AUTOMOBILSPORT #46

RACING | HISTORY | PASSION

ISSUE #46

IN STORES AROUND EUROPE SINCE 03.10.2025
AND AVAILABLE IN OUR ONLINE SHOP

COVER STORY

Alpine in racing and rallying 1952–1978

Norman Invasion – Founding and early years of Automobiles Alpine
The seven Musketeers – Alpine drivers
The first World Rally Champions
Home win at Le Mans – Alpine in sportscar racing
The F3/F2 story
A level playing field – One-make Alpine series over the years
Competing at World Championship-Level – Alpine in modern F1 and endurance racing

On its way to all subscribers on 26.09.2025.

NORMAN INVASION

Founding and early years of Automobiles Alpine

The story of Alpine, the FIA’s World Rally Championship’s first champion manufacturer, stretches from a German aristocrat through to characters mirrored in the pages of an Alexandre Dumas novel. It begins during the Second World War in occupied France, with the secret development of the Renault 4CV.

In 1941 a senior manager and engineer at the Mercedes factory in Stuttgart, Prince Wilhelm von Urach, was sent to take control of the Renault manufacturing business at Boulogne-Billancourt in Paris that was now under German control. Within the company, Louis Renault had already initiated a programme to suggest designs for a new car. He personally thought that this should be something along the lines of the Juvaquatre or even the larger Primaquatre, both of which had ceased production to make way for trucks needed for the war. Head of the team looking to design the new car was Renault’s technical director, Fernand Picard, who together with Charles-Edmond Serre began to think in terms of a smaller, less expensive car than those produced by Renault in the 1930s. Louis Renault was eventually persuaded that they had a good argument, and the project was given the working title of 106E.

The German management had officially banned any work on new models, but fortunately, von Urach was something of a Francophile and for the next four years he managed to turn a Nelsonian eye to the work going on under his aegis that would eventually produce the Quatre Chevaux with its rear engine and all-round independent suspension. Of course, the British RAF did not help very much as the Renault factories on the Île Seguin were one of their prime targets. After the liberation of Paris, Louis Renault was sidelined and accused of treason while the French government nationalised Renault S.A. One of their first moves was to invite a certain Ferdinand Porsche to see whether the Volkswagen project might be relocated to France or whether, as a designer of a small car with a rear engine and all-round independent suspension, he might have any suggestions for the nascent 4CV. This did not go down well with the new chairman of Renault S.A., Pierre Lefaucheux, honoured for his work in the resistance, and he rather brusquely rejected any such help.

Back with the 4CV, despite all the difficulties, the engineers working under Picard had come up with a prototype as early as 1942 and two more prototypes followed. The completed working prototype was presented at the Paris Motor Show in October 1946. For the production of their new car, Renault invested in large amounts of new machinery and developed automatic stations on their transfer lines that could carry out successive operations on a single component, much as electronic robots do today. From the time that the 4CV hit the open market in 1947 until production ceased in 1961, over 1.1 million had been produced. The original engine was a 760 cc four-cylinder and the transmission was via a three-speed gearbox. After just three years of production, the engine was changed to a more powerful – 17 bhp – with a capacity of 747 cc to enable the little car to compete in races and rallies in the up-to-750 cc class …

More in the current issue!

by John Davonport

Photographs: Renault

The seven Musketeers

Alpine drivers

During the period of the late 1960s and early 1970s in the lead-up to Alpine’s World Rally Championship title success, the French press frequently referred to the drivers of the works-entered A110s as ‘The Musketeers’, invoking the image of Alexandre Dumas’s swaggering heroes. Of course, there were never just three of them or even four if you also count d’Artagnan. In all, there were seven drivers whose contributions over the period from 1966 up to and including 1973 created the success that was Alpine’s.

Jean Vinatier
The first on the scene was Jean Vinatier. Born in Paris in 1933, his motorsport career started – as with so many young Frenchmen in that post-war period – with a 4CV and then an A106 before he finished fourth on the 1958 Tour de Corse with a Dauphine Gordini. He then spent a couple of years driving Fords before reverting to an R8 Gordini to win Corsica in 1964. Further R8 successes followed, but in 1966 he started driving for Alpine Renault and rewarded them with a win in the Critérium de Cévennes driving in Group 6 with a 1,440 cc engine. In 1968 he won the Rallye des Alpes together with a Coupe des Alpes, an exploit he was to repeat twice more in 1970 and 1972 – there was no Rallye des Alpes held in 1971 – to be awarded a coveted Coupe d’Or. He won the Cévennes again in 1968 and repeated that feat in 1969.

At the end of 1971, Vinatier reverted to Ford and had some good results with a Capri RS2600, which led to him being appointed to the position of Ford France’s competition manager. He thus missed out on being part of the Alpine team that became the first world champions but, nevertheless, his hard work and dedication had created the necessary foundations for that feat.

