47 replies to this topic

[Allen Brown]

I thought it was quite straightforward to define a privateer in Formula 1 terms: somebody who bought a car from a constructor and raced it themselves.  Anyone who built their own cars was a "works" team.  

 

But I am just working through the 1970 F1 season, and it's really not that simple.  Matra, Ferrari, BRM, Lotus, McLaren, Brabham and the STP March team are all clearly "works" teams.  Pete Lovely and Colin Crabbe (Peterson's March 701) were clearly privateers.  But what about the Tyrrell team?  Yes, Ken had bought March 701s, but Tyrrell can't really be classed as a privateer.  Then what about Frank Williams?  He had bought cars from De Tomaso, but he'd done the deal to make those a reality, so isn't he a works team?  John Surtees had bought a McLaren but he had a whole factory behind him building F5000 Surtees and working on a new F1 car, so is he a works team even when he's racing the McLaren?  And if Williams is not a privateer, does that mean Silvio Moser is not a privateer either?  His deal with Bellasi was not really any different to Williams' deal with De Tomaso was it?  

 

So I am lost.  Exactly how do we define a privateer?  

[Ray Bell]

I know it won't help, Allen...

 

But I do recall Jack Brabham being referred to as a 'privateer' when he was running the Lotus 24.

[Barry Boor]

I would say a privateer team is one that didn't actually build the car themselves. So Brabham was a privateer when he ran a Lotus and applying that criteria, I guess Williams would be as he ran the de Tomaso but didn't own the factory that built it.

[Allen Brown]

I would say a privateer team is one that didn't actually build the car themselves. So Brabham was a privateer when he ran a Lotus and applying that criteria, I guess Williams would be as he ran the de Tomaso but didn't own the factory that built it.

 

So Tyrrell was a privateer when Stewart won the championship in 1969?

[Charlieman]

B S Fabrications ran private cars for which they supplied parts to the manufacturers. For the McLaren M23, they had factory drawings for much of the car.

[Sterzo]

My view is that, rather like the term "pay driver", so "privateer" doesn't really have a definition. Somebody goes racing, and the way they fund it is often convoluted. What matters is that people somehow assemble a car, and a driver hops in and twiddles the steering wheel.

 

Let's just look at Maseratis:

• Some bought and maintained them themselves.
• Some bought one and had it maintained at the factory.
• Possibly some (Menditeguy?) paid to drive in the works team.
• Lucky Casner cut a deal to enter a works-owned car in his team's name.
• Stirling Moss's own chassis was run in late 54 as a works entry.
• Various private owners were entered by the works to secure a start and better money.

And that's before things get really murky and you talk about March, or the Centro Sud BRM.

Edited by Sterzo, 06 February 2021 - 14:57.

[Vitesse2]

My view is that, rather like the term "pay driver", so "privateer" doesn't really have a definition. Somebody goes racing, and the way they fund it is often convoluted. What matters is that people somehow assemble a car, and a driver hops in and twiddles the steering wheel.

 

Let's just look at Maseratis:

• Some bought and maintained them themselves.
• Some bought one and had it maintained at the factory.
• Possibly some (Menditeguy?) paid to drive in the works team.
• Lucky Casner cut a deal to enter a works-owned car in his team's name.
• Stirling Moss's own chassis was run in late 54 as a works entry.
• Various private owners were entered by the works to secure a start and better money.

And that's before things get really murky and you talk about March, or the Centro Sud BRM.

Or Eifelland, or LEC, or Embassy Racing with Graham Hill ...

[Allen Brown]

Here is Mike Doodson writing in Motoring News (6 Aug 1970 p15) addressing this very problem:

 

"private entries seen to have a lot of trouble qualifying these days, but John Surtees' TS7 and the Frank Williams De Tomaso are more in the nature of one-off works cars ..."

[Roryswood]

Eifelland , was a revised March , bodywork by Colani, so not a constructor or works team , did Graham Hill not commission Lola to build the Embassy Lola's

[Vitesse2]

Eifelland , was a revised March , bodywork by Colani, so not a constructor or works team , did Graham Hill not commission Lola to build the Embassy Lola's

The Eifelland was raced as an Eifelland 21 though, not as a March 721.

