Early Scandanavian ice racing (merged)

On this page
http://www.renntrans...e/html/___.html

I found this intersting duo




Who know's what sort of car it is (the red one ;) ) and the year ?

The racer is an Elva 100 Formula Junior - probably with a DKW 3 cylinder two-stroke engine. As it has found its way to Finland, it will be 1960 or later and I suspect the picture was taken in Finland (or Sweden) where icer racing was and is popular.

Ice racing is indeed very popular in the Nordic countries, although frozen lakes are getting increasingly hard to find withing reasonable distance of major population centres in this country.
There used to be National Ice Racing Championships every winter, and in the Thirties we had cars like Alfa Romeo Monza, ERA, Bugatti and Maserati duelling on long circuits cleared on frozen lakes, and with snow drifts as very efficient crash barriers. Most of the big names in Nordic racing pre WWII would race on the Continent in the Summer, and tackle a season of ice racing in the winter.
The tyres were very unlike the studded tyres we use on road cars here, they were "langpigg", ie
inch-and-a-half long steel cones with a threaded part at the base of the cone, these were bolted through the tyre from the inside. They were like cogwheels, and gave amazing grip on sheet ice.
Up to the Seventies, our National Ice championships were still running strongly, and would cater for all kinds of racing car....including the brave souls who ran open-cockpit single-seaters. No Nomex gear for that lot.. their outfits looked more like those of the Polar explorers of the 1920s!
No polar bear was safe from the aspiring ice racer in those days....its fur was too useful ;)

There used to be National Ice Racing Championships every winter

We didn't have any championship on ice here in Sweden until 1958. And by then the last era with the big racing cars on the ice was over. The first season a Ferrari Mondial won the sports car class. In the early sixties the sportscar or GT-class was mostly a Porsche affair apart for a couple of years when Lotus 23s ruled. They raced Fjunior for a couple of years, but there wasn't a championship for them. (Well, they tried one in '64 for F2/FJ, but there were too few competitors, so Gunnar Carlsson never got that championship.) In the late 60ies Fvee took to the ice. Otherwise it has been mostly touring cars.

Most of the big names in Nordic racing pre WWII would race on the Continent in the Summer, and tackle a season of ice racing in the winter.

I know only of two guys who raced on the continent : Per Viktor Widengren and Eugen Björnstad. (And Henken Widengren, but his only winter race was at Ramen, wich wasn't a real ice-race.) Surely there was a lot of other "big names" in Nordic racing. What races on the continent did they attend?

I have a vivid mental image of a photograph I saw years ago of motorcycles racing on ice, long spikes on the tyres. What happened if you fell while leading the pack into the first turn?

Well it is still an active kind of motorsport in Scandinavia and Russia. It's like speedway on ice. But today the most part of the wheels are covered. You don't want to be run over by an ice-racing bike though.
If I remember right, one of the best Scandinavian speedway riders after WWII, Norwegian Leif "Basse" Hveem left the ice-racing scene after having discovered how it felt...

Originally posted by Tomas Karlsson

We didn't have any championship on ice here in Sweden until 1958. And by then the last era with the big racing cars on the ice was over. The first season a Ferrari Mondial won the sports car class. In the early sixties the sportscar or GT-class was mostly a Porsche affair apart for a couple of years when Lotus 23s ruled. They raced Fjunior for a couple of years, but there wasn't a championship for them. (Well, they tried one in '64 for F2/FJ, but there were too few competitors, so Gunnar Carlsson never got that championship.) In the late 60ies Fvee took to the ice. Otherwise it has been mostly touring cars.

Norway and Sweden were quite dissimilar, in that we had no tarmac circuits for summer use, only hill-climbs and horse trotting tracks. Thus, the spectrum of cars taking part was quite different, with very few sports-racers or sports cars in Norway post WWII until Rudskogen was opened in 1990. Thus there was no repeat of the pukka international single-seaters racing on ice after the war, in the way that they did in the Twenties and Thirties. We did, however, have National ice racing championship series through the Fifties and up to the mid Seventies. The only single seater category was for FVees.

I know only of two guys who raced on the continent : Per Viktor Widengren and Eugen Björnstad.

That is correct, but as early as 1922, Sigvart Haugdahl raced in America (which is a different "continent", obviously ;) and that included speed records at Daytona Beach. In the Twenties, several Bugattis were campaigned by Norwegians, the most famous, and a household name at the time, was John Eric Isberg. (who started out as a Swede I believe). Other exponents of Bugattis internationally were Bjørnstad, Cai Jensen and Hesselberg-Meyer.