Jean-François Piot
Also a Parisian and born in 1938, Jean-François Piot’s original destiny was to have been an architect and he was enrolled at the famous Beaux-Arts de Paris. However, his mind was constantly on cars and when he was 19, he borrowed the family Citroën ID19 to do a minor rally and put it on its roof. In 1961 he co-drove a Dauphine Gordini and when the driver fell ill, he took over. Regular drives with a Dauphine 1093 followed and then in 1964 he drove a Citroën again as well as a Triumph TR4. His link with Triumph also saw him finish 14th at the Le Mans 24 Hours in a Spitfire. Towards the end of 1965, he was able to get an R8 Gordini 1100 and with it took a fifth place on the Coupe des Alpes. Works support came for 1966 and despite retirements in both Monte Carlo and Sanremo, he was third overall on the Lyon–Charbonnières. With a full works R8 1440 prototype, he won the Tour de Corse and made his first appearance in an A110, finishing fourth overall on the Cévennes. In 1967 he drove an R8 Gordini 1300 to victory in Sanremo and Three Cities before taking an A110 1300 to third place in the Cévennes …

More in the current issue!

by John Davonport

Photographs: Renault

DUO INFERNALE

An interview with Prince Leopold of Bavaria and Dieter Quester

Prince Leopold of Bavaria (‘Poldi’ to German racing fans) and Dieter Quester have been close friends for decades. It’s a friendship that goes far beyond their shared passion for racing. They sat down with AUTOMOBILSPORT for an in-depth conversation at the Red Bull Ring Classics. Hans-Joachim Stuck was also supposed to be there, but had to cancel his attendance at the event at short notice. So instead, our interview was with two thirds of the legendary trio.

AUTOMOBILSPORT: Gentlemen, can you remember when you first met?

Prince Leopold: It must have been sometime in the early 1970s. I was still relatively new to motorsport at the time, but Dieter is much older than me, so he was already a hero when we met.

Quester: Yes, I started racing before Poldi. Sometime in the 1970s I won a Formula 2 race at Hockenheim against [Clay] Regazzoni. We met somewhere there and realised that we got along well. And then, at some point in the following years, Strietzel [Stuck] joined us. That’s how the term ‘trio infernale’ came about – and it’s a justified name. The things we did back then wouldn’t be possible these days, because you’d be arrested immediately. But I have to say, the professional aspect was never overlooked. There was racing on one hand and fun on the other. At least for me, there was a very clear dividing line, and professional thinking took precedence.

Prince Leopold: Well, once you put your helmet on, that was the end of the friendship! The nice thing about the story of the two of us, or the three of us, is that we maintained our friendship outside of racing for so long.

AUTOMOBILSPORT: Do you still meet up privately often? Where do you prefer to meet? Or does that vary?

Quester: Well, to be honest, we don’t get together very often. I used to talk to Strietzel on the phone a lot, and Poldi and I also talk on the phone from time to time. It’s a shame that we don’t get together and shake hands very often.

Prince Leopold: But we’re still so busy!

Quester: Yes, of course. And we’re still young, so there’s still time for all that. We’ve got at least 30 years left ...

AUTOMOBILSPORT: If we asked you for your favourite anecdote from racing, what would you say?

Prince Leopold: How old are your readers? …

More in the current issue!

by René de Boer

Photographs: McKlein, René de Boer, DTM History, Kräling, BMW

TREASURE HUNTER

Franco Meiners and his exceptional car collection

Franco Meiners grew up in Italy as one of four siblings with German parents. He speaks five languages fluently (German, English, Italian, French and Spanish) and is a passionate collector, racing driver and dealer of exceptional cars. He has been a regular at Peter Auto events for many years and was back again in 2025 for the highlight of the season, Le Mans Classic. Meiners invited us to a chat in his office near the port of Monaco, where he gave AUTOMOBILSPORT an exclusive insight into his collection.

Franco Meiners was born with petrol in his veins. During a visit to the Turin Motor Show with his parents, around 1968, he saw a Lotus Formula 3 car and instantly knew: ‘Dad, I want one of those!’ Young Franco quickly developed a penchant for rare and fast cars. Even as a child, racing cars were the most beautiful vehicles in existence to him. He sold his first car, 1962 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint which he had lovingly restored, at the age of 18 and then used the money to buy two other cars, laying the foundation for his career as a collector and dealer. Over the years, he has acquired and overseen the sales of numerous exceptional automobiles. Today, his mechanics restore his own cars and those of customers in his own workshop. Meiners has a particularly close connection with the Ferrari brand, and with good reason, as his father was already a personal acquaintance of Enzo Ferrari – but in a different way than one might expect.

Ford vs Ferrari
‘I have a special relationship with Ferrari,’ explains Franco Meiners. His parents were from the city of Wilhelmshaven on the North Sea Coast of Germany. After their wedding, they took a honeymoon tour of Europe. ‘They liked Italy so much that they wanted to stay there,’ Meiners continues. ‘So I was born in Italy. My father worked for the Ford Motor Company at the time and was responsible for Europe. His job was to fire managers in Germany, the UK, Switzerland, France and Italy if they were not performing as expected. The American way. If you’re good, you get a bonus. If you’re not good, you can go home.’

In 1963 the elder Meiners was assigned by Henry Ford and Lee Iacocca to work on the planned takeover of Ferrari …

More in the current issue!

by Robert Weber

Photographs: Robert Weber, McKlein, Peter Auto, Dino Eisele