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The Online Magazine for Italian and French Classic Car Enthusiasts

Graham Gauld

Alec Issigonis and the Lightweight Special

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54 year old Alec Issigonis brought out his old cloth helmet and demonstrated the Lightweight in a historic display at the 1960 British Grand Prix at Silverstone ( Photo Gauld)

Story and photos by Graham Gauld and Jonathan Sharp

‘Wunderkind’ Adrian Newey and his first production hypercar, the Aston Martin-RB001, are making headlines. But Newey is following in the footsteps of another great designer, Gordon Murray, who set the modern pattern, so to speak, with the original McLaren road car.

But long before them was another wunderkind. Before he became famous as the designer of the ubiquitous BMC Minis, their equally ground breaking designer Alec Issigonis built his own advanced race car, the Lightweight Special.

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Gauld on Klemantaski

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Louis Klemantaski with Peter Collins in the 335S Ferrari on the 1957 Mille Miglia, two Leicas round his neck. Gauld photo

Story by Graham Gauld

Those of you who regularly visit VeloceToday will have noticed that motor sport photography has been my interest throughout my life as a motoring journalist.

It has been an adjunct that has helped boost the income from articles and books I have written and though it has been a great passion I have always appreciated and admired certain photographers who have become outstanding in the field of motor racing.

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Gauld, Fiat Fish and an Abarth Goccia

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The Vignale “Goccia”. Gauld took this photo in 1957, only to find the same car at a motor show in 1999, plus the Fish and the Pinin. Read on!

From the VeloceToday Archives, March, 2017

Story and photos by Graham Gauld

As most of you probably know there was a motor show in Geneva last week, where all the attention appeared to be on supercars with weird and wonderful aerodynamics; it all looked terribly serious. Editor Pete asked me if I was going to attend the show, but had to admit that it has been about twenty years since I attended the big salons of Geneva and Paris..

I knew that Pete will have plenty of photos of the Geneva event from other correspondents so wasn’t too worried. However, Pete’s comments reminded me of an interesting show I attended in 1999. It was organized by the well-known Italian collector Franco Lombardi in his home town of Genoa and I knew I had to be there. I was not disappointed! So to get you into the Motor Show mood let me tell you about three of the cars there.

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Ecurie Ecosse Tour 2024

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One of the four Porsche Carrera 2.7 RSs chases a Ferrari Dino amidst the splendor of the Scottish Highlands.

Story and photos by Graham Gauld

The Ecurie Ecosse Tour has been running now for nearly forty years as a four-day event which is not competitive, but simply an invited gathering of friends with a mutual interest in cars and racing.

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Mimmo Dei’s Scuderia Centro Sud

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Story by Graham Gauld

If you were a journeyman racing driver or a tyro and lived near Modena, Guglielmo Dei’s Scuderia Centro Sud had many attractions.

First of all, it was a driver’s school, but it was also a club with its own clubhouse in a small villa at 646 via Emilia Ovest. There, you could sit at tables under the trees and talk motor racing or perhaps share stories of how you had driven a racing car on the nearby Modena Autodromo.

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Medardo Fantuzzi by Graham Gauld

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Photographed together at a dinner in Sant Agata Bolognese in the late 1950s. Standing at the back are young Fiorenzo Fantuzzi and his father Medardo. Front row Jean-Paul Behra and his father Jean Behra, Maserati chassis builder Caiani and Omer Orsi of Maserati. ( Photo: Adolfo Orsi, Historica Selecta)

Story by Graham Gauld

One outstanding element in the rise of Modena as a center for high performance road cars and racing cars in the 1950s was the proliferation of specialist artisans each of whom contributed something unique to the picture. As a result, there were numerous coachbuilders, many of whom were linked to companies like Stanguellini, Maserati, OSCA and Ferrari, so it was normal that at one time or another they would intermingle.

A typical example would be Carrozzeria Fantuzzi founded by Medardo Fantuzzi, who was born in 1906 in Bologna and trained as an engineer. In 1927 he and his brother Gino joined Maserati as apprentices shortly after the Maserati brothers started building their own racing cars. [Read more…] about Medardo Fantuzzi by Graham Gauld

Gauld Visits Aladdin’s Motor Sport Cave

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Story and photos by Graham Gauld

Most of the finest motor sport collections and museums are well known, but this is one I first heard about a few years ago now thanks to the late Adrian Hamilton who, with his father Duncan Hamilton, ran a successful garage business which specialized in buying and selling racing and sports cars in Hampshire, England.

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Gauld and the 1965 Monte Carlo Rally

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Story and photos by Graham Gauld

During the 1960s there was an increased interest in International rallying to boost production car sales. Consequently, we saw a number of interesting race cars appearing from time to time in the bigger events. I was reminded of this recently when someone raised the question of Ferraris taking part in International Rallies but for me one of the most spectacular and successful performances came in the 1965 Monte Carlo Rally when Porsche entered one of their successful Porsche 904 Carrera GTS cars that had been raced for the first time a year earlier at the Sebring 12 Hour race.

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Gauld Drives a 1958 Fiat 500 Abarth

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One of Carlo Abarth’s first production modified Fiats, the Fiat 500 Sport.

Story and photos by Graham Gauld

The scene was the Albergo Della Rocca, a small hotel in Bazzano near Modena in 1958.

Vittorio Rocchi, whose father owned the hotel, told me that a friend of his had just taken on the Abarth distributorship for the area and was going to bring one of the brand-new production Fiat Abarth 500 Sports to the hotel for me to try out.

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Graham Gauld talks to Bernard Asset

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Change indeed. Bernard Asset’s art. McLaren at Eau Rouge on the Spa circuit. F1 photography would never be the same again. Copyright Bernard Asset. All rights reserved.

By Graham Gauld
From the VeloceToday archives June 2013

At a recent race meeting I met up with an old friend of over 25 years, the famed French Formula 1 photographer Bernard Asset. You may not have heard of him, but he completely changed the style of motor racing photography back in the 1970s.

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Gauld: Sleuthing around Silverstone

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The prettiest Maserati, the 1936 4CM as driven by Goffredo Zehender in period.

Story and photos by Graham Gauld

As is my wont I embarked on a five-hour drive from my new home in isolated Cornwall to Silverstone for the Classic. Last year I could leave the house in the south of France, drive an hour to Nice airport, wait an hour, fly to Luton airport, rent a car and drive to Silverstone in less time than my drive from Cornwall!

As usual my idea was to prowl the paddock, chat to people and come up with one or two interesting snippets for VeloceToday.

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Andrea Fraschetti, Ferrari Engineer

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The original 2.1 liter Ferrari Dino on its debut at the Modena Autodrome a few weeks after Andrea Fraschetti’s death. Graham Gauld photo

By Graham Gauld

When it comes to words and books, no marque in motoring history has been over-written and over-published than Ferrari. Through the years it has led to some weird publications, such as the book that featured only the different ways in which Ferrari race cars were numbered. Not the actual numbers, you understand, but the graphic style of numbering on the side of the cars. Esoteric, you bet!

And yet there are still many stories to be told, and one of them concerns a young engineer and designer who was with Ferrari for less than two years before he was killed testing a Ferrari Dino prototype at the Modena Autodrome in 1957. What made this poignant for me was that he died just three weeks before I arrived in Modena for the first time and from that day little or nothing has been written about him. His name was Andrea Fraschetti.

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