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Chief
engineer Charles Weiffenbach was no friend of motorsport; the cars that
left the factory were intended to be dependable if not fast. The Type
135 though was a great starting point for racing successes and in 1933
a young Lucy O'Reilly approached the factory to build a special development
of the new car for her to enter in rally events. Lucy was the daughter
of an American multi-millionaire of Irish origin married to an American
Laury Schell (their son Harry Schell was a famous playboy F1 driver of
the '50s).
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| Dalip
singh puts the Delahaye 135 through her paces on the streets of Jodhpur.Independent
front suspension and low-slung chassis endows her with excellent handling
forher era. |
In
1936 the French developed their own sports car series as an alternative
to Grand Prix racing in which the Germans dominated. Lucy commissioned
a special racing variant of the Type 135, the 135 Compétition Spéciale
or 135 CS. Soon she had collected orders from wealthy friends for 12 cars
and suddenly to Weiffenbach's surprise Delahaye found themselves in sports
car racing with a two-car works team and 12 privateer cars, six of them
owned by Lucy Schell. Drivers included Lucy's husband Laury, René
le Bègue, Joseph Paul and later also René Carrière
and René Dreyfus. The 135 totally dominated the French sports car
racing field in 1936, netted wins in the Monte Carlo Rally, the Paris-Saint
Raphaël motor race and culminated in a Delahaye 1-2 at Le Mans in
1938. The Delahaye also distinguished itself that year in a challenge
organised at Britian's Brooklands track by a number of wealthy sportsmen
who wanted to find who owned the 'Fastest Road Car in Britian'. The winner
was expected to be an Alfa Romeo 8C, but a three-year old 135 beat it
and a number of other fancied runners.
For 1938 Jean François designed the 4.5-litre type 145 V12 which
fitted nicely into the new Formula A, although still being a two-seater.
The car demanded a totally new engine and François made the bold
decision to cast the whole block in magnesium, a technique hardly anyone
has dared to follow. After numerous failures he finally managed to build
a 230bhp V12 magnesium engine and it was added to a development of the
135CS chassis. A totally new body was also constructed and on June 25,
1937 at the Montlhéry track the Delahaye 145 was shown for the
first time.
Meanwhile in 1937 the French Fonds de Course, an organisation aiming to
put back France into GP racing, had announced that a million francs should
go the French car built to the 1938 formula that could run 200km at a
speed exceeding 146.5kmph by the widest margin on the Montlhéry
track before September 1, 1937. The Bugatti team with Wimille were favourites
but the team got into technical problems and Wimille was involved in quite
a bad accident with a road car. On August 7 Dreyfus made his attempt with
the Delahaye 145 taking the record. Then the team was on stand-by all
the weekend to counter any rival attempts. When Wimille's last minute
attempt had to be aborted after a few laps it was clear that Dreyfus had
won the 'million' for Delahaye.
For the 1938 season opener Lucy Schell's Ecurie Bleue team depended on
the type 145 and entered two cars for the Pau GP to be driven by Dreyfus
and Comotti. Both Mercedes-Benz and Alfa Romeo had brought two of their
new challengers along but Mercedes were plagued by clutch slip, oiled
plugs and a five-speed 'box that was more of a problem than help. Alfa
Romeo also had to withdraw their cars after the 308 was engulfed by a
fire caused by a ruptured saddle tank caused due to chassis flexing that
left Nuvolari with minor burns and vowing never to race an Alfa again.
Only Carraciola's Mercedes made it to the starter's flag and duly led
until, surprise: Dreyfus passed him on lap 7! It took the embarrassed
German 8 laps to restore the situation but, relinquishing a 6-second lead
on lap 52 of the 100-lap race he had to stop to refuel whereas the Delahaye
would go the whole distance thanks to better fuel efficiency. Also Carraciola
had to hand over to Hermann Lang as his feet had been slightly burned,
but although Lang tried all he knew he fell even further behind when the
clutch packed up and was finally very lucky to stay unlapped!
The
Mercedes team had to admit that they had been beaten fair and square,
Korpsführer Hühnlein having some explaining to do in his report.
The Germans had been beaten by a French driver with a Jewish name driving
a semi-sports car from a more or less unknown lorry factory… Dreyfus
also won the Cork GP two weeks later and Lucy Schell was convinced that
the team should have the full back-up from the Fonds de Course from now
on. But the French seemed to prefer Talbot and Bugatti and the whole thing
ended in a fierce fight, with Ecurie Bleue moving to Monaco and boycotting
the French GP. The marque's pure GP car, the Delahaye 155 was never fully
developed and Ecurie Bleue changed to Maserati. Laury Schell died in an
accident just before the war but Lucy took the Maseratis to Indianapolis
where they were raced by Dreyfus and Le Bègue. After the war Dreyfus
remained in the USA where he opened a restaurant in New York. |
February
2003