THE OCTANE INTERVIEW
With success in the Monte, at Daytona and in the Targa Florio, plus stints in F1, it’s no wonder this ace is known as ‘Quick Vic’. Richard Heseltine meets him
The unusually quick and versatile Vic Elford
a blur of industry and denim. We’re in a restaurant halfway up the Alps, the other diners having long since left. Tables are being cleared and chairs stacked, but we’re being left alone. Vic Elford is royalty here, clearly. It was in these environs that he stormed to victory in the Monte Carlo Rally in January 1968. The reigning Group 3 European Rally Champion famously demolished the opposition on the icy mountain sections to claim outright honours for Porsche. Nine days later, he was part of the line-up that bagged the Daytona 24 Hours – by five laps. Three months after that, he recorded a remarkable win on the Targa Florio despite a first-lap puncture. Later that season, he finished fourth in the French Grand Prix. It was his first-ever race in Formula 1 and only his third start aboard a single-seater.
It is little wonder that he’s known both as ‘Quick Vic’ and as ‘Versatile Vic’ – few wheelmen have ever excelled as much in so many different disciplines. All of which seems a world away as he sips on his coffee, recalling the pivotal moment when he realised what he wanted to do in life. ‘My dad took me to see the 1949 British Grand Prix at Silverstone,’ he says, eyes widening at the memory. ‘We had seats in the grandstand at Stowe corner. These wonderful cars came tearing down the Hangar Straight for the first time and I knew then that I was going to be a racing driver. It took a while to materialise, though.’
First came rallying, albeit sitting in the ‘wrong’ seat. ‘The only people who could afford to go motor racing when I was looking to start were wealthy gentlemen. I had no money. I had no car. There was no family money, either. My mum and dad ran a little café in Peckham, South London, and it became clear to me that the only way I could get involved without it costing me anything was to become a rally navigator. The mother of my best friend at school had a stake in an Irish sweepstakes and she won some money. He got an MG TF out of it and we did some club rallies together. I was his co-driver. That lasted a little while but he then gave it up to get married. After that, I started reading notes for David Seigle-Morris.’
This in turn led to him making his International debut on the 1960 Tulip Rally. ‘For 1961, he had a works deal with BMC. Marcus Chambers was the manager of the Competitions Department, and he fired me because he didn’t want co-drivers who wanted to be drivers. However, he had already agreed to sell me a Mini 850 that had a Don Moore-tuned engine. It cost me £300, and I took
it racing. I won first time out at Mallory Park, but the money had run out by the end of the year so I had to sell the car. It was back to rallying. I didn’t want to be a navigator again, though, but then out of the blue I received the offer of a works drive with DKW. I grabbed the opportunity and won back-to-back National events in 1962. On one of them, I overtook John Sprinzel and Graham Robson on a special stage. Robson ran the factory team at Standard-Triumph and he instantly hired me as a works driver. He also introduced me to a young navigator, David Stone, who was my co-driver for the rest of my rally career.’
In 1964, Elford embarked on a three-year stint with Ford. It wasn’t always a happy relationship. ‘When I signed, Alan Platt ran the works team, but then he was replaced by Henry Taylor. I cannot pinpoint why, but we didn’t get on. In 1966, we had so many silly problems. We won that year’s Rallye des Fleurs, only to be disqualified because the homologation paperwork wasn’t in order. I suppose what did it for me was us retiring from the Alpine Rally. We were leading, only for the car to break 20 miles from the finish. I was angry as hell and wasn’t about to stay with Ford any longer. It became a case of which new team do I sign for: Alpine or Porsche?’
The rally ended in Cannes, where Porsche’s motor sport chief Huschke von Hanstein was staying at the Hotel Martinez. The two had lunch together and the rest is motor sport history. ‘Actually, to begin with, he wasn’t interested in rallying. He then said he could lend me a car for the November ’66 Tour de Corse but I would have to pay my own way. I remember thinking “I gave up a works drive for this?” Anyway, David and I flew to Corsica at our own expense, hired a Simca Aronde and flogged it around the narrow mountain roads on a ten-day recce. Two works mechanics turned up with a 911 just before the start, with nothing in the way of spares, and we finished third. Huschke was beside himself. Suddenly, Porsche had money to go rallying.’
Elford and Stone led the 1967 Monte Carlo Rally until the snow descended, but they still finished third. ‘Then Huschke asked me if I had ever considered racing. I told him I had thought of nothing else for as long as I could remember. I won the first-ever Rallycross, in a stock 911 lent by the importer AFN, and then, since the car had been badly dented thanks to the attentions of Brian Melia and Roger Clark in the factory Fords, AFN sent it to Stuttgart. It came back as a race car. I then won the twolitre category in the British Saloon Car Championship in it. My first International was the ’67 Targa Florio, sharing a 910 with Jochen Neerpasch.’
