As Found Number 10. Note Alfas in the background.
Thanks to the Museum team of the Zolder Terlaemen circuit in Belgium and our own Gijsbert-Paul Berk, we now know a bit more about the background of the mystery sports car in ”As found Number 10”. Ed.
By Gijsbert-Paul Berk
All photos by JP Duhem
Recently, the Museum team of the Zolder Terlaemen circuit in Belgium responded to a query about the As Found Number 10:
‘We have searched in our archives from 1953 (the first race at Zolder) to 1970. We have found that on June 21, 1964, Mr. Michel Desmaisieres raced on the Zolder Circuit at the occasion of the TAC (Telrlaemen Auto Club) days, with a prototype that fits the photos and description. He achieved 14th place. The brothers Desmaisieres (Michel and Ricardo, burggraven kasteel van Heers (Viscounts of the Castle Van Heers) were enthusiast collectors of Alfa Romeo cars and are reputed to have constructed the prototype themselves”.
Number 14 is the entry for the Desmaisieres Prototype.
The Museum team at the Zolder also mentioned that the photos published on VeloceToday were also on Facebook and that the Belgium TV (VTM VTM –Telefacts, Medialaan 1, 1800 Vilvoorde, Belgium) in their program “Jambers” broadcast an item about the brothers Desmaisieres and their cars.
Number 54 corresponds to the final result posted by our mystery car.
The car is also known by the Belgium Stichting Club Alfa Romeo bezitters (Alfa Romeo owners) as the “achtergelaten liefde” (abandoned love) and kasteelalfa’s (Castlealfa’s)
Badge on car led Berk to finding the racecourse and resolving the mystery.
On the Forum page of the website by the Stichting Club Alfa Romeo bezitters, one of the members who had seen the collection wrote about the racer: “nice example of home craft, VW wheels, Fiat 1100 engine, chassis welded together from heavy pieces of iron, but with a rather well made aluminum body. I wonder if it has ever been raced”.
From the same website I learned that the collection of the Desmaisieres brothers was auctioned as recently as June 20 by the Veilinghuis (Auction house) nv Lussis M&N, Hasseltseweg 544, 3700 Tongeren, Belgium telephone ++32 12 23 11 59 / e-mail
I have asked these auctioneers by e-mail if they could inform me if the sports car on the ‘As found car No 10’ photos has been sold at their auction.
As I have understood, the whole collection has been sold as one lot. So it is sold. Due to the enourmous amount of parts in boxes, needed for the other cars, I presume that the new owner will start to sort all parts and put them with the cars they (may) belong to, to sell as projects.
At our website (www.vintageplanet.be) you can see some pictures of the racecar. At the auction not all bodyparts were fitted at the car… after searching in all the boxes with parts we were able to fit more panels to the car.
My great grand aunt , sister of my grandmother was very close to the Family Desmaisieres. I have even a picure of her where she poses in the car . must be 1964 as well…