(And Henken Widengren, but his only winter race was at Ramen, wich wasn't a real ice-race.) Surely there was a lot of other "big names" in Nordic racing. What races on the continent did they attend?

In 1932, a number of Bugatti victories were scored by Isberg and Bjørnstad, including Bjørnstad's fourth in the Finnish Grand Prix, and a new record at Solvalla in Sweden. Bjørnstad initially purchased a 35A from England, believeing it would be a supercharged 35C...he was very disappointed and resolved to fix this by draining the radiator of the Bugatti , having thoroughly warmed the engine, then quickly filling up with ice cold water...the engine blew, and young Bjørnstad told his sponsors - his parents - that the car had to go to Molsheim for repairs.
In France, it was not repaired, but exchanged for a 35C!
The Bugatti proved very successful, and was replaced by a Monza Alfa-Romeo which was then rebuilt into a single-seater. Later still, Bjørnstad engineered a deal with a British gentleman to p/ex an Amilcar for an ERA...with a cash adjustment which proved, er, difficult, eventually the ERA was reposessed. Famously, Bjørnstad won the Polish GP at Lwow (where Per Widengren led for a long time, until a time-consuming pit stop) in the Alfa, and the Torino GP in 1937, now in the ERA.

Other notable Nordic international exponents from this era, according to my father who worked on the Bjørnstad cars, were Finns Carl Ebb and Einar Alm and Helmer Carlsson from Sweden, in addition to the Widengren brothers.

Originally posted by Tomas Karlsson
Well it is still an active kind of motorsport in Scandinavia and Russia. It's like speedway on ice. But today the most part of the wheels are covered. You don't want to be run over by an ice-racing bike though.
If I remember right, one of the best Scandinavian speedway riders after WWII, Norwegian Leif "Basse" Hveem left the ice-racing scene after having discovered how it felt...

Basse crashed at Daelenenga, after a period of mild weather had turned to frost, and the snow banks lining the 400m track had frozen. Basse lost his Jap special and hit the ice bank which was bad enough, but he was then hit by the bike that he had just fallen off! The bike hit him in his back and pelvis. Basse suffered multiple injuries, including the loss of one kidney and a major liver fissure which it was very tricky to treat at the time. He needed to recouperate for several weeks, and returned to the track as a spectator only to see his friend and mentor Oscar Sagen crash his bike fatally at Bjerkebanen, being thrown into one of the steel lamp-post that provide floodlight for this horse-trotting track.
Basse, though, came back to win numerous races on two wheels and four, both speedway and long gravel track races, and using a Cooper Norton 500 (purchased from Coopers in Ovtober 1958)
to win on ice, gravel and tarmac. He also raced and won in a Volvo PV....he would sometimes bring a bag of crushed white marble to the ice races, putting some on the ice ahead of his wheels at the
start

Yes Björnstad won the Lwow GP, but on the other hand the competition wasn't that hard. His races in the ERA showed on the other hand, that he could have been something if only the money hadn't dried out. He was said to have had a rather spectacular driving style in the ERA. I suppose he was used to the ice tracks.

Other notable Nordic international exponents from this era, according to my father who worked on the Bjørnstad cars, were Finns Carl Ebb and Einar Alm and Helmer Carlsson from Sweden, in addition to the Widengren brothers.

Well it depends on what you would call intenational or "on the continent". Alm and Ebb took the ferry to Estonia and Carlsson unfortunately never raced outside of Scandinavia. He would surely have made a name for himself. If only...

Originally posted by Hugo Boecker
Who know's what sort of car it is (the red one ;) ) and the year ?

The picture is from march 1963, taken in Oulu, northern Finland. This site has few more pictures, just click the racing link.

Great pictures!! I wish I could read Finnish, then I would have been able to do some more research in the Finnish ice racing history. There are a lot to discover yet.
It is interesting to see that the Finnish Fjunior heats weren't bigger than the Swedish ones. I can identify Curt Lincoln of course, but the other two...?
My guess would be Leo Mattila in the Lotus and Heimo Hietarinta in the Elva... but I am only guessing. Can we have the Finnish votes please....?

Other notable Nordic international exponents from this era, according to my father who worked on the Bjørnstad cars, were Finns Carl Ebb and Einar Alm and Helmer Carlsson from Sweden, in addition to the Widengren brothers.