The Anglo-German pairing placed third. Elford continued with a mixed programme, winning his class at Le Mans, while also claiming honours on the Tulip, Lyon-Charbonnières and Geneva rallies. Not only that, he anchored the team that claimed victory in that year’s Marathon de la Route; all 84 hours of it around the Nürburgring north and south circuits. For 1968, rallying took a back seat to racing as Elford jumped between sports-prototypes, tin-tops and single-seaters.
After he’d racked up big wins with Porsche in sports cars, mixed emotions met the offer of a Formula 1 drive with Cooper. ‘During the ’68 Belgian Grand Prix at Spa, Brian Redman had been injured after his car’s suspension broke and he crashed out. John Cooper said it was driver error, but a photographer had taken a snap just as the thing collapsed. I had been going well with Porsche and had chatted to Tim Parnell at BRM about how I would like to have a go in F1, should the opportunity arise.
‘The upshot was that one day he phoned and told me to head to Silverstone. There were no guarantees of a drive, just come and try the car. BRM and Cooper were side-byside in the pits, and they were trying to get a handle on anti-dive suspension. I went out in the BRM, which was very easy to drive, and then John Cooper suggested I had a go in his car. Actually, he was brusque to put it mildly, but I did some laps and it was bloody awful. Even so, he asked me if I wanted to do the French GP. He would pay me £200. I wasn’t about to say no, even though I didn’t think it was a good car. It was very wet at Rouen, but I always went well in the rain and came fourth. I carried on with Cooper for the rest of the year, but then it was game over for the works team at the end of that season.’
Elford wasn’t done with Formula 1, however. ‘One day, Colin Crabbe phoned for a chat. He said he was going to an auction to buy a Maserati engine. He then called a few days later to say that he’d bought a Cooper-Maserati T86B and would I like to drive it? We did a non-points race together and he then entered it in the 1969 Monaco Grand Prix. We finished seventh. Colin then got serious about F1 and bought a McLaren M7B. I started getting some good points finishes, but that came to an end on the first lap of that year’s German GP at the Nürburgring. I qualified sixth, but made a poor start. Mario Andretti, who was in the four-wheel-drive Lotus 63, came steaming through from several rows back. He hadn’t driven the car
‘JOHN COOPER SUGGESTED I HAD A GO IN HIS CAR – BRUSQUELY, TO PUT IT MILDLY – BUT I DID SOME LAPS AND IT WAS BLOODY AWFUL’
on full tanks before, though, and the Lotus bottomed out and spat him off the track. One of his car’s wheels then bounced back onto the circuit. I rode over it, which launched me into a huge accident. I came to a stop upsidedown with fuel pouring out of the tanks. I tried to get to a fire extinguisher bottle with my right hand, only to realise that my arm and shoulder were damn’ near pulverised. The marshals just stood there. Mario then came over, kicked their arses and helped get me out of the car. Aside from a single outing with BRM in 1971, which is best forgotten, I never raced in Formula 1 again.’
Nonetheless, Elford continued to excel elsewhere, the early 1970s seeing him compete in everything from NASCAR to Can-Am, the International Championship for Makes to Interserie. He was also a stand-out star during Porsche’s 917 era. ‘It wasn’t a great car to begin with,’ he muses. ‘I remember doing the Le Mans 24 Hours with Richard Attwood in 1969. We were leading by five laps when the clutch expired with three hours to go. In 1970, I drove the short-tailed car, which was much nicer. You had to build up to getting the best out of the 917, though. I found that I could go through the Mulsanne kink flat, at night and in the rain, at 240mph. Once I’d done that the first time, it was no problem. In 1971, I won the Sebring 12 Hours in a Martini 917 with Gérard Larrousse, who remains a very dear friend. We kept nudging the haybales to the point that a lot more road was available towards the end of the race! I think you would get done for exceeding track limits these days.’
By way of contrast, a move to Alfa Romeo at the end of 1971 proved to be a culture shock. ‘Carlo Chiti, who ran the show, was a delightful guy, but the team was a bit of a joke.’ Having witnessed great friend Jo Bonnier’s fatal accident at Le Mans in ’72 up close, Elford then gradually wound down his driving career. ‘I was never afraid of getting killed. It never really occurred to me when I was driving, but I didn’t want to have life-changing injuries, as it were. I just got fed up with it, to be honest. This was a period when suddenly you were expected to bring sponsorship money with you, and I was terrible at selling myself. I did a few bits and pieces and then got into the management side with Inaltera and also the ATS F1 team, which was a nightmare. I returned to driving a few times, though, including the Paris-Dakar Rally in the early ’80s. I also did the 1984 Daytona 24 Hours with Attwood in a near-standard Porsche 928, but it wasn’t a proper comeback or anything.’
And with that, our time together is up. It’s raining outside, but Elford doesn’t seem to notice as he leaves the car park aboard a bright red 911, although slingshot is perhaps a more apposite description of his method of departure. The passing decades certainly haven’t blunted his enthusiasm, given the smile he’s wearing as he screams off. Once a hero, always a hero.