 

Embassy Racing with Graham Hill started out in 1973 with a customer Shadow DN1, then in 1974 raced the Lola T370 which - as you say - was commissioned by the team from Lola. In early 1975 season races the successor to the T370 was called the T371 but then became the Hill GH1 when Andy Smallman left Lola to work for Graham. The unraced GH2 was therefore the first 'pure' Hill F1 car. So within just over three years Embassy Racing with Graham Hill was first an old-fashioned privateer/customer, commissioned its own cars from another company (one of which had two names!) and then built one ... clear as mud!

[68targa]

When Ken Tyrrell ran his March 701's there was also a works March team so Tyrrell's was a non-works privately entered car. Tyrrell did not become a 'works' entry until they built 001.   Likewise Surtees although a works team in F5000 it was not a works team when it ran it's F1 McLaren.

 

Frank Williams had exclusive use of the de Tomaso which was built by the latter at Frank's request and so, in my mind, was a works run car.

 

David Purley's LEC was built by their team I believe, in which case it was a 'works' LEC.  Just as  there was a 'works' Maki ... ! 

 

I don't believe the size of the team operation should come into this

[Henk Vasmel]

What about Alfa's in the thirties, entered first by Alfa Corse, then by Scuderia Ferrari. I see a similarity here with Tyrrell running first Matra cars and then March, in '69 he was the only team running the (works?) Matra, but in '68 and '70 it was in parallel with a proper works team.

[Henk Vasmel]

Maybe there is something in between Works teams and privateers. That would be independent teams. Not constructing their cars, but entering bought cars for drivers to race. A privateer is more like a driver and entrant in one person. Next puzzle: Fittipaldi

 

Plus: R.R.C. Walker is usually seen as a privateer, though he didn't race himself after 1939.

Edited by Henk Vasmel, 06 February 2021 - 16:07.

[Vitesse2]

What about Alfa's in the thirties, entered first by Alfa Corse, then by Scuderia Ferrari. I see a similarity here with Tyrrell running first Matra cars and then March, in '69 he was the only team running the (works?) Matra, but in '68 and '70 it was in parallel with a proper works team.

Alfa Romeo always had a financial stake in the original Scuderia Ferrari though. Alfa Corse was just temporarily 'retired' to avoid duplication of effort - Alfa was effectively bankrupt anyway. Once Ugo Gobbato - appointed by Mussolini to rebuild it - had sorted out the road car division and he had acquired enough shares in Scuderia Ferrari to wrest overall control from Il Commendatore Alfa Corse reappeared during 1937 and the Scuderia was closed down in the off season - although it appears they did use the name once more, for the entries in Brazil in 1938.

[Michael Ferner]

... and what about Alfa Romeos run by Autodelta, or Euroracing? Privateers, or can of worms...

[Vitesse2]

David Purley's LEC was built by their team I believe, in which case it was a 'works' LEC.

Indeed. But, like the F1 Marches, F5000 Chevron and (almost!) the Connew which Purls raced before the CRP1 and the Shadow DN9 which he raced afterwards it was entered by LEC Refrigeration Racing.

[Glengavel]

So Tyrrell was a privateer when Stewart won the championship in 1969?

 

Matra put their own programme on hold to support Tyrrell. Semi-works?

[Bob Riebe]

As the term -- privateer -- is based on the word private, if you are not  a government (a.k.a. factory team, or factory support , team  you are a privateer.

[Doug Nye]

Don't tie yourself up with silly needlessly rigid rules Allen.  If it looks like a duck, and operates like a duck - it's a duck.  

 

And ducks bend.

 

Rob Walker's operation at Dorking was run better and more efficiently than several 'works' teams - but he was always for our purposes a privateer.

 

Ken Tyrrell's operation once they began running the Matra chassis in Formula 1 was quasi-works, definitely a cut above 'a privateer' for many reasons.  Once he began building cars to run under his own name - or more to the point his own company's name - he was head of a works team.

 

Pete Connew - well, they built their car but they hardly had 'a works'.  So wonderful private effort.  

 

Each of them would bend the semantic rule.  So why bow to someone else's perceived rule - none of them did?

 

DCN

[E1pix]

My thinking has always been that “works” means “operated with factory backing.”

Begging the question “What is a factory?”

To me, that’s mostly meant road car manufacturers, but need more thought.

Edit: In strictly racing terms, perhaps “works” only applies if a team also sells cars — delineating themself from privateers like BS Fab from Team McLaren.