One thing about Einar Alm's international racing: when he entered the Vallentuna ice race outside of Stockholm in 1935, he wasn't allowed to start, because his curious car wasn't considered safe enough.

I can confirm what was said early on in this thread. About thirty years ago I was in Sweden for the Swedish rally and was taken to an ice track carved out on a lake near Torsby in Varmland. It was one of those courses run by SAAB and run by Erik Carlsson to teach you how to drive on ice. We used SAAB's with light studding and I still try and use the skills taught there. However, a local enthusiast was churning round with a Formula Vee fitted with serious spikes and the owner kindly offered a drive. As was explained, the grip was quite remarkable and it was possible to hit around 100 mph on the long straight in a cloud of ice crystals churned up by the spikes. Trouble was I did not have the full-face leather mask that the Swedish drivers use and though I was well wrapped up I had left a space around my throat. In the minus 25 degree temperatures I ended up with a band of mild frostbite across my throat which caused me to be speechless for at least a day. Most of my friends agreed it was a welcome affliction !!!

I have a few questions for our Swedish friends regarding a driver called Tore Wistedt, who raced irregularly in the 30s.

In 1933 he seems to have raced an MG Midget against the mighty Nordic Specials, with fairly predictable results - though you have to give him marks for bravery, if nothing else! Anyone know what model Midget? M-type or C-type? And not strictly ice racing: he retired on lap 1 of the 1933 Sommar GP - was he involved in the big shunt just after the start or was it a separate problem?

He then disappears until 1937, when Leif has him listed in a K3 Magnette in the Flatenloppet. I very much doubt it was a K3 as I don't think there were any in Sweden then. And did he race again in 1937 or later?

The car Wistedt was supposed to have driven at Rämen '33 was a C-type, but it couldn't be delivered in time, so he had to do with a J2,

And not strictly ice racing

Please note that the Rämen race wasn't an ordinary ice race. Only the start-finish area on lake Rämen and a very small loop on the Sellnäs lake were on ice. The most part of the track was on gravel roads.

For the Summer GP at Norra Vram Wistedt finally had his C-type. His clutch broke in the start and Wistedt had to give in after 500m. So he wasn't involved in the crash.
As for 1937, I also have a note of a K3 for the races at Flaten and Västerås. But where I have got that information from, I don't know. All I am sure of is that the car had a supercharger.
I know whom I can ask. I'll be back!

About the red Nr. 2: whatabout Elva and Rauno Aaltonen (I once talked with him and we were standing by a green Elva...)?

Tomas: thank you - much appreciated. A J2 eh? He was an even braver (or more foolhardy) soul than I'd reckoned!

About the red Nr. 2: whatabout Elva and Rauno Aaltonen (I once talked with him and we were standing by a green Elva...)?

Could be... I won't argue. It seems that I was wrong about Hietarinta since he had a BMC engine in his Elva. But there were other Elva drivers in Finland during this period, Bergholm, Godenhjelm, Virtanen...

A J2 eh? He was an even braver (or more foolhardy) soul than I'd reckoned!

I have been in contact with a journalist who once met and talked to Wistedt about his racing. He was quite sure about that there hadn't been any mention of a K3. I will dig a bit deeper....

In connection with ice racing what did SVEMO stand for? Was it the initials of the organisers of the championship, or what?

Svemo is the Swedish Motorcycle Association (Svenska Motorcykel Förbundet), so they would mainly deal with bike events.

BTW the cars in the ice-race were Curt Lincoln, Leo Mattila in the Lotus 22 and Caj Godenhjelm in the Elva.

Thanks Rainer.

In 1951 there appears to have been some sort of ice-racing championship, it might have been unofficial, and the winner was Erik Lundgren in his Ford Special.

"SVEMO statistik 1951 isbanesasongen 1st Lundgren, Halsinglands MK, 23pt/ 7 tavi"

In 1952 and 1953 SVEMA was the initials, so perhaps SVEMO was a typo.

Lundgren was top scorer in both years, in 1952 with 44 p/12 tavi and in 1953 with 34 p/ 6 tavi.

There does not appear to have been a "championship" 1954-1957.

There were no "championship" in 51-53 either. Please don't invent one now! It was just statistics from the approved winter races. There were often races on the same day on different places and all the cars seldom met. The first championship was in 1959.
BTW in 1957 there were no ice-races thanks to the Suez crisis.
SVEMA was for cars and SVEMO for motorcycles.

