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Louis Chiron

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Louis Chiron
Chiron in 1931
BornLouis Alexandre Chiron
(1899-08-03)3 August 1899
Monte Carlo, Monaco
Died22 June 1979(1979-06-22) (aged 79)
Monte Carlo, Monaco
Formula One World Championship career
NationalityMonaco Monégasque
Active years1950–1951, 1953, 1955–1956, 1958
TeamsMaserati (works and non-works), Talbot-Lago, O.S.C.A., Lancia
Entries19 (15 starts)
Championships0
Wins0
Podiums1
Career points4
Pole positions0
Fastest laps0
First entry1950 British Grand Prix
Last entry1958 Monaco Grand Prix
Champ Car career
1 race run over 1 year
First race1929 Indianapolis 500 (Indianapolis)
Wins Podiums Poles
0 0 0
24 Hours of Le Mans career
Years1928–1929, 1931–1933,
1937–1938, 1951, 1953
TeamsChrysler, Weymann, Bugatti, Bouriat, privateer, Chinetti,
Ecurie Bleue, Lancia
Best finishDNF (1929, 1931, 1932, 1933, 1937, 1938, 1953)
Class wins0

Louis Alexandre Chiron (French pronunciation: [lwi ʃi.ʁɔ̃]; 3 August 1899 – 22 June 1979) was a Monégasque racing driver who competed in rallies, sports car races, and Grands Prix.

Among the greatest drivers between the two World Wars, his career embraced over thirty years, starting in 1923,[1] and ending at the end of the 1950s. He is still the oldest driver ever to have started a race in the Formula One World Championship, having taken 6th place in the 1955 Monaco Grand Prix when he was 55.[2] Three years later he became the oldest driver to enter a Formula One race, at 58.[3] The Bugatti Chiron takes its name from him. Until 2024, when Charles Leclerc matched his achievement, he was the only Monegasque driver to have won the Monaco Grand Prix.

Early life and career

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Coming from a family of wine-growers, Louis Chiron's father gained employment as a butler in the Hôtel de Paris at Monaco. As a teenager, Louis was employed as a bellboy at the hotel, and his interest in cars and racing started at that time. During World War I, he was seconded from an artillery regiment as a driver for Maréchal Pétain and Maréchal Foch, thanks to his persistence and a driving license financed by a Russian duchess he met at the hotel.[3][4]

Employed as a dancer after World War I, Chiron's racing career started in 1923, after a rich American woman he was friends with bought him a second hand Bugatti Brescia.[4][1] He started in local hillclimbs,[5] and moved to Grand Prix racing in 1926, after getting a Bugatti T35, and befriending rich industrialist Alfred Hoffman.[1] He won the Grand Prix du Comminges that year, at Saint-Gaudens, near Toulouse.[6]

Driving career

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Starting in 1928, Chiron became a Bugatti factory driver in parallel to his role in Hoffman's private team. During that period, he became one of the dominant drivers in Grand Prix racing. He took major victories at the 1928 Italian Grand Prix, 1929 German Grand Prix, and 1930 Belgian Grand Prix. In the Indianapolis 500 of 1929, he drove a Delage to 7th place.[7] He won the 1931 Monaco Grand Prix and 1931 French Grand Prix in a Bugatti T51.[1]

Chiron's partnership with Hoffman ended in the early 1930s after he was found having an affair with his wife Alice. He was also fired from Bugatti's factory team at the end of 1932. He then founded with his friend Rudolf Caracciola a new team, called Scuderia CC. At the team's first race, the 1933 Monaco Grand Prix, Caracciola had a season ending accident, and Chiron switched to Alfa Romeo cars run by Scuderia Ferrari mid-season.[1] He won the 1933 Spa 24 hours race with specialist endurance racer Luigi Chinetti in an Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 Monza.[8]

Chiron drove an Alfa Romeo P3 run by Ferrari for the 1934 Grand Prix season. He won the 1934 French Grand Prix at Montlhéry, against several works Mercedes-Benz and Auto Union entries, a race that is often considered one of the greatest victories of his career.[1][9] The Alfa Romeos struggled against the German cars in 1935, and Chiron only salvaged a podium at the 1935 Belgian Grand Prix and a minor victory at the Lorraine Grand Prix that year.[1]

Chiron moved to Mercedes-Benz's factory team for the 1936 Grand Prix season. He started the European championship campaign with a pole at his home race of Monaco, but his race ended after an accident on lap one. A more serious accident at the second round, the 1936 German Grand Prix, left him with head and shoulders injuries. He decided to retire from Grand Prix racing after that. He won the 1937 French Grand Prix, a race that was run for sports cars only that year.[1]

Chiron retired from racing in 1938,[1] and World War II curtailed motor racing a year later. When racing resumed after the War, he came out of retirement and drove a Talbot-Lago to victory in two French Grands Prix.[10]