Edited by E1pix, 06 February 2021 - 18:41.

[ensign14]

Yes, Ken had bought March 701s, but Tyrrell can't really be classed as a privateer.  

 

Why not?

 

Privateer = someone who buys someone else's car to race.  With the caveat that, if you are the supplier's sole (or main) choice of entry, you're their agent, so are not a privateer.

 

The real problem comes when Toro Rosso were using rebadged Red Bulls...

 

[PayasYouRace]

Why not?

 

Privateer = someone who buys someone else's car to race.  With the caveat that, if you are the supplier's sole (or main) choice of entry, you're their agent, so are not a privateer.

 

The real problem comes when Toro Rosso were using rebadged Red Bulls...

 

 

I think we're into another category there, between works and independent, which I'd call a "satellite team".

 

So we have works -> satellite -> independent -> privateer.

[opplock]

Maybe there is something in between Works teams and privateers. That would be independent teams. Not constructing their cars, but entering bought cars for drivers to race. 

 

Good point and an excellent thread. I've pondered for decades why JYS's Spanish GP win in the March 701 has not been given credit as the last win for a non-works entry. Five years before the works team won a GP! In my opinion Toro Rosso and its more recent rebranding don't count. Apart from Red Bull financing and spared technology, driver contracts stipulate that they can be placed in either team as both Kvyat and Gasly found out the hard way.  

[richie]

Here is Mike Doodson writing in Motoring News (6 Aug 1970 p15) addressing this very problem:

 

"private entries seen to have a lot of trouble qualifying these days, but John Surtees' TS7 and the Frank Williams De Tomaso are more in the nature of one-off works cars ..."

I always considered privateers were drivers like Silvio Moser, Pete Lovely, Bob Anderson, Colin Crabbe running Vic Elford & Ronnie Petersen, Rob Walker running Joe Siffert and given that label by the press. 

[Victor]

I think all private teams in possession of a letter of marque from a work's team allowing them to attack and capture the cars from rival team during races follow under the definition of Privateers.

[john aston]

Privateer is not a term of art , and I always thought of privateers as those brave, underfunded  efforts with second rate drivers which didn't  threaten the status quo, and thus could be praised without jeopardy . If they did start to win , or even to get into the top six other than through happenstance , they stopped being patronised but started being criticised .  

[DCapps]

Don't tie yourself up with silly needlessly rigid rules Allen.  If it looks like a duck, and operates like a duck - it's a duck.  

 

And ducks bend.

 

Rob Walker's operation at Dorking was run better and more efficiently than several 'works' teams - but he was always for our purposes a privateer.

 

Ken Tyrrell's operation once they began running the Matra chassis in Formula 1 was quasi-works, definitely a cut above 'a privateer' for many reasons.  Once he began building cars to run under his own name - or more to the point his own company's name - he was head of a works team.

 

Pete Connew - well, they built their car but they hardly had 'a works'.  So wonderful private effort.  

 

Each of them would bend the semantic rule.  So why bow to someone else's perceived rule - none of them did?

 

DCN

 

As Doug suggests, don't get caught in the semantics game, especially one that is pretty lame to begin with in this case. Not to mention the always issue of presentism obscuring the past.

 

When all else fails, simply use what ever way the contemporary scene viewed them and go from there. I most cases, if you peruse the entry lists, you can begin to sort out the ducks, geese, and swans.

 

Things change as do operational definitions and even nomenclature. I certainly wouldn't lose any sleep over it. Just do what you think works best for you and the hell with those who think otherwise. It is your sweat and effort, so your rules.
 

[Doug Nye]

Precisely - nice debating point in periods of enforced idleness - but hardly worth losing sleep over...  You do so much, just make your own judgment the rule.

 

DCN

[Allen Brown]

For the avoidance of doubt, this is not keeping me awake at night. 

 

I am just interested in what other people think about this and will take those views into consideration while being bound by precisely none of them.  The way I am writing about the history of motor racing requires me to superimpose some structure onto it, for example in terms of marques, models and individual car identities.  I know that structure can sometimes be artificial, but when it is, it helps to go with the grain of what other students of F1 history have concluded, and TNF is a good place to ascertain which way the grain is going.  