As far as I have found out these lists were made up by a Swedish motorsport magazine and not by SVEMA.
The centre of the Swedish motoring scene in those days lay in the middle part of the country and I think a lot of the drivers would have protested if Valter Lundström had been credited with a second place in a championship in'52. Lundström won his races up in the northern part of the country against a couple of other cars. When some of the big guys made the long trip up north, they drove circles around the local stars.

Tomas

Thanks, that's cleared that up.

As I thought it might be, it was an unofficial "championship", but my Swedish is non=existant so I needed to check it out. Many magazines across the world devised their own point-scoring "championships".

John

In 1952 and 1953 SVEMA was the initials, so perhaps SVEMO was a typo.

John, I have to correct one thing I wrote: The Swedish motor racing federation SVEMO was responsible for both motorcycles and cars from 1935 to sometime in the fifties, when it was separated into one organization for cars, SVEMA ,and one for motorcycles, SVEMO. So it probably wasn't a typo.

I have become really fascinated with the ice racing that was going on in Sweden and Norway in the 1930s. To a certain extent that is because notable stars from these countries that were famous for doing it (Bjornstad and Widengren) took part in the 1933 Lviv Grand Prix in my hometown. I am not too well educated in the history of these events. As I do not have the opportunity to purchase any books on the subject could you perhaps show me a place on the Net where I could find some good info and photos of the ice racing in the 1930s.
Thank you in advance.

Leif Snellman's Golden Era has details of some of them. Easy to find, because they all took place between January and March!

See also this thread:

http://forums.autosp...&threadid=84962

Thanks for the info. I checked out Leif Snellman's site some time ago and looked at the thread you posted. Thanks.
What I would really like to see are some photos from the pre WWII Scandinavian races which were held on frozen lakes.

The very first Swedish auto race was actually on ice in 1905. But up until the late twenties there weren't much racing. The popular thing then was speed events on long straights marked up on ice.
In Norway they used to have races on Gjersjöen in the twenties. Five laps on a 3000m oval. I think they drove two by two and best time counted.
There were no road-races. In the summer those who looked for speed, had to make do with hill-climbing. Then in the late twenties they started to race on 1000m trotting courses. Usually two cars at the time for five laps.
And then they followed that up with 1000m ovals on ice in the winter.
The Rämen races were no ice-races, but the long track ran over two lakes. After the introduction of the Rämen races modern type courses started to show on some ice-races. In the later part of the thirties that became the common type, even if there still was some ice-races on ovals. The oval races were more like speedway racing, but I know that they tried races on ovals with big fields in Finland in '34. Both on ice and on trotting-courses.
There were also ice-races on land! They flooded a piece of flat ground when it was cold and voila'.
There were no road races in Sweden after the tragic Swedish Summer GP in '33, but Finland had it's Djurgårdsloppet. Otherwise it was hill-climbs and races at trotting courses that kept the drivers busy during the summer.

Per-Wiktor Widengren made his debut on Solvalla trotting course outside of Stockholm in 1930. With a Mercedes-Benz SSK! He ended up in the barriers. It got better though. In '32 he went down to Italy and bought an Alfa 8C Monza which he raced until the end of '36 when he hung up his helmet.
Björnstad started with a small Fiat until he went down to Paris for a Bugatti. It wasn't as fast as he had hoped, so he got a new one for '31. A 35C. But when Widengren got an Alfa, Björnstad followed him and bought one for himself to. He raced with that until 1937 when his money dried out.

I used a few photos of 1930s Scandinavian ice racing in my book, ROARING ROADSTERS #2 Some of the cars that raced on the ice could be called track roadsters or hot rods I think I got the photos from Tomas Karlsson (Hi Tomas!) I don't think that I have the actual photos anymore but I could send photos from the book. I am not sure how good the quality would be but if Indyfan13 will contact me directly we could try it. My address is radbruch@sandpoint.net.

I have yet to learn how to post photos on Atlas F-1

Thanks for the additional information.

Don, I sent you a few lines just a few minutes ago.

Well Don, those "photos" were actually photocopies from different sources and they were meant to be a help in understanding what the cars looked like... I had hoped that the guy who acted as middle-man should dig up some real photos.

Indyricefan, I can send you some photocopies too. Just give me your email-adress.

Tomas, thanks a lot.

My e-mail adress is: pbilynsky@yahoo.com