Sunday 15th May, the 10th edition of the Grand Prix de Pau Historique took place in Pau, capital city of the Bearn region.
This historic race was one week before the Grand Prix Moderne which returns to Pau after a one-year break. Main partner for these two events, Richard Mille contributes to the growing success of the Grand Prix Historique, which attracted more than 700 collector cars and 10 000 spectators during the weekend.
On Saturday and Sunday, seven grids followed each other on the legendary urban circuit: from pre-war Bugattis, through 1960’s GTs, up to historic F1 cars, some 200 competition cars all produced some fabulous racing despite the poor weather. At the end of the racing week-end, the winners were Paddins Dowling on 1936 ERA; Martin Walford for the Junior Trophy with a 1963 MK5 Lola; Ian Nuthall on Alta F2 in the Argentin Trophy; Peter Horsman and his Lotus 18 in the Pau Trophy; Laurent Fort in the Pyrenees Trophy with a Crossle 32F, Christian Traber on a Jaguar Type E in the Phil Hill Trophy, and finally Nick Swift on a 1965 Morris, in the very keenly contested Mini Classic Trophy.
As with Le Mans Classic to which Richard Mille is also a main partner; the Historic Grand Prix de Pau Historique offered a warm welcome to the local historic car clubs. Some 500 vehicles were exhibited including the Delahaye 145, winner in Pau in 1938, which was the true star of this meeting having crossed the Atlantic specifically for the event.
This weekend kicked off a full week of passionate motor racing in the city of Pau. Many animations taking place until the next racing weekend commencing on Saturday 21st of May including the much expected F3 competitors.
Please note the copyright for the images; ©Julien Philippy