 

In the era of what Robin Herd called the "British Standard F1 car", which was built not only by McLaren, Brabham, March and Surtees in England, but also by De Tomaso and Bellasi in Italy, the term privateer cannot be defined quite the way it had been defined up to that point.  I would argue Moser was still a privateer even after he commissioned a car from Bellasi, and really so was Frank Williams even when he ran cars supplied by De Tomaso.  Ken Tyrrell had operated a two-car team through F3 and F2 into F1, so the privateer label does not sit comfortably on him.  John Surtees had operated a team in sports car racing, F2 and F5000 for several seasons and by the time the TS7 was built he had a factory at Edenbridge and a team of at least six so I really struggle to see him as a privateer in F1, even when he was racing a McLaren.  

 

The answer to my original question appears to be that there is no clear definition.  

[Glengavel]

Stirring up the puddle a bit further...Hesketh. Could they be considered privateers?

[Ray Bell]

Surely up until they built their own car?

 

Going back to Brabham, when he ran the 24 he had his own cars running in FJr and his own F1 car was on the drawing board.

[E1pix]

Somehow Hesketh and “works” makes no sense at all — at any point of the team’s life.

I’d consider them privateers the entire time... whether with the March, or their own car.

[DCapps]

For the avoidance of doubt, this is not keeping me awake at night. 

 

I am just interested in what other people think about this and will take those views into consideration while being bound by precisely none of them.  The way I am writing about the history of motor racing requires me to superimpose some structure onto it, for example in terms of marques, models and individual car identities.  I know that structure can sometimes be artificial, but when it is, it helps to go with the grain of what other students of F1 history have concluded, and TNF is a good place to ascertain which way the grain is going.  

 

In the era of what Robin Herd called the "British Standard F1 car", which was built not only by McLaren, Brabham, March and Surtees in England, but also by De Tomaso and Bellasi in Italy, the term privateer cannot be defined quite the way it had been defined up to that point.  I would argue Moser was still a privateer even after he commissioned a car from Bellasi, and really so was Frank Williams even when he ran cars supplied by De Tomaso.  Ken Tyrrell had operated a two-car team through F3 and F2 into F1, so the privateer label does not sit comfortably on him.  John Surtees had operated a team in sports car racing, F2 and F5000 for several seasons and by the time the TS7 was built he had a factory at Edenbridge and a team of at least six so I really struggle to see him as a privateer in F1, even when he was racing a McLaren.  

 

The answer to my original question appears to be that there is no clear definition.  

 

Allen, how about just calling them "race teams" and not worrying about such artificial terms as "privateer" or whatever else some might refer to them as? Just do what you certainly do best and the structure -- such as it is -- will begin to fall into place. There is a tendency to overthink all this at times (mea culpa) and forget about simply putting the pieces together and seeing what results. I fully get your point and certainly understand it, but, again, just working through things and the ducks, geese, and swans really do begin to sort themselves out, regardless of what one decides to refer to them as. Looking this era from my viewpoint, I sense that it is still in a transition that is roughly a decade or so old and that will definitely begin to change during the 70s. At that point, your concerns/thoughts about the structure will begin to become more clear as the structure begins to shift significantly from the period you are currently pondering. Indeed, the beginning of the shift is only a few seasons away, with the tectonic plates beginning to shift more and more and more, resulting in a more evident structure. But, you already know this, of course. You are sitting at the cusp of all this at the moment, when the sorting of the ducks, geese, and the swans is still a tad murky.
 

[Roger Clark]

There are clearly a lot of grey areas here but I would make at least three distinctions 

 

(1) a private owner running usually a single car with minimal technical and financial resources. A long extinct species, epitomised in the 60s by Bob Anderson and Jo Siffert. 
 

(2) a customer team running cars bought from the factory but aspiring to the same professional standards as the works team. Examples of these would be BRP, Parnell and Walker. I would put Jack Brabham running a Lotus 24 into this category. 
 

(3) a team running cars commissioned by them from a factory where the factory is not itself running a team. They are works teams in all but name. I am thinking a Parnell running Lolas in 1962, but not 63, and Tyrrell when running Matras. 
 

We also have examples of cars entered by private teams but looked after by factory mechanics, either on secondment or as part of the works team: the Centro-Sud BRMs, Baghetti’s Ferrari in 61 and numerous Maseratis. They are probably best dealt with on a case-by-case basis. 

[mariner]

One of the great threads as such a simple question results in so many answers!