According to a Los Angeles Times review of fellow driver Hellé Nice's biography, Chiron accused her, at a 1949 party in Monaco to celebrate the first postwar Monte Carlo Rally, of "collaborating with the Nazis". The review says biographer Miranda Seymour is "circumspect on Nice's guilt".[11] A review of the same book in The New York Times says Nice was accused of being a "Gestapo agent"; that Seymour "rebuts" the charge; and that it made Nice "unemployable".[12] Seymour's book says that in a letter to Antony Noghes, the head of the Monte Carlo Rally committee, Hellé Nice "protested her innocence"; that she told him she would appeal to the Monaco court unless Chiron wrote an apology; that no letter from Chiron has been found; and that the court has no record of such a case between 1949 and 1955.[13]

Chiron took part in the first ever Formula One World Championship season in 1950, as a factory Maserati driver.[2] At his home Grand Prix of Monaco he finished in third, at age 50,[14] the only points scoring finish of his career.[15]

Paired with the Swiss driver Ciro Basadonna, Chiron won the 1954 Monte Carlo Rally. His last race was in 1955,[16] when he took a Lancia D50 to sixth place in the Monaco Grand Prix a few weeks before his 56th birthday,[17] becoming the oldest driver to compete in a Formula One race.[16] He is also the oldest driver ever to have entered for a Formula One race, taking part in practice for the 1958 Monaco Grand Prix when he was 58.[2]

Later life and legacy

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Chiron retired after 35 years in racing but maintained an executive role with the organizers of the Monaco Grand Prix, who honoured him with a statue on the Grand Prix course and renamed the Swimming Pool corner after him.[18] As he had achieved the greatest number of podium finishes in Bugattis, the 1999 Bugatti 18/3 Chiron concept car and the 2016 Bugatti Chiron are named in his honour.[19][20]

Louis Chiron was so popular in Czechoslovakia, whose Grand Prix he won three consecutive times, that even after 75 years his name still lives in a popular saying "He drives like Chiron", used mainly when referring to speeding motorists or generally to people who drive very quickly.[18]

Chiron was the only Monegasque driver to score points in a Formula One race until Charles Leclerc in the 2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix and the only Monegasque to score a podium until Leclerc in the 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix.

Motorsports career results

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Major career victories

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Chiron after winning the 1934 French Grand Prix

Complete European Championship results

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(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap.)

Year Entrant Chassis Engine 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 EDC Pts
1931 Automobiles Ettore Bugatti Bugatti T51 Bugatti 2.3 L8 ITA
Ret 		FRA
1 		BEL
Ret 		6th 13
1932 Automobiles Ettore Bugatti Bugatti T54 Bugatti 5.0 L8 ITA
Ret 		5th 17
Bugatti T51 Bugatti 2.3 L8 FRA
4 		GER
Ret
1935 Scuderia Ferrari Alfa Romeo Tipo B/P3 Alfa Romeo 2.9 L8 MON
5 		10th 40
Alfa Romeo 3.2 L8 FRA
Ret 		BEL
3 		GER
Ret 		SUI
Ret 		ITA ESP
Ret
1936 Daimler-Benz AG Mercedes W25K Mercedes ME25 4.7 L8 MON
Ret 		GER
Ret 		SUI ITA 18th 28
Source:[21]

Post-WWII Grandes Épreuves results

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(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap.)

Year Entrant Chassis Engine 1 2 3 4 5
1947 Ecurie Auto-Sport Maserati 4CL Maserati 4CL 1.5 L4s SUI
13
Ecurie France Talbot-Lago MC Talbot 4.5 L6 BEL
Ret 		FRA
1
Enrico Platé Maserati 4CL Maserati 4CL 1.5 L4s ITA
Ret
1948 Ecurie France Talbot-Lago MC Talbot 4.5 L6 MON
2 		SUI
6 		FRA
9 		ITA
Ret
1949 Ecurie France Talbot-Lago T26C Talbot 23CV 4.5 L6 GBR
Ret 		BEL SUI FRA
1 		ITA
Source:[7]

Complete Formula One World Championship results

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(key)

Year Entrant Chassis Engine 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 WDC Pts
1950 Officine Alfieri Maserati Maserati 4CLT/48 Maserati 4CLT 1.5 L4s GBR
Ret 		MON
3 		500 SUI
9 		BEL FRA
Ret 		ITA
Ret 		10th 4
1951 Enrico Platé Maserati 4CLT/48 Maserati 4CLT 1.5 L4s SUI
7 		500 NC 0
Ecurie Rosier Talbot-Lago T26C Talbot 23CV 4.5 L6 BEL
Ret 		FRA
6 		GBR
Ret 		GER
Ret 		ITA
Ret 		ESP
Ret
1953 Louis Chiron OSCA 20 OSCA 2000 2.0 L6 ARG 500 NED BEL FRA
15 		GBR
DNS 		GER SUI
DNS 		ITA
10 		NC 0
1955 Scuderia Lancia Lancia D50 Lancia DS50 2.5 V8 ARG MON
6 		500 BEL NED GBR ITA NC 0
1956 Scuderia Centro Sud Maserati 250F Maserati 250F1 2.5 L6 ARG MON
DNS 		500 BEL FRA GBR GER ITA NC 0
1958 André Testut Maserati 250F Maserati 250F1 2.5 L6 ARG MON
DNQ 		NED 500 BEL FRA GBR GER POR ITA MOR NC 0
Source:[22]

