Lavaggi LS1 (merged threads)

[BootsOntheSide]

Better move this to the sportscar forum, it's more cromulent there.

www.f1rejects.com has a good profile of him, showing that he's done many years of sportscar racing, and (IIRC, I'm in a hurry) his racign was funded by money he raised himself, and not by his nobleman background, so he may have an engineering background.

[danieljboys]

If I remember correctly, Lavaggi was a design engineer by trade and started his own engineering business, many years before he raced in the higher levels of single seaters.

Looking at his personal website, he sounds like a nice enough guy who managed to raise the money to rent a drive in F1, like any of us would do given the chance! Good luck to him, it sounds like an ambitious project.

[Adam43]

Aysedas has pointed out a link to a thread about the Sportscar efforts. Check it out for the latest.

However this thread is good for Lavaggi and his F1 efforts.

[Kicking-back]

People must have been looking the other way for the last fifteen years when Lavaggi regularly raced sportscars.


As for F1, he knew he was never going to pull up any trees, but he had a life long dream which he worked hard for and he tended to keep the car on the track.

F1's moved on from the likes of him now, but he did keep Minardi in business for a while longer.

Good old Johnny Carwash

[Louis B.]

Portuguese GP 1996: Lavaggi is about to be overlapped by MS then in P3. Jonathan Palmer talks about the elastic effect explaining (ad nauseam) to the TV viewers why the cars look as if they are closing in under braking while the leading car looks as if it is pulling away in the straits.

I am sitting on the tip of my chair bashing the TV director for not showing what is going on behind MS as I noticed JV closing in at the same occasion. Suddenly, as the TV shows the view from MS inboard camera, we see the right front wheel of another car next to MS and dangerously close to MS' front left wheel. I know it is JV and Murray interrupts Palmer's insipid monologue. JV is trying to overtake MS from the outside.

As both cars get into the straight side by side, the Williams "slowly" overtakes the Ferrari. This is not the end of the story as JV must get back in front of the Ferrari before getting into the gearbox of Lavaggi. He does so just on time. MS goes for the outside but JV makes it first to the next corner. JV can now attack Alesi (IIRC) and Damon Hill still in the lead (JV ultimately won the race).

MS was pis ****ed off after the race toward GL for not having given way earlier. The following day, a Montreal newspaper had as title on its front page: "Villeneuve se fait un prénom!" (Villeneuve makes his firstname known!).

Thank you Johnny Carwash!

P.S. I also recall Lavaggi for often having seen his picture with gorgeous pit babes.

[Fab]

Lavaggis threads have been merged.

[The Badger]

Originally Posted by grandprixdiary

and the machine will be powered by a six-litre Ford V8 prepared in America by PME.

Right ..... who exactly is "PME" ??? Anything to do with Penske Nascar effort ?

[Bramzel]

I primarily remember Lavaggi for being the playboy who whipped Fisichella out of his seat at Minardi in '97 I think.

[MulsanneMike]

Originally Posted by The Badger

Right ..... who exactly is "PME" ??? Anything to do with Penske Nascar effort ?

"Pro-Motor Engines" out of Mooresville, NC.

[danieljboys]

Bramzel, it was '96 to be picky, but you are right apart from that :0)

[Bramzel]

Thanks Luckily Fisichella ended up quite well

[TheNewBob]

think Lavaggi also had a couple of drives with the Pacific (or should that have been Pacific-Lotus...?...) team during 1995. Without success, obviously...

I used to have a video file of Lavaggi having retired from the Italian GP in '96 - or at least I think it was Italy. He was slowly, calmly getting out of the car, blissfully unaware that it was on fire... once he spotted the fire, he soon legged it! Quite an amusing vid me thinks...

[Splendid Cat]

Give the guy a break. He's lapped Le Mans in a 962 in under 3mins 25. That's good going IMHO.

[kipper]

Originally Posted by TheNewBob

I used to have a video file of Lavaggi having retired from the Italian GP in '96 - or at least I think it was Italy. He was slowly, calmly getting out of the car, blissfully unaware that it was on fire... once he spotted the fire, he soon legged it! Quite an amusing vid me thinks...

I think that would have been practice for the German GP of '96.

[Ryo28]

Originally Posted by Louis B.

Portuguese GP 1996: Lavaggi is about to be overlapped by MS then in P3......

Yes I remember that, what a great move, also remember Murray's hyper commentary (on board with Schuey)- "Look left, thats Villeneuve!!! He's going through...But Lavaggi is in his way!!! FANTASTIC DRIVING FROM BOTH OF THEM!!!" (or something like that... )

[FIRE]

According Mulsanne's Corner the car will test within 2 months.

http://www.mulsannescorner.com/news.html

[Spyder]

Originally Posted by Splendid Cat

Give the guy a break. He's lapped Le Mans in a 962 in under 3mins 25. That's good going IMHO.

I agree. A couple of F1 drives at age 37 in awful cars notwithstanding, old Johnny has done OK... the guy is not a playboy, but an engineer who took up racing at 25 and raced sportscars at WC level for years (won the Daytona 24 Hours in 1995, remember?) and went as high as his own money and sponsors could get him in single seaters. Then he set up a sportscar team and did pretty well there too... remember the 2001 Monza 1000 kms where a stuck throttle put the Ferrari-Judd in the gravel and 4 laps back on lap 4 - only for Lavaggi to storm back through a strong field (Lammers, Bourdais, Bouillon, Guy Smith, Ben Collins et al) to win and set fastest lap?

Now let's see if he can design an LMP1.

[gwyllion]

According to http://www.endurance-info.com/article.php?sid=2328 the car will be presented this Saturday during the 1000 km of Nürburgring. The car will participate the 1000 km of Donington

[Nick49]

Hello

Yes but will he now stop his current LMP1 project and start on a new one for the new coupe rules LMP1 for 2010? Would be nice to actually see it competing at Donington though.

Nick

[gwyllion]

endurance-info has a sneak preview of the car: http://www.endurance-info.com/2006_L...ring/Quizz.jpg

More details this evening.

[jet]

More pics

[FIRE]

http://www.endurance-info.com/articl...&mode=&order=0

The car looks very "angular" and "heavy".

[spectre200]

It's no oil painting either - that's gotta be the ugliest nose I've seen since the original Lister (and its continuing rhinoplasty!)

[ger80]

is it a problem with the pics or is the rollover structure material realy much thinner?

[pirenzo]

Well, it looks like it was built on a very small budget doesn't it? I hope this isn't quite the finished article in someways. The bits of bodywork on the tail that rise up to meet the wing endplates look like they might be made from a block of balsa wood and held in place with double-sided tape. The steering wheel (at least what you can see of it) looks a bit like a mock-up too, though that maybe just the photo...