 

My own definition would be based on " design authority" vs " maintenance responsibility" Who owns the design even if the car is one-off? Not so much a case of did you buy the design rights with the car as whether you can safely change it within the original safety parameters without going back to the original designer.

 

If a team alters the design as bought in a significant way it has become a " manufacturer" i.e it has accepted design responsibility . The Rob Walker Lotus 18/21 V8 special would be an example.

 

A litmus test would be did the team employ a trained draughtsman or engineer. 

 

I guess this definition requires three categories to work -" works", "works supported" and "privateer" The Ron Harris F2 Lotuses would be work supported for example.. 

Edited by mariner, 08 February 2021 - 11:12.

[ensign14]

If you buy the car, you're a privateer.

 

If you build or commission it, you're not.

 

Am trying to think of grey areas.  But I'm happy enough that e.g. Hill was a privateer when running Shadows and not when running Lolas.  Or BRP was a privateer until it modified enough to be considered a constructor.  Ken was a privateer when running the 701, not when running the Matra.

 

Of course old Enzo got it covered - constructors vs garagistes.  But in his mind I guess that's basically Ferrari vs Not Ferrari.

[Charlieman]

A litmus test would be did the team employ a trained draughtsman or engineer. 

Now define trained engineer... 

 

If you use privateer as an adjective rather than a noun, it allows for fuzziness or subjectivity. Even with fuzziness, a privateer team differs from a works team or a satellite team. (I'd argue that Tyrrell, whilst entering cars as Matra International, functioned as a satellite team.) The tricky cases are teams which bought in a design plus significant manufacturing. I can't think of an elegant single word descriptor, but that no doubt reflects the range of examples. When BRP started to build cars, they were denied membership of the original F1 constructors' club because it was perceived that they bought in too many parts.

 

I think Mariner's suggestions about "design authority" have merit.

[mariner]

Just for the hell of it I will shoot a hole in my own argument! 

 

Richard Lloyd racing !

 

Richard Lloyd racing built new chassis for their Porsche 962's as they were not happy with the torsional rigidity or safety of the Porsche built tubs .

 

They must have employed at least a draughtsman and they were taking on the design responsibility  for the core of the car its chassis. 

 

However they were not a works team just a customer !

[DaveSmith]

Richard Lloyds 962 chassis was designed by Nigel Stroud. I was a design authority in aerospace prior to retirement, so applying the criteria under which I worked, Nigel would have been design authority not RLR. So as they bought in the design and the chassis they must still be a privateer?

[Charlieman]

In the case of Hesketh in 1973, the team ran a March which they re-worked according to the directions of Harvey Postlethwaite who had worked on the March cars from which the 731 was developed. There must be other re-works of March F1 cars where the engineers involved had knowledge acquired when working with March.

 

If the Eifelland had worked better than a March 721, the design responsibility would have been with Colani's team   After all, they would have been the ones who added the value.

 

Incidentally, ORC refers to David Purley's Chevron B30 in the 1976 ShellSport Gp 8 season as "Pilbeamed", a splendid description.

[BRG]

It is a difficult (and as Don and Doug have suggested, probably meaningless) debate.  But just to add to the confusion, I considered the question in terms of rallying.  Clearly. those lovely Alitalia livered Lancias and FIATs were factory cars, but what about the Jolly Club cars?  Sebastian Loeb drover factory Citroens for all his championships, bar one, when the car was run by Kronos.  But was it a privateer entry?  When he drove a Ford Escort, was Russel Brookes's Andrews Heat for Hire entry a private one or a Boreham car under different colours?  Or what about the David Sutton Cars entries - Ari Vatanen won the WRC in one, but was it really a Ford official effort - they were quick enough to claim it!   And what about the various Dealer Teams (DTV, DOT, Nissan)?  Do these count as factory efforts or privateers?

 

Then, bringing it bang up to date, we have Malcolm Wilson's M-Sport team in the WRC.  It uses Ford Fiestas and the FIA chooses to pretend it is Ford for their own reasons, but it isn't Ford at all, although they may provide a degree of help.  So are M-Sport privateers?

 

And finally, does Allen Brown wish he had never asked?? 

[D-Type]

I started to write a post starting with two sentences defining a private entrant and a works team.  Then I wrote "But there are grey areas ...".  Several paragraphs later, I realised there is a whole spectrum and where you place the marker separating light grey and dark grey is arbitrary and up to you depending what the criterion used: intent, intellectual property, budget and source of the finance, professionalism, design responsibility, and so forth.  It all depends what you want to say.
 

