Yvonne Simon

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Yvonne Simon (born in 1917 in Troyes , the department of Aube , France ; died on 16th August 1992 , possibly also in Troyes) was a French automobile - racing driver . It was active immediately before and after World War II until the second half of the 1950s, especially in endurance races in France and Italy . In particular, she drove in circuit races with sports cars , in multi-day rallies and hill climbs , including twice in the Le Mans 24-hour race and once in the Mille Miglia . Together with her British co-driver Betty Haig , Simon was the last female driver to finish the Le Mans 24-hour race for more than two decades from 1951. She was one of the first women to compete with her own Ferrari , and in her day one of the best-known and most successful motorsport - “ Amazons ”.

Yvonne Simon in Saint-Raphaël, 1939

background

Yvonne Simon is one of a small group of female racing drivers from different countries who were successful both before and after World War II. In addition to her and Betty Haig, these include the Italian Anna Maria Peduzzi (also known by her nicknames Marocchina and Moroccan Girl ), Germaine Rouault , Charlotte Versigny , Fernande de Cortanze (née Hustinx, mother of the racing driver André de Cortanze ) and the Norwegian Greta Molander . With the changed economic and social conditions after the war, only a few female racing drivers followed for several decades, including Gilberte Thirion and Annie Bousquet .

Life

Yvonne Simon grew up in France. She was able to celebrate her first motorsport successes in her home country from 1937 in her early twenties, before the Second World War put an end to further racing activities. From 1949 she continued her career as a “ gentleman driver ”, that is, as an amateur motor sportswoman without a works contract with an automobile manufacturer . She came into contact in particular with the Italian-born racing driver Luigi Chinetti , who had won the Le Mans 24-hour race in 1932 , 1934 and 1949 ; he emigrated to the United States during World War II and was naturalized there in 1946 , but lived in Paris after the war , from where he ran his first own racing team . Through Chinetti, later a successful Ferrari importer for the United States and founder of the North American Racing Team (NART), Simon acquired her first Ferrari in 1950, a 166 MM , which was soon followed by a second. She competed in at least 14 important endurance races on Ferraris. From 1953, Simon was now a good 35 years old, she drove several races for the French private team Monopole with their light, self-designed Panhard- motorized racing sports car , before ending her career in rallies in the second half of the 1950s.

She was mostly active in France and Italy, occasionally also in Belgium , the Federal Republic of Germany and Portugal . She competed several times in all -women driver teams, for example with her compatriots Suzanne Largeot and Rouault and the Briton Haig. She formed mixed driver pairs at Monopole with her compatriots Jean de Montrémy and Jean Hémard . On the fringes of motorsport events, she liked to be among her fellow racing drivers and compatriots , including Rouault, the dancer and " Bugatti Queen" Hellé Nice (1900–1984) and Anne-Cécile Rose-Itier (1890–1980).

Career in motorsport

Long-distance drives, rallies and mountain races

A Hotchkiss 686 with a 3.5-liter six-cylinder engine, like the one that Simon drove in a similar form at the Monte Carlo Rally in 1938 and 1939

One of the first races that Yvonne Simon contested before the outbreak of World War II was the long-distance Liège – Rome – Liège journey, steeped in tradition ; her co-driver Régine Gordine had her motorsport debut here, replacing the sick Suzanne Largeot and becoming a frequent partner of Simons in the following years. In 1937, Simon competed in a Hotchkiss Grand Sport in the Paris – Saint-Raphaël Féminin rally , a long-distance drive through France advertised only for women, and came second straight away. She became a regular participant in the prestigious race that has been held every year since 1929 and regularly ran over a distance of 1500 to 2500 kilometers. In 1939, Simon won the last pre-war edition, still on their Hotchkiss. She was able to repeat this victory three times in the post-war period, in 1952 and 1953 on a Renault 4CV 1063 and in 1954 on a Panhard Monopole 750.

Also in 1939, Simon won the Coupe des Dames women's championship in the legendary Monte Carlo Rally from Athens . At her first "Monte" in 1937, while still on a Matford , she was eliminated; In 1938 she reached the finish line in Monte Carlo as co-pilot of Luise Lamberjack on her Hotchkiss, depending on the source in eleventh or second place. In addition, he came seventh overall at the Paris – Nice long-distance rally in 1939, again on Hotchkiss.

In the post-war period she competed in the Monte Carlo Rally several times , for example in 1949 (the first post-war edition) and with her co-driver Gordine in a Simca 8 Grand Sport Coupé in 1951 and 1952. She completed the Aosta-Gran hill climb three times in a row San Bernardo on one of her Ferraris, in 1951 on her light blue Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM with chassis number 0042M from 1950 and in the following two years on her Ferrari 166 MM Zagato Spyder with chassis number 0018M from 1949/50. In May 1951 she took part in the Rally Morocco (the 5th Rallye International de l'Atlas Marocain ) and was nineteenth overall. Her partner was once again Michel Kassel , with whom she had already contested the Le Mans 24-hour race in 1950 ; Her emergency vehicle was again the Ferrari 166 Export Vignale Spyder with chassis number 0072E of the entrepreneur and racing driver Alberico Cacciari , which she had already driven at the 1951 Mille Miglia .