Indianapolis 500 results

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24 Hours of Le Mans results

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Year Team Co-Drivers Car Class Laps Pos. Class
Pos.
1928 No Team Name France Cyril de Vere Chrysler Six Series 72 5.0 66 DSQ DSQ
1929 France C. T. Weymann France Édouard Brisson Stutz DV32 8.0 65 DNF DNF
1931 France Equipe Bugatti Italy Achille Varzi Bugatti Type 50S 5.0 24 DNF DNF
1932 France Guy Bouriat France Guy Bouriat Bugatti Type 55 3.0 23 DNF DNF
1933 Monaco L. Chiron Italy Franco Cortese Alfa Romeo 8C 2300MM 3.0 177 DNF DNF
1937 Italy Luigi Chinetti Italy Luigi Chinetti Talbot T150C 5.0 7 DNF DNF
1938 France Ecurie Bleue France René Dreyfus Delahaye 145 5.0 21 DNF DNF
1951 United States Luigi Chinetti France Pierre-Louis Dreyfus Ferrari 340 America Barchetta S
5.0 		29 DSQ DSQ
1953 Italy Scuderia Lancia France Robert Manzon Lancia D20 S
8.0 		174 DNF DNF
Source:[24]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i "8W - Who? - Louis Chiron". 8w.forix.com. Retrieved 2 January 2024.
  2. ^ a b c "Louis Chiron | The 'forgotten' drivers of F1". F1forgottendrivers.com. 26 September 2019. Retrieved 5 January 2024.
  3. ^ a b "Louis Chiron – Monaco". ESPN. Archived from the original on 3 March 2021. Retrieved 28 August 2018.
  4. ^ a b MORENO, Cathy (16 May 2022). "Louis Chiron, le gentleman driver". Code Sport Monaco (in French). Retrieved 6 January 2024.
  5. ^ Delaney, Michael (3 August 2015). "Course de leur vie #56 Louis Chiron, Monaco 1950". f1i.autojournal.fr (in French). Retrieved 6 January 2024.
  6. ^ "Pourquoi la nouvelle Bugatti s'appelle-t-elle Chiron ?". www.largus.fr. Retrieved 6 January 2024.
  7. ^ a b "Louis Chiron – Biography". Motor Sport Magazine. Archived from the original on 28 August 2018. Retrieved 28 August 2018.
  8. ^ "Spa 24 Hours 1933 - Race Results - Racing Sports Cars". www.racingsportscars.com. Retrieved 2 January 2024.
  9. ^ "8W - When? - Racing in the 40s". 8w.forix.com. Retrieved 2 January 2024.
  10. ^ "Drivers – Louis Chiron". grandprix.com. Archived from the original on 28 August 2018. Retrieved 28 August 2018.
  11. ^ Neil, Dan (8 December 2004). "In pursuit of the Queen of Speed". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 19 March 2016. Retrieved 4 February 2016.
  12. ^ Grimes, William (24 December 2004). "A Racing Life: Plenty of Men and Fast Cars". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 7 August 2017. Retrieved 4 February 2016.
  13. ^ Seymour, Miranda (2004), Bugatti Queen, Random House, pp. 258–259, ISBN 1-4000-6168-7
  14. ^ "Statistics Drivers - Podiums - By age • STATS F1". www.statsf1.com. Retrieved 6 January 2024.
  15. ^ "Louis CHIRON - Points • STATS F1". www.statsf1.com. Retrieved 6 January 2024.
  16. ^ a b Spurgeon, Brad (22 August 2009). "Measuring Experience in Youthful Formula One". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 7 August 2017. Retrieved 4 February 2016.
  17. ^ "1955 Monaco Grand Prix". Motor Sport Magazine. Retrieved 4 February 2016.
  18. ^ a b "Louis Chiron – the Monegasque Gentleman Driver". montecarlodailyphoto.com. Archived from the original on 28 August 2018. Retrieved 28 August 2018.
  19. ^ European Car, Volume 37, Issues 7–12. Argus Publishers. 2006. p. 106.
  20. ^ Taylor, Michael (29 February 2016). "Bugatti Chiron blasts into Geneva with nearly 1,500 hp". Autoblog. Archived from the original on 1 March 2016. Retrieved 28 August 2018.
  21. ^ "THE GOLDEN ERA – OF GRAND PRIX RACING". kolumbus.fi. Archived from the original on 6 June 2011. Retrieved 11 October 2017.
  22. ^ "Louis Chiron – Involvement". StatsF1. Archived from the original on 28 August 2018. Retrieved 28 August 2018.
  23. ^ "Louis Chiron". www.champcarstats.com. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  24. ^ "Louis Chiron/Results/24 Hours of Le Mans - The Third Turn". thethirdturn.com. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
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