[Dipster]

Bob Anderson. Simple.

[AJB]

Bob Anderson. Simple.

Definitely!
Anyone who carries his car and team on a VW Transporter is a privateer. Even though it was grandly named DW Racing Enterprises.

Edited by AJB, 09 February 2021 - 08:02.

[Allen Brown]

A couple of people here seem to have missed the point of why I'm asking this question.  It's not because I want a tidy answer, a bunch of labels that I can stick onto pigeonholes; it's because it helps me to understand - and then to explain - the evolution of our sport as it went through the garagiste era of the 1960s and 1970s.  

 

Roger Clark's three distinctions and mariner's litmus test are very interesting, The nature of a private entrant was changing from the wealthy young man seeking glamour and adventure to the hard-headed businessman trying to make glamour and adventure pay.  The Brabham team started as Brabham Racing Organisation when Jack Brabham took his private Cooper to minor races in search of start money while also racing for the works Cooper team.  Bruce McLaren Motor Racing started when Bruce McLaren took his own Cooper out the (pre-)Tasman series, and then started building his own sports car.  Both were privateers at first, then employing talented professionals around them as they transformed into factory operations.  John Surtees followed the same route with Lola T70s, then F2 cars and then F5000 before he built his own F1.  But this model of a team coalescing around a brilliant driver/engineer was really a model of the 1960s, and as the financial model changed in the 1970s from teams being financed by start money and trade sponsors such as Dunlop to needing outside sponsorship, so the sort of new teams that arrived on the scene were very different.  The way March assembled the required skills is illustrative: the urbane team principal to charm sponsors plus the brilliant designer plus the experienced team manager plus the nouse of a factory manager.   

 

As the 1970s begin I think we are seeing the privateer change from being a well-heeled sportsman buying the best equipment and recruiting a spanner man, to a professional team that would employ the talent required to succeed.  Team managers started to appear as key players in a team, and car designers were no longer making chalk marks on the workshop floor but probably had a few years behind them working in the aerospace industry.  The successors to the privateers of yore were, for the moment, Silvio Moser and Rob Walker, but "private" teams soon emerged combining the talents of Bubbles Horsley and Harvey Postlethwaite, or Ray Brimble and Andy Smallman.  

 

So yes, I agree a third category was emerging in between the major constructors such as Lotus, Brabham and McLaren, and the small one-car privateers.  It wasn't new to motor racing, as Ken Gregory, Ron Harris, Bob Gerard and Ian Walker all demonstrate, but it became an increasingly important part of F1 and the dominant model.  To me, Ken Tyrrell was never really a privateer in F1, he was part of the sport's rapid transformation in the early 1970s.  

[uechtel]

A couple of people here seem to have missed the point of why I'm asking this question.  It's not because I want a tidy answer, a bunch of labels that I can stick onto pigeonholes; it's because it helps me to understand - and then to explain - the evolution of our sport as it went through the garagiste era of the 1960s and 1970s.  

 

 

Ok, so I then have a try...

 

I think everybody here may have his own definition of what is 'private'/'privateer' and what is not. For myself I have spent quite some thoughts on this and came to the conlcusion, that there are plenty shades of grey, more than can be covered with two categories only. Also the meaning of words may be not exactly congruent in different languages, so this may also lead to slight variations in definitions. So first of all, the word 'Privatier' in German has of course a completely other meaning (somebody who has retired, living from what he has layed aside or some investments) and I think it could be similar in English. But as 'privateer' has a slight 'pirate-ish touch' I like the word very much and it seems common sense here to use it in 'our' context I can get along very good with that.

 

Again, for my personal taste, a 'private' team/driver and a 'privateer' are not necessarily all the same. The first has the meaning as acting 'independent' from the works, a category which  can contain a lot of different forms of team organzations. But a 'privateer' in its strict meaning to me is a driver who operates his own car, usually with a comparatively small organisation. In some cases he has a wealthy patron or a rich lady to buy the car and enter it under his/her own name, but that doesn´t really change the case fundamentally.