Endurance racing on the circuit

Before World War II

One of the first circuit races Simon contested in September 1938 with the 12-hour race in Paris on the Montlhéry circuit ; Together with her partner Largeot, she took 8th place in the overall classification and 2nd place in the class up to 1.1 liter displacement on their Simca 8 with a distance of 1151.656 kilometers .

The 1949 season

In July 1949 she took part with her partner Rouault in the Spa-Francorchamps 24-hour race on a Delahaye ; In a field dominated by sports cars, they finished eleventh overall and won the touring car class with a displacement of up to 4.0 liters. It is likely that Luigi Chinetti, the overall winner of the race, became aware of Simon and supported her for the next few years.

The 1950 season

From the summer of 1950 Simon used her newly acquired Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM. In June she was fourth overall and also class winner at the Circuito do Porto in Portugal. A week later, she and her partner Michel Kassel, who was on Luigi Chinetti's team, retired early at the Le Mans 24-hour race in 1950 : When braking into a bend, Simon slipped into a run-off zone with sand and gravel and got stuck there . Since no outside help was allowed according to the regulations, she dug the car free together with her co-pilot and got back on the track with the help of improvised sand sheets . In doing so, however, they had used up the last of the fuel and finally got stuck on the way back to the pit. Nonetheless, she received recognition on site and in press reports for her brave efforts.

The next month she competed in the Grand Prix de Rouen sports car race , where she was twelfth in a field of mostly larger-displacement vehicles. In August, she was eliminated from the German Grand Prix at the Rhineland-Palatinate Prize at the Nürburgring , the fourth round of the German Sports Car Championship , shortly before the end of the race, but was still ranked tenth in her class.

The 1951 season

In 1951, Yvonne Simon won two sports car races in Nice on her Ferrari , including the Circuit de Vitesse de Nice . For the Mille Miglia 1951 at the end of April, she teamed up with the Italian entrepreneur and racing driver Alberico Cacciari from Milan ; in his Ferrari 166 Export Vignale Spyder with the chassis number 0072E, which had its racing premiere here, they came in 90th overall place out of 426 registered vehicles, at the same time in 7th place for sports cars up to 2.0 liters displacement.

For the 24-hour race at Le Mans in 1951 in June, she was again registered on her own Ferrari. Once again in Luigi Chinetti's team, but now with her British co-driver Betty Haig, she achieved the highly regarded 15th place overall, as well as third place for sports cars up to 2.0 liters. The success attracted all the more attention as water had collected in the brake drums on the long straights during heavy rain and made braking difficult; Similar to the previous year, Simon slipped into a run-off zone, but this time was able to continue her race with a considerable delay and heavy oil consumption. For a long time both were the last female drivers to cross the finish line in the Le Mans 24-hour race; It was not until 1973 that Marie-Claude Charmasson (under her pseudonym Marie-Claude Beaumont) succeeded in making the next woman finish there.

In August 1951, however, Simon left the III. Giro delle Calabrie . The following week she was overall sixth at the Coppa Adriatica on the Circuito di Senigallia .

The 1952 season

In June 1952, Simon achieved 8th overall and 4th place in her class at the Grand Prix de Reims with her Ferrari 166 MM Zagato, but retired from the Circuito di Senigallia in August . A month later she contested the Bari Grand Prix - still on her Ferrari - and came in thirteenth overall. (6th place in her class).

The 1953 season

At the Mille Miglia 1953 in April she was registered for the first time on a Fiat 1100 , for the first time with partner Paola Della Chiesa , but did not start. In June she finished 11th with her Ferrari at the Gran Premio di Monza . In July, she contested her first race for Monopole: at the 12-hour race in Reims , she finished fourteenth overall with an X85 and co-operator Hémard as partner. (6th place in her class). In August, she completed the 12-hour race in Pescara in 1953, the last major circuit race in her Ferrari.

The years 1954 and 1955

In 1954 and 1955, Simon drove circuit races only for monopolies. In April 1954 she finished fourth at the Grand Prix de Nîmes , but in July at the 12-hour race in Reims , she and her partner Jean de Montrémy were eliminated by accident. Their last big circuit race was the Bol d'Or for automobiles in 1955 in Montlhéry near Paris together with de Montrémy, in which they were tenth overall and second in their class.

