Arturo Merzario's F1 Team
Italian Racing Driver Raced Own Formula 1 Car in Grand Prix Racing
Merzario Races March in F1
Arturo Merzario’s Formula 1 career had started brightly in the early 1970s, driving for Ferrari. After losing that drive he spent the next few years driving an assortment of uncompetitive machines. For 1977 he purchased a March and entered it for himself in the Spanish Grand Prix.
Merzario was not a driver without talent and he frequently embarrassed the works March drivers throughout 1977, but his real ambition was to race a car of his own construction. The Merzario A1 was designed Giorgio Piola and sponsored by Marlboro. Merzario was a keen smoker and often wore a Marlboro cowboy hat.
Merzario A1 Joins F1 Grid
The DFV powered car qualified 20th for the 1978 Argentine Grand Prix, only to retire from the race. Reliability was a problem thoughout the 1978 season, and Merzario only finished one race, the Swedish Grand Prix. Qualfiying also became difficult, with just eight Grand Prix starts over the course of the year.
Merzario started bringing his old March to races during 1978 and also raced it, finding it superior to the A1. At Italy he handed Formula 1 newcomer Alberto Colombo a drive, but the Italian failed to pre-qualify for his home race. Apart from this one-off Merzario only entered a single car for Grands Prix.
Merzarios Final F1 Season
Merzario’s car was continually updated and qualified in Argentina once again at the start of the 1979 season. Unfortunately, his race was ruined when he became involved in a multiple shunt. After that qualifying again became a problem but Merzario hoped he had the answer. At the US Grand Prix West the team appeared with a new ground-effect car, although it was only a modified version of the standard car. Nevertheless, Merzario qualified the machine 24th but had to revert to the March chassis for the race, after damaging the ground-effect car’s suspension.
In Belgium Merzario crashed heavily, breaking his arm. After that meeting he purchased the remnants of the defunct Kauhsen Formula 1 team. Despite their cars being hopelessly uncompetitive Merzario forged ahead with converting one to ground-effect specification. Gianfranco Brancatelli failed to pre-qualify in Monaco while Merzario recovered from his accident.
Although Merzario returned to the cockpit he never again qualified for a Grand Prix. Showing remarkable optimism he constructed a car for the 1980 season but it did not appear at a Formula 1 meeting. Instead, Merzario concentrated on Formula 2, where his team competed for several seasons, with limited success. Merzario’s attempt at running a Formula 1 team had been commendable. Against seemingly impossible odds he kept his operation running for three seasons.
Arturo Merzario
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