts. As an amateur racing driver, his recognized vehicle control brought him many works engagements.

His wife Elsie, known as "Bill", was also an active racing driver in the 1930s and 1940s. Although they never raced on the same team, the two were very popular in Le Mans in the late 1930s as "The Tommy and Bill Show". The question of which of the two would cross the finish line as the better placed regularly triggered a flood of competition among British spectators. The daughter Ann followed in the footsteps of her parents in the 1950s and was active as a racing driver and rally driver for several years; Among other things, she contested the 1956 Monte Carlo Rally with Pat Moss , the sister of Stirling Moss.

Career

Tommy Wisdom contested his first international race in 1931 when he started in the RAC Tourist Trophy . He finished the race on a 22 km circuit near Belfast in 19th place overall. When he started the Le Mans 24-hour race for the first time in 1934 , he had already signed a works contract with Singer . With the Singer 9 Le Mans , which had a 1.0-liter in- line engine , a success in the overall standings was out of the question. A victory in the class for racing vehicles up to 1.1-liter displacement was also unmatched. The race winners - Luigi Chinetti and Philippe Étancelin in an Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 - missed the finish line with 52 laps (Wisdom had covered 161 laps with partner John Donald Barnes ). The gap to the class winners Charles EC Martin and Roy Eccles on a MG K3 was still 36 laps at the finish.

In 1935 , a married couple competed for the first time in Le Mans. Tommy Wisdom drove a Singer 9 Le Mans again, his wife Elsie drove a Riley Nine together with Canadian Kay Petre . Both did not see the checkered flag after defects. Two years later , the two were also registered in the Mille Miglia. It was Wisdom's first appearance in the 1000-mile race through Italy and this time he and his wife formed a team. The MG SA Berlina had an accident halfway through with Tommy Wisdom at the wheel; The driver and front passenger were uninjured.

He drove his last Le Mans race before the Second World War in 1939 . It wasn't until three years after the end of the war that he started racing again. He returned to the international racing stage with an eighth place overall in the Spa-Francorchamps 24-hour race this year . In 1950, after a sixth place overall at Le Mans and many motorsport articles in the British trade press, he had risen to become a well-known person in the racing scene, who also had good contacts with team bosses and managing directors of automobile manufacturers. In the early 1950s, the promoted the young career of Sterling Moss. Moss started some races with Wisdom's Jaguar C-Type , which today belongs to the British collector Richard Frankel.

As a driver, he had his greatest successes in the early 1950s. His wife had already ended her career by then. After an accident on the Alpine tour in 1951 - Elsie was her husband's co-driver - she resigned. "It would be enough now," and "when should fate not continue to challenge" she said in an interview. Tommy continued his career and was third overall in Le Mans and twelfth in the Mille Miglia in 1952 .

In 1952 Wisdom made an extraordinary appearance with the Daimler Motor Company . Together with Baron Selsdon and Anthony Hume, he entered the 1952 Monte Carlo Rally with a Daimler DE36 . They started in Lisbon and brought the large and heavy car, which was actually a state car , to the finish line, but were not classified.

From 1953 he worked for the Bristol Aircraft Company in Le Mans for three years and drove their Bristol 450 there . In 1953, a fallen suspension part damaged the fuel line on Tommy Wisdom and Jack Fairman's vehicle while Wisdom was behind the wheel, causing leaking fuel to ignite on the hot exhaust. The fire spread to the cockpit as the car drove, inflicting severe burns on Wisdom's hands and legs.

He contested his last Mille Miglia in 1957 and his last race ever was the 1964 Targa Florio, which he was unable to finish as a partner of Paddy Hopkirk after a differential damage to the Austin-Healey Sprite .

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1934	Singer Ltd.	Singer 9 Le Mans	John Donald Barnes	Rank 18
1935	Singer Ltd.	Singer 9 Le Mans Replica	John Donald Barnes	failure	starter
1938	Team Autosports	Singer 9 Le Mans Replica	John Donald Barnes	failure	drive shaft
1939	Archie Scott	Singer 9 Le Mans Replica	Archie Scott	failure	Dirty gasoline
1949	HSF Hay	Bentley 4¼ Paulin	Soltan Hay	Rank 6
1950	Jowett Cars Ltd.	Jowett Jupiter R1	Tommy Wise	16th place and class win
1951	Jowett Cars Ltd.	Jowett Jupiter R1	Tommy Wise	failure	Overheated cylinder
1952	Donald Healey Motor Company	Nash-Healey 4 liter	Leslie Johnson	3rd place and class win
1953	Bristol Airplane Company	Bristol 450 Coupe	Jack Fairman	failure	accident
1954	Bristol Airplane Company	Bristol 450	Jack Fairman	Rank 8
1955	Bristol Airplane Company	Bristol 450C	Jack Fairman	Rank 9

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	18th	19th	20th
1953	Aston Martin Bristol Cars	Aston Martin DB2 Bristol 450	SEB	MIM	LEM	SPA	ONLY	RTT	CAP
				DNF	DNF
1954	Donald Healey Motor Company Bristol Cars	Austin-Healey 100 Bristol 450	BUA	SEB	MIM	LEM	RTT	CAP
					DNF	8th
1955	Aston Martin Bristol Cars	Aston Martin DB2 Bristol 450	BUA	SEB	MIM	LEM	RTT	TAR
					DNF	9
1956		Austin-Healey 100S	BUA	SEB	MIM	ONLY	KRI
					77
1957		Austin-Healey 100S	BUA	SEB	MIM	ONLY	LEM	KRI	CAR
					37
1959	Tommy Wisdom	Austin-Healey Sprite	SEB	TAR	ONLY	LEM	RTT
				18th
1964	Donald Healey Motor Company	Austin-Healey Sprite	DAY	SEB	TAR	MON	SPA	CON	ONLY	ROS	LEM	REI	FRE	CCE	RTT	SIM	ONLY	MON	TDF	BRI	BRI	PAR
					DNF

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 .
• RM Clarke: Le Mans. The Bentley & Alfa Years 1923-1939. Brocklands Books, Cobham 1998, ISBN 1-85520-465-7 .
• RM Clarke: Le Mans. The Jaguar Years 1949-1957. Brooklands Books, Cobham 1997, ISBN 1-85520-357-X .

Web links

Commons : Tommy Wisdom  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Tommy Wisdom at Racing Sports Cars

Individual evidence

1. ^ Anne Wisdom; in their parents' footsteps
2. ^ RAC Tourist Trophy 1931
3. ↑ Mille Miglia 1937
4. ↑ The ex-Tommy-Wisdom Jaguar C-Type at the Ennstal-Classis 2011
5. ↑ Elsie Wisdom resigns in 1951
6. ↑ List of participants in the 1952 Monte Carlo Rally (accessed on March 21, 2020).
7. ^ Brian Long: Daimler & Lanchester. A Century of Motor History , Longford International Publications, 1995, ISBN 1899154019 , p. 218.
8. ↑ Targa Florio 1964