Simon's Ferrari sports cars

The Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM with chassis number 0042M, which Yvonne Simon had acquired in 1950 and used for almost two years
The same Ferrari 166 MM, exhibited in 2013 in the Museo Enzo Ferrari in Modena, Italy (in the picture above, exhibited in 2011 in Abu Dhabi ( UAE) )

Yvonne Simon was one of the first women to buy a Ferrari. In the spring of 1950, she bought the light blue Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM with chassis number 0042M from Luigi Chinetti in Paris. Apart from the color, the vehicle was similar to the one that Ferrari had presented at the Turin Motor Show. With Italian registration, Simon used it from June 1950 until at least August 1951, including in the 24-hour races of Le Mans in 1950 and 1951. She then sold the car to the Italian racing driver Gilberto Cornacchia , who generally ran his races under the pseudonym " Serano ”denied; After several own assignments in 1953, he made the Berlinetta available to Scuderia Autieri from the end of the 1953 season . The vehicle has survived to this day and has belonged to an Italian Ferrari collector from Modena since the late 1970s , who had it extensively restored and occasionally presented at anniversaries of the Ferrari parent company.

At the end of 1951, Simon bought the Ferrari 166 MM with chassis number 0018M. The vehicle with the short wheelbase of 2.20 meters was acquired by the Italian racing driver Antonio Stagnoli as a new car in the summer of 1949, originally equipped with a custom-made “Panoramica” Berlinetta body from Carrozzeria Zagato designed by Ugo Zagato . In August 1950, Stagnoli had it converted into the Zagato Spyder with a slim two-seater body, free-standing wheels and removable motorcycle-like fenders , again as a one-off piece that resembles the earlier Spyder Corsa models from Ferrari and individual racing items from Carrozzeria Paolo Fontana and Carrozzeria Campana . Yvonne Simon raced the Zagato Spyder in various races from the end of 1951 to the end of 1953, including several Grands Prix and twice in the Aosta – Gran San Bernardo hill climb. The whereabouts of the car is largely in the dark: until the 1960s, it was said to have been in a very poor overall condition, technically complete, but with a poor body. In 1968 he found a new owner who - probably still unrestored - kept it in the south of France before selling it within France. The Ferrari has not been presented to the public since 1953; its whereabouts from 1999 onwards are unclear.

Yvonne Simon only used a third Ferrari from the early days of the brand on loan, the Ferrari 166 Export Vignale Spyder with chassis number 0072E, which Alberico Cacciari from Milan had acquired in 1951. After Simon had contested the Mille Miglia in 1951 and the Morocco Rally with him, Cacciari had it converted into a Spyder Corsa at Carrozzeria Campana in the summer of 1951 , and then after further races into a striking, stylish Spyder in autumn 1952 at Carrozzeria Vignale of the unique Ferrari 340 Mexico Vignale Spyder with the chassis number 0228AT. The whereabouts of this car is also largely in the dark: After the conversion, Cacciari sold it to a Brazilian in the state of São Paulo , transferred the sports car himself and took part in a race there. In 1961 the Ferrari was resold within Brazil; his whereabouts after 1964 are uncertain.

statistics

Le Mans results

year team vehicle Teammate placement Failure reason
1950 United StatesUnited States Luigi Chinetti Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM FranceFrance Michel checkout failure Accident / lack of fuel
1951 United StatesUnited States Luigi Chinetti Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM United KingdomUnited Kingdom Betty Haig Rank 15

Paris – Saint-Raphaël Féminin rally

  • 1937: 2nd overall on Hotchkiss Grand Sport (behind Germaine Rouault , probably on Delahaye)
  • 1939: 1st overall in Hotchkiss Grand Sport (ahead of Germaine Rouault in Delahaye 135 and Betty Haig in MG)
  • 1951: 2nd overall in a Ferrari (behind Lucienne Alziary de Roquefort in a Panhard Dyna and in front of Betty Haig in a MG)
  • 1952: 1st overall in Renault (ahead of Lucienne Alziary de Roquefort in Panhard Dyna and Madeleine Pochon in Renault)
  • 1953: 1st overall in Renault (ahead of Alexandra Hammersley in Lancia Aurelia and Jane Bagarry / "Mlle de Warren" in Renault)
  • 1954: 1st overall place in Panhard Monopole (ahead of Lucienne Alziary de Roquefort in Dyna Panhard and Gilberte Thirion in a Porsche 356)
  • 1957: 1st overall place in Panhard Monopole

Rallye Monte Carlo - Coupe des Dames (ladies' championship)

literature

  • Jean François Bouzanquet: Fast Ladies - Female Racing Drivers 1888 to 1970 . Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2009, ISBN 978-1-84584-225-3 , in particular pp. 29, 61, 73 f., 82, 92, 95, 101 (English).