 

Looking back in history I think the motoring world was separated quite early into 'gentlemen drivers' ("Herrenfahrer" in German) and 'factory drivers' ("Fabrikfahrer" / "Industriefahrer"). The first category were whealthy amateurs, who had found yet another playground for their sporting activities, while the other one consisted of 'professionals' - mechanics, chauffeurs etc. - who were under employment by the manufacturers. In fact, thinking about the real pioneers like Albert de Dion can probably be regarded as a combination of both, but the steps to separation must have started before 1900 already. For example I have read that when the drivers for the 1903 Gordon Bennett Cup were chosen, the German Automobile Club insisted on 'gentlemen' drivers, which included drivers from abroad, to avoid than being represented by members of the 'working class', as the Daimler factory had initially suggested.

 

The division was set forth by the introduction of the 'Grand Prix', which by definition was exclusive to works participation only until 1928. Therefore to me it is not precisely correct to subsume other events of this period under 'Grand Prix Racing', which to my understanding was only one category of motor sport and not congruent to 'Formula Libre Racing' (even if some of the latter events had the words 'Grand Prix' in the title).

 

But already in the 1920ies there were first occasions to further split the two basic categories. On one hand competitors like Eldridge, Halford or the Montiers may have 'legally' been 'manufacturers' (building their own cars made them eligible to participate in the official Grands Prix), but certainly not of the same class like Alfa Romeo, Delage or Bugatti, so usually we categorize them as 'special builders'. Decades later the BRP would perhaps also fall into this group which would be the explanation why they were refused with F1CA/FOCA membership by the more established 'garagisti'.

 

On the other side there were Bugatti, soon also Maserati and others, who offered their racing cars for sale, with or without works support on and off the race tracks, depending on whether the customers were willing to pay for this. Those who didn´t want to pay soon realized that they could save resources by forming 'racing associations' ("Renngemeinschaft" in German) with others on a peer-to-peer level, a step towards 'private teams', but still I would put them into my personal "privateer" category.

 

The development carried on when in the 2nd half of the 1920ies some of the independants/racing associations started hiring out their 'superfluous' cars to other drivers (Materassi, Nuvolari also perhaps). Some of the team leaders soon realized, that they were perhaps not as talented as their drivers, getting too old, or simply that running the team kept them too busy to carry on driving themselves, with Enzo Ferrari certainly the most prominent example. He was probably also the first to further break the divison between factory and private teams with his agreement to operate Alfa Romeo´s Grand Prix cars in place of an official 'factory team'. Similar concepts and arrangements I would categorize as 'works contracted teams' or maybe even 'exclusively contracted teams', depending on what kind of agreement is behind.

 

Thinking further there may be also a difference between teams like the Scuderia Ferrari in the 1930ies or Euroracing in the 1980ies (in both cases Alfa Romeo comissioned a team to operate the factory cars for them) or on the other hand Moser with Bellasi, Williams with de Tomaso, Lec with Pilbeam or Hill/Embassy Racing and later also Larrousse with Lola, when the teams commissioned a manufacturer to design and develop a race car model for their (exclusive) use.

 

Also there may be room for a 'semi-works' category, for example like the Scuderia Centro Sud with Maserati in the 1940ies, the Parnell team with BRM, Tyrrell with Matra perhaps in 1968 (not 1969), the Space Racing/Stockbroker March in 1973 or in more recent times Toro Rossi/AlphaTauri with Red Bull, Sauber (aka "Alfa Romeo") with Ferrari or Racing Point with Mercedes, who act/have acted more or less as "B(ackup)-Teams" in comparatively close cooperation with their main manufacturers.

 

Finally I could also think about dividing the 'private teams' further into 'fully independents' and 'customer teams', the latter with a certain degree of works support (like paying for regular service at the factory) but still operating on their own organization, in contrast to mere 'sponsorship entries', to which I would for example count the aforementioned Lec-Team of 1973, when to my understanding purley hired the factory March as a 'pay driver' with full works support...

Edited by uechtel, 09 February 2021 - 14:26.

[ray b]

how to we class the lancia built Ferrari raced cars of the mid 50's

they did not build them just took the cars to the races

[uechtel]

Well, there were further occasions when teams took over designs from others. Wolf/Williams with the Hesketh in 1976 for example, not to forget the famous Life L190 being born first as First F189. In these cases the design property obviously went to the sucessor together with the car, so to me it is still rather a normal works team, or if you don´t want that maybe you could also place them into the Bellasi/de Tomaso/Larrousse category.