Splitting of motorsport

Hello,
Taking advantage of your patience, let me ask you all another question:

When motorsport began splitting into several well defined categories ?
Who promoted such a splitting ?

Thankyou.

Splitting into categories has occurred since at least 1909, when the AAA split its racing into different categories based on capacity, price etc.

And there were voitures legeres and voiturettes in Europe before that - and the first "touring-car" races

The 1896 Paris-Marseilles-Paris Trail was split into four classes, although I don't know on what basis (there was Class A Series 1, Class A Series 2, Class B (for motorcycles) and Class C).

Leon Bollée's first voiturette was placed (on its own) into a separate "miscellaneous" class in the 1896 Paris-Marseille-Paris race, since the authorities couldn't fit it into either the car or quadricycle classes. By 1897 there was a separate "Voiturette" (ie light car) class in the Paris-Dieppe.

The first attempts at unified formulae in Europe came before WW1, although really only the GP Formula was closely defined. The 1500cc/Light Car/Voiturette class of the 1930s for example more or less evolved itself: no-one sat down and said "Let's have a second Formula" - it just happened that way, partly because there were lots of 1500cc cars around left over from the 1920s. Lots of French organisers started races for them, because there were plenty of T37 and T51 Bugattis about, plus a few old Maseratis, Alfas, Talbots and Delages. Then the ERA came along, together with some newer Maseratis and then the Alfa 158. Voiturette racing peaked in 1937-38 and was due to become the new AIACR GP Formula in 1941.

That actually happened in 1947 when, for the first time, the FIA defined a second Formula. Shortly afterwards, F3 came along too.

Paris-Bordeaux-Paris 1895. Two seater cars were allowed to enter but only four seaters could win prizes.

There are plenty of threads on the earliest days with different voiturette classes &c from the 1890s onwards, although these seem to be pretty much ad-hoc.

Perhaps the earliest permanent split was bikes v cars, which when you think about it is not necessarily logical in town to town races; I mean, it is once you start about thinking about categories (and different prizes and increasing the chances to win), but if it's about getting from A to B as fast as poss it is irrelevant whether you do so on a car or a motorbike or a trike. Damn commercialism again.

It doubtless dates from immediately after the very first motorcar competition, when the second placed driver, writing the very first page in the Racing Driver’s Book of Excuses, announced that he would certainly have won the race if only the winner had not had a larger engine or a lighter car.

Classes and categories appeared very early on.

Originally posted by BRG
It doubtless dates from immediately after the very first motorcar competition, when the second placed driver, writing the very first page in the Racing Driver’s Book of Excuses, announced that he would certainly have won the race if only the winner had not had a larger engine or a lighter car.

Classes and categories appeared very early on.

Perhaps, this example could even fit into the thread about protests in motor racing, started by ReWind.

I wonder if rather than formulae and classes, the original poster doesn't mean the distinction between races, rallies, hillclimbs, sprints etc rather than just the old city-to-city events? -- in which case I guess 'circuit racing' evolves post-1903 from 'road racing', the legacy of which eventually becomes rallying... hillclimbs and sprints evolve from various early competitions... etc?

Originally posted by petefenelon
I wonder if rather than formulae and classes, the original poster doesn't mean the distinction between races, rallies, hillclimbs, sprints etc rather than just the old city-to-city events? -- in which case I guess 'circuit racing' evolves post-1903 from 'road racing', the legacy of which eventually becomes rallying... hillclimbs and sprints evolve from various early competitions... etc?

Thankyou Pete,
I meant the distinction between categories within motor racing. When I started the thread, I was not thinking of different formulae within any given category.
For example, when was stablished the splitting between single seaters and other cars ?

All racing cars originally had two seats - monoposto bodywork did not become common until the 1930s.
Before then the principal distinction between them and what we would now call sportscars was that road equipment (lights, mudguards, sometimes roofs) had to be fitted to what were still usually called touring cars in the 1920s, and there was usually an additional requirement that they had to have been produced in numbers (or could have been.... )

Don't forget the obligatory RIDING MECHANIC which is why we had the two seater Racing Car.
Once there was no need for the onboard spanner man it wasn't too long before the Monoposto emerged.

Several intertwining points here.

The Gordon Bennet Trophy was contested by out and out racing cars. then in 1903 the Mercedes team cars were destroyed in a fire and they only had time to produce stripped versions of the production car and still won.

The Kaiserpreis on the other hand was for cars that had to bear some resemblance to production cars with road equipment - effectively the first sports cars.

Le Mans and the Spa 24 hrs were originally for 4-seater touring cars with a certain number having to be produced orat least planned. Smaller cars could be two seaters.

Later the sports/racing car evolved - put wings and lights on a two seater GP car and you had a terrific road car. Or you could buy one from Bugatti or Alfa Romeo.

The definition of a 'sports car' in the Mille Miglia was far more elastic than at Le Mans

The RAC Tourist Trophy was originally for 4 seater production touring cars, but at different times was for out and out racing cars and sports cars prewar. Then postwar it was for production sports cars, sports prototypes, GT cars and Touring cars at different times.

Even after riding mechanics had been abolished the regulations still had a minimum width. Which is why the GP Alfa and Maserati monopostos had the strange widening at low level.

And didn't the original Auto Union have a door for the driver.

Then after WW2 you could race or rally your road-going Austin Healey, Jaguar XK120 or TR2.

The ACO admitted prototypes to Le Mans and the purpose built sports/racing car evolved. At least a D-type Jaguar or a Testa Rossa Ferrari could. at a pinch, be driven on the road and production cars were derived from them. But the same couldn't be said of a Lola T70 or a Porsche 917. And a Can-Am car was officially described as a 'two seater racing car' complying to Group 7.

But Porsche did win virtually anything with derivatives of the 911.

Rallying was originally for 'same as you could buy' cars but gradually modifications crept in until we reach today's situation where there is only a family resmblance between the cars in the Monte carlo or RAC rallies and those in the showrooms.

In summary, each different aspect of motor sport - road racing, track racing, rallying, hill climbs, sprints etc has become more and more specialised so have the cars although some themes still develop in parallel, e.g. IRL and NASCAR