The greatest ever racing engineers thread

[Richard]

Actually ....

- Race engineer = 'race' is a noun so this is someone provides engineering support for a race.
- Racing engineer = "racing' is a verb so this is someone who happens to be an engineer by profession and drives a racing car, or rides a horse/motorbike/bicycle etc.
- Motorsport or F1 engineer is probably the right phrase for what is intended in this thread.

I think Bruce McLaren was successful for all 3 meanings. Any others?

[xpensive]

So, if I am a "racing man", what am I, a man in a hurry or a fan of racing?

This guy was both I can tell you that much;



As well as a most underestimated design engineer and manager.

[marcush.]

One not so obvious hero of mine is Mo Nunn who had some shoestring designs in Formula 1 which went a lot better than you would have thought possible considering the recources available. He embarked on a career in US single seaters as a race engineer with Ganassi and this led to many many titles with Emerson Fittipaldi,Zanardi and Montoya...
Sadly two of his drivers -Reggazoni and Zanrdi suffered bad injury racing for him.
I think Mo Nunns efforts were absolutely astonishing.

Excellent point: doing much with little is commendable. I believe Aldo Costa turned out some worthy designs while at Minardi with very scant resources. (Or am I mis-remembering?)

Make no bones about it -building race cars will never turn out being a cheap undertaking -it was not for Mo Nunn it was not for Chapman and it was certain ly not for Toyota.
Bang for buck some efforts were pure money drains not necesarily because of the engineers involved but somehow these brilliant people did not prosper in their environment for one reason or another.

The Pitbull Gascoyne a very good example with his time at Toyota and Caterham.

coming back to Mo Nunns Fomula 1 time -i´m pretty sure they had brilliant suppliers in the background and used them wisely to get a good return on investment .
I´d think Ensign rarely had the top cosworth engines ,let alone spare PUs ,Money sensibly spent at the right corner of the car -wasn´t Caterham not running RedBulls rear of the car for years now ? so basically 3/3rds of the car was a RedBull but that did not help much....

Aldo Costa was already a little star during his time at Minardi -I think he was the youngest TD ever in formula 1( i think he was 29 when caliri stepped down from his role as TD at Minardi) ?

[xpensive]

John Barnard drew, and I mean drew, this beauty in his own living room;

[SectorOne]

- Hey Newey, can you design your first ever F1 car for us please?
- Sure i´ll just make it aerodynamically superior to everything else on track, is that ok?


Just love this car to bits. The small creases at the front suspension, the sidepod "wing", the boxy airbox (get it?)

Now the aerodynamically superior thing is just a joke but still, not a bad first try.
4 different teams, 3 of them became champions, 1 of which enjoyed the second longest WCC/WDC run tied with Mclaren.

[xpensive]

I remember when Ivan Capelli almost won the 1990 French GP in that car, only overtaken by Prost three laps from the end.

[lebesset]

tony rudd

[GitanesBlondes]

AJ Watson was the best car builder at the Indy 500 from the mid-1950s into the early 1960s.

[scotty86]

Norbert Singer.

[xpensive]

Hans Mezger;

[Lt_Boards]

Sir Jack Brabham..... Game set match!

[Sombrero]

Gerard Ducarouge has passed away. R.I.P. Gégé & Andrea



http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/f1-informati ... ducarouge/

http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/cref-ducger.html

http://www.racer.com/f1/item/113774-obi ... 5?showall=

[F1NAC]

Not f1 because it didnt exist then bit Vittorio Jano and his Alfa Romeo p2

[J.A.W.]

Peter Williams : `70s John Player Norton factory racing head development engineer - was also their No 1 rider..

[Facts Only]

The countless guys who spend their evenings and weekends designing building there own race cars, trailer them to events and compete at National level out of the back of their car with nothing but a tool box and some packs of Sandwiches. They have built cars to the same regs' as the big teams and prepare, run and drive their own cars on tiny budgets.
These guys may not get the glory or the pay, and may not be on Newey genius levels but what they do is a Great achievement especially when they do it alongside regular jobs just for the love of racing.

I know plenty of these guys (naming no names) and to me these are up there with any of the greatest racing engineers already mentioned.