Auto Racing Commentary

  7/11/1943, Siegen, Germany Deceased Riverside, USA 4/24/1983 Starts: 54 Points: 14 Wins:0 Poles:0 Fastest Laps:0   Rarely is a driver’s first Formula 1 season his absolute best, especially when a driver hasa long GP career, as was Stommelen’s case. A sports car driver by excellence, who was drafted into the Porsche team after some useful hill climbing performances, Stommelen got a crack in the Formula 1 circus in the F2 section of the German Grand Prix, in 1969. He was 8th in the race and 9th in class, driving a Lotus for Roy Winkelmann. His Formula 1 debut proper took place in the South Africa GP of 1970. Aided by sponsorship from the German magazine Auto Motor und Sport, Rolf was retained by Brabham to run alongside team boss Jack. Rolf normally qualified poorly, save for a 7th place in Belgium, but ended up scoring points in four occasions. The first time was in Belgium, where he finished 5th. He placed 5th in Germany as well, and the...

By Carlos De Paula   In hindsight it is always easy to criticize decisions that went wrong. On the surface, everything was fine with the World Championship of Makes in the configuration it had in 1971, yet, FISA decided to outlaw the 5-liter Group 5 monster machines, and run the championship exclusively with 3-liter prototypes, which would be essentially Grand Prix racers with prototype bodies. While it is true that only a couple of manufacturers, Porsche and Ferrari, had built new generation 5 liter Group 5s, and these would eventually become old, one gets the feeling that the decision was indeed hasty. Perhaps the 5 liters could contest the championship for a couple more years, ably backed up by 3-liter prototypes as had been the case hitherto. By 1971 the prototypes were no longer grid fillers. Alfa Romeo had won three races on merit, Ferrari was often the fastest car (even faster than the 917 and 512s), and even updated Porsche 908s sprang surprises here ...

2/11/1959, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Starts:41 Points: 15 Wins:0 Poles:0 Fastest Laps:1 Understanding Roberto Moreno’s career is a major undertaking, for he was an obviously talented driver, with enough stamina to be driving to this day, who simply did not seem to catch the right breaks at the right time, although on paper he seemed to have plenty of opportunities. A pal of Nelson Piquet’s, Moreno went to Europe in 1979, and by 1980 was a major force in Formula Ford, winning 15 races. He went to Formula 3 in 1981, got excluded from some races due to regulation violations, and that early in his career got a testing contract with Lotus. Having won the Australian GP in 1981, against many established GP aces, Moreno went to the USA to drive in Atlantic. He then got what could be seen as the opportunity of a lifetime, but turned out to almost kill his career: he was entered as a Lotus race driver in the Dutch GP, but failed to come to grips with the car and DNQ’d miserably. That was...

By Carlos De Paula By 1969, there were quite a few 2 liter sports cars around in Europe to warrant a separate championship. These cars normally competed in the World Championship of Makes, with no chance of outright victory, so competitors welcomed the chance of actually winning races, rather than classes. Read more about it here  https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732674426