Louis Alexandre Chiron (3 August 1899 – 22 June 1979) was a Monaco, Monégasque racing driver who competed in Rallying, rallies, sports car racing, sports car races, and Grand Prix motor racing, Grands Prix. Among the greatest drivers between the two World Wars, his career embraced over thirty years, starting in 1927, and ending at the end of the 1950s. He is still the oldest driver ever to have finished in Formula One, having taken 6th place in the 1955 Monaco Grand Prix when he was 55. Three years later he became the oldest to start a Formula One race, at 58. The Bugatti Chiron takes its name from him.

Career

Louis Chiron gained interest in cars and racing when he was a teenager. He started driving in Grand Prix races after World War I, in which he was seconded from an artillery regiment as a driver for Philippe Pétain, Maréchal Pétain and Ferdinand Foch, Maréchal Foch. He won his first local race, the Grand Prix du Comminges of 1926, at Saint-Gaudens, Haute-Garonne, Saint-Gaudens, near Toulouse, and went on to drive a Bugatti and an Alfa Romeo P3 to victories in the Marseille Grand Prix, the Circuit of Masaryk, and the Spanish Grand Prix. In the 1929 Indianapolis 500, Indianapolis 500 of 1929, he drove a Delage to 7th place. He won the 1931 Monaco Grand Prix—the only Monégasque driver to have won his home grand prix—and in 1933 he partnered with specialist endurance racer Luigi Chinetti to win the Spa 24 hours race. Chiron retired in 1938, and World War II curtailed motor racing a year later. When racing resumed after the War, he came out of retirement and drove a Talbot-Lago to victory in two French Grands Prix. According to a ''Los Angeles Times'' review of fellow driver Hellé Nice's biography, Chiron accused her, at a 1949 party in Monaco to celebrate the first postwar Monte Carlo Rally, of "collaborating with the Nazism, Nazis". The review says biographer Miranda Seymour is "circumspect on Nice's guilt". A review of the same book in ''The New York Times'' says Nice was accused of being a "Gestapo agent"; that Seymour "rebuts" the charge; and that it made Nice "unemployable". Seymour's book says that in a letter to Antony Noghes, the head of the Monte Carlo Rally committee, Hellé Nice "protested her innocence"; that she told him she would appeal to the Monaco court unless Chiron wrote an apology; that no letter from Chiron has been found; and that the court has no record of such a case between 1949 and 1955. Paired with the Swiss driver Ciro Basadonna, Chiron won the 1954 Monte Carlo Rally, and achieved podium finishes in the fifteen Formula One races he entered that year. His last race was in 1955, when he took a Lancia D50 to sixth place in the 1955 Monaco Grand Prix, Monaco Grand Prix a few weeks before his 56th birthday, becoming the oldest driver to compete in a Formula One race. He is also the oldest driver ever to have entered for a Formula One race, taking part in practice for the 1958 Monaco Grand Prix when he was 58.

Racing record

Major career victories

Louis Chiron after winning the 1934 French Grand Prix

*Belgian Grand Prix – 1930 Belgian Grand Prix, 1930 *Czechoslovakian Grand Prix – 1931, 1932, 1933 *French Grand Prix – 1931 French Grand Prix, 1931, 1934 French Grand Prix, 1934, 1937 French Grand Prix, 1937, 1947 French Grand Prix, 1947, 1949 French Grand Prix, 1949 (Reims) *German Grand Prix – 1929 German Grand Prix, 1929 *Italian Grand Prix – 1928 Italian Grand Prix, 1928 *Spanish Grand Prix – 1928 Spanish Grand Prix, 1928, 1929 Spanish Grand Prix, 1929, 1933 Spanish Grand Prix, 1933 *Monaco Grand Prix – 1931 Monaco Grand Prix, 1931 *Moroccan Grand Prix– 1934 *Grand Prix du Comminges – 1947 *Grand Prix de Marseilles – 1933 *Grand Prix de Nice – 1932 *Spa 24 hours – 1933 Spa 24 Hours, 1933 *Rome Grand Prix – 1928 *Marne Grand Prix – 1928 *Monte Carlo Rally – 1954

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Complete European Championship results

(:Template:EC driver results legend, key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.)

Post-WWII Grandes Épreuves results

(:Template:Motorsport driver results legend, key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap.)

Complete Formula One World Championship results

(:Template:F1 driver results legend 2, key)

Legacy

Chiron retired after 35 years in racing but maintained an executive role with the organizers of the Monaco Grand Prix, who honoured him with a statue on the Grand Prix course and renamed the Swimming Pool corner after him. As he had achieved the greatest number of podium finishes in Bugattis, the 1999 Bugatti 18/3 Chiron concept car and the 2016 Bugatti Chiron (2016), Bugatti Chiron are named in his honour. Louis Chiron was so popular in Czechoslovakia, whose Czechoslovakian Grand Prix, Grand Prix he won three consecutive times, that even after 75 years his name still lives in a popular saying "He drives like Chiron", used mainly when referring to speeding motorists or generally to people who drive very quickly. Chiron was the only Monegasque driver to score points in a Formula One race until Charles Leclerc in the 2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix and the only Monegasque to score a podium until Leclerc in the 2019 Bahrain Grand Prix.

References

External links

Grand Prix History
Louis Chiron
Louis Chiron at The Crittenden Automotive Library
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Chiron, Louis 1899 births 1979 deaths Bugatti people Indianapolis 500 drivers 24 Hours of Le Mans drivers 24 Hours of Spa drivers Monegasque racing drivers Monegasque Formula One drivers French military personnel of World War I Maserati Formula One drivers Enrico Platé Formula One drivers Ecurie Rosier Formula One drivers Lancia Formula One drivers Scuderia Centro Sud Formula One drivers Monegasque rally drivers Grand Prix drivers World Sportscar Championship drivers European Championship drivers Carrera Panamericana drivers