Difference between revisions of "Guillaume Gauthier"

Revision as of 04:11, 30 May 2018

Guillaume Gauthier (Born 6th January 1956 in Toulon, Var, France) is a former French racing driver and owner of Equipe Gauthier. He is the father of Arnaud Gauthier, and grandfather of F1RDS driver Aimée Gauthier.

Early Life

Guillaume was born in 1956 in Toulon to Pierre and Gabrielle Gauthier. Pierre was briefly an amateur racing driver in the years before World War II, and fought in the French Resistance during it. After the war, he settled down and opened a successful chain of garages which eventually covered most of southern France, and which is still in operation today by Guillaume's older brother Robert.

In this position, much of Guillaume's pre-school days were surrounded by cars, and naturally he had a fascination with them that would shape his life. At first however, he wished to work on cars, like his father, not race them. That changed on his father's 50th birthday, when the family travelled to Monaco to watch the 1967 Monaco Grand Prix. After watching the race, Guillaume was certain: He wanted to be a Formula 1 driver. His brother, Robert was equally convinced and the two began working hard to ensure their dreams would come true. Eventually the pair earned enough to buy a kart; they would participate infrequently until the end of Guillaume's school days, with mixed success for both brothers.

Early Career

After leaving school at the age of 18 in 1974 with mostly average grades, Guillaume's father proposed a deal to Guillaume and Robert. He was looking to advertise his garage business, and so offered to buy them a competitive kart, and free use of his tools, on the condition that they service it themselves and purchase all necessary parts themselves. The only question left was who would drive. Guillaume and Robert took turns setting times around the local go-kart track, until Robert spun off on his third lap. Pierre decided at that point that Robert's driving style was too wild and declared that Guillaume would be the driver and Robert the mechanic - which was fortunate because Robert happened to be better than Guillaume at servicing cars anyway.

Very quickly upon joining the French karting scene proper, Guillaume found himself one of the chief protagonists there. Indeed, by the end of 1975, he was second only to Alain Prost. Pierre was more than happy to finance Guillaume's rise to Formula Renault for 1976, after his results had been matched with a marked increase in the business that Pierre's garages were doing. The 1976 French Formula Renault title was bitterly fought, with Prost only just beating Gauthier by 7 wins to 6. Prost then moved on to Formula Renault Europe for 1977, whereas Guillaume remained, allowing himself to win every race in French Formula Renault that year.

Guillaume then moved up to French Formula 3 for 1978, where he would again clash with his rival, Alain Prost. This time, Guillaume was determined to prevail, and did so, winning 5 races.

Formula 1

1986: Williams

Gauthier won the 1986 Formula One Driver's Championship.

1987-1989: Lotus

In 1987, Gauthier chose to defend his title at the Camel Team Lotus Honda team alongside British driver Derek Warwick. In a season plagued by poor reliability, Gauthier managed only a solitary win at the Monaco Grand Prix.

He trailed his teammate by a single point over the course of the season and finished in fifth place overall, with Lotus third in the constructor standings.

Gauthier and Warwick both remained at Lotus for a second year, this time running Ford engines in the new 100 chassis. The car was an abject failure, with both drivers only managing to score a single point each in 1988.

A third engine supplier in as many years for Lotus saw the British team feature an all-French lineup, with Minardi refugee Frederic-Maxime Voeckler joining Gauthier in the Renault-engined 101 chassis in 1989. This season was far kinder to him, taking two podium finishes with a third in Monaco and a second place in the Lotus 1-2 behind Voeckler in Portugal. However, the results were not all that they seemed - in many races Gauthier had failed to capitalise on a front row or second row start and threw away victory in the Portuguese Grand Prix by spinning from the lead of the race.

1990: Arrows

Having had a fairly frustrating time at Lotus, 1990 saw Gauthier make the jump to the newly amalgamated Benetton Arrows organisation alongside British driver Chris Dagnall. Gauthier took pole in the second race of the season in Brazil - but squandered the win away in the opening two laps. Things did not improve for Gauthier at the Pacific Grand Prix, as a spin during the race saw him come home in only 7th position. Gauthier took his first podium of the season with a third place in Canada behind Dagnall and Berger. Gauthier had a second pole position one race later in Mexico, but once again he could not convert this into a result.

WTCM

Prior to the start of the 1989 season, Gauthier took part in the World Touring Car Masters race weekend at Watkins Glen driving a Ford Sierra RS500 for defending champions Kaliber Industrial Control Services Racing - replacing injured team owner Andy Rouse.

This result encouraged the Frenchman and he accepted a further invitation for the Tooheys 1000, driving a Sierra RS500 for Aegis Motorsport alongside New Zealander Paul Radisich.

Post-racing career

Following Guillaume's retirement from racing, he intended to return to the booming family business, now run by his brother Robert. However, he was contacted by Mercedes late in 1993, and offered a position at the head of their driver academy, specifically, looking to mentor young drivers to spear their single-seater efforts. Among the various drivers on Mercedes' books, Guillaume identified a young Welshman by the name of James Davies as the most promising, and proceeded to take him under his wing. Throughout 1994 and 1995, he encouraged Davies to be more forceful, both on and off the track, something which Davies would take to heart. Guillaume was also a key part in switching Mercedes' backing from Sauber to McLaren, and also in convincing F1RGP2C McLaren team boss Don Rennis to take on James Davies.

Late in 1996, however, Guillaume quietly resigned from his position, and was employed by seatholder Éadbhard Ó'Caoimhín in an advisory role at Tyrrell, in an attempt to aid the struggling constructor. However, as he later revealed in interviews, Tyrrell's finances were in a sorry state, and the team was, "one [very] bad day away from bankruptcy". When Ó'Caoimhín's attempts at securing sponsorship for the team for 1997 failed, however, he bowed out of the team, and Tyrrell's future was in doubt, until Guillaume offered to buy it from Ken Tyrrell for a nominal fee, taking on the massive debts the team accrued.

Team owner

F1RGP2C (1997-)

Guillaume's first year as a team owner was something of a baptism of fire. He had taken on a team in severe debt, without any sponsors or drivers, a somewhat more reliable update of Tyrrell's 1996 challenger, or even an engine supply. The first thing he did was agree to a two-year contact with Ford for their lowest-grade engines, the only ones the team could afford. On the driver front, Guillaume could hardly afford to take on a paid driver, so instead hired former F1RGP2C driver Samael Meerwick and occasional F3000 points-scorer Lawrence Tucker on the basis of their robust sponsor packages as opposed to their skill. Guillaume also ensured that there were numerous clauses in their contracts enabling them to be cancelled if certain conditions were not met, though Guillaume would retain the full amount of sponsorship. This would be a feature in all of Guillaume's driver contracts in 1997, and it would prove to be frequently used.

Guillaume also applied for a name change to the series bosses, given the change in ownership, though it would only be partially approved after a protest from Ferrari seatholder Andreas Stefano. Throughout the first 5 races, Gauthier's driver lineup was proclaimed to be the worst in F1RGP2C, culminating in a Reject of the Race for the team. Both Tucker and Meerwick were sacked from the team, and replacing them were Martin McFry, who had shown some pace at Forti in 1996 amongst his litany of crashes and errors, and Robert Anderson, who was heavily criticised for his lack of racing ability, and had recently recovered from severe injuries following a crash with Éadbhard Ó'Caoimhín at the 1996 Belgian Grand Prix. Anderson did, however, come with significant backing from British-American Tobacco, enabling Gauthier to pay McFry a meager salary.

Complete Formula 1 Results