Web links

Commons : Yvonne Simon  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Rachel HG: Yvonne Simon . Speedqueens, October 24, 2018 , accessed on March 5, 2020.
  2. ↑ a b Yvonne Simon on the motorsportmagazine.com web portal , accessed on March 5, 2020 (English).
  3. ↑ Yvonne Simon on the web portal 24h-en-piste.com , accessed on March 5, 2020 (French).
  4. ↑ Yvonne Simon on the web portal les24heures.fr , accessed on March 5, 2020 (French).
  5. ↑ Jean François Bouzanquet: Fast Ladies - Female Racing Drivers 1888 to 1970 . Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2009, ISBN 978-1-84584-225-3 , p. 92 (English).
  6. ↑ a b c d e f g h i The racing history of the Ferrari 166 MM Touring Berlinetta LM with chassis number 0042M, owned by Yvonne Simon from 1950 to 1952/53, on the web portal barchetta.cc , accessed on March 5, 2020 (English).
  7. ↑ a b c d e f The racing history of the Ferrari 166 MM Zagato with chassis number 0018M, which belonged to Yvonne Simon from around 1951/52 until the 1960s, on the web portal barchetta.cc , accessed on March 5, 2020 (English).
  8. ↑ a b Overview of Yvonne Simon's racing results on the racingsportscars.com web portal , accessed on March 5, 2020 (English).
  9. ↑ a b Jean François Bouzanquet: Fast Ladies - Female Racing Drivers 1888 to 1970 . Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2009, ISBN 978-1-84584-225-3 , p. 29 (English).
  10. ^ Moteurs (magazine), 1957, p. 53 (French).
  11. ↑ a b Jean François Bouzanquet: Fast Ladies - Female Racing Drivers 1888 to 1970 . Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2009, ISBN 978-1-84584-225-3 , pp. 73 f. (English).
  12. ↑ a b Jean François Bouzanquet: Fast Ladies - Female Racing Drivers 1888 to 1970 . Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2009, ISBN 978-1-84584-225-3 , p. 95 (English).
  13. ↑ a b c d The racing history of the Ferrari 166 Export with chassis number 0072E, used by Yvonne Simon for two races in 1951, on the web portal barchetta.cc , accessed on March 5, 2020 (English).
  14. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Detailed presentation of the racing results of Yvonne Simon on the web portal racingsportscars.com , accessed on March 5, 2020 (English).
  15. ^ Erwin Christian Lessner: Famous Auto Races and Rallies . Hanover House, London, United Kingdom 1956, ISBN without, p. 229 (English).
  16. ↑ a b Jean François Bouzanquet: Fast Ladies - Female Racing Drivers 1888 to 1970 . Veloce Publishing, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2009, ISBN 978-1-84584-225-3 , p. 101 (English).
  17. ↑ Terry O'Neil: NART: A concise history of the North American Racing Team 1957 to 1983. Veloce Publishing, Poundbury, Dorchester, United Kingdom 2015, ISBN 978-1-845847-87-6 , p. 27 (English).
  18. ^ Motor Sport (magazine), 1961, p. 689 (English).
  19. ↑ Overview of the starters in the 24 Hours of Le Mans on the web portal les24heures.fr , accessed on March 5, 2020 (French).
  20. ^ Road and Track (magazine), 1966, p. 42 (English).
  21. ↑ Rachel HG: The Paris — St. Raphaël Rally . Speedqueens, January 16, 2011 , accessed on March 25, 2020.
  22. ↑ Rachel HG: The Coupe des Dames in the Monte Carlo Rally: Part I . Speedqueens, March 16, 2016 , accessed on March 25, 2020.

Remarks

  1. ↑ Sometimes there are also deviating, sometimes contradicting information about the person. The web portal 24h-en-piste.com (accessed on March 5, 2020, in French) names the full name Yvonne Marie Louise Simon, the maiden name Hémart and the dates of birth December 6, 1910 in Charmont (probably meaning Charmont-sous-Barbuise in the Aube department in the Grand Est region ). The web portal les24heures.fr (accessed on March 5, 2020, in French) confirms the other first and maiden names and the place of birth, but deviates from the date of birth December 6, 1906. However, both earlier dates of birth contradict other sources and the girlish appearance on photos of first racing appearances.
  2. ↑ However, the organizer of the Le Mans 24-hour race, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO), no longer allowed female drivers up to and including 1970 to start after Annie Bousquet's accidental death at the Circuit de Reims-Gueux in 1956. which puts the performance of Simon / Haig into perspective. On the other hand, due to changed economic and social developments in those years there were hardly any female drivers who were able to gain a foothold in increasingly professional motorsport and who would have been interested in a Le Mans start.
personal data
SURNAME Simon, Yvonne
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French racing car driver
DATE OF BIRTH 1917
PLACE OF BIRTH Troyes , Aube department , France
DATE OF DEATH August 16, 1992
Place of death Troyes , Aube department , France