E.R.A. – English Racing Automobiles

In the current vintage racing scene at diverse venues ranging from Silverstone to Prescott, you’ll probably chance to see a lovely proportioned single-seat open-wheeled race car, the E.R.A., shorthand for English Racing Automobiles.

These cars were the brainchild of Humphrey Cook, Raymond Mays, and Peter Berthon in late 1933. It was their way of upholding British prestige in international racing by the design, manufacture and creation of a team of single-seat race cars.



Top-tear Grand Prix racing was prohibitively costly, so they set their sights on the smaller Voiturette (1500cc supercharged) class of racing.

The brilliant British designer Reid Railton designed the chassis, and the engine was a highly developed version of well-proven Riley six-cylinder.

The well-proportioned body certainly made the finished car look like a winner.



With some chassis design refinements and adjustments, by the end of 1934, they had a winning combination.



Through the rest of the decade, the E.R.A. dominated the international Voiturette class, taken to some notable wins by such great drivers as Raymond Mays, Dick Seaman and Prince Bira.



Later on, as the basic design was modified through the A-Type, B-Type, C-Type and D-Type versions, other new designs were developed in the form of the E-Type and G-Type, but these were not developed enough before funding ran out for race car creation, and the company refocused it’s resources into engineering research and development.



The E.R.A. was a rugged racer, and today, most of them have survived.

They live today as the iconic pre-war British race car.

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The Rainmasters

It has been a relatively rainy spring here, there ... and everywhere.

Interestingly, there are some drivers in motor sports history who smiled at the sight of rain before their race.

Many of these drivers were equal to their counterparts on a dry track, yet their sense of balance, and their ability to read the track and sense to minute shifts in the movement of their car gave them a clear advantage in a rainy race.

The list of such virtuosity in the wet spans the decades.

Rudolf Caracciola was one of the earliest maestros in the rain, earning the himself nickname “Regenmeister”, German for “Rain master”.

Dick Seaman’s drive of his Mercedes-Benz W154 at the 1939 Belgian Grand Prix ended fatally for him, but it was because he kept pushing even after building an unbelievable lead on an already challenging track. There is Phil Hill’s win, along with Olivier Gendebien, of the rainy 1958 24 heures du Mans in the Ferrari 250 TR. Sir Jackie Stewart showed utter bravery to take the 1968 German Grand Prix in the Matra MS10, driving in virtually invisible conditions.

Pedro Rodriguez, sharing a Gulf Porsche 917K with Leo Kinnunen, beat the second-place car by 5 laps in the rainy 1970 BOAC 1000km at Brands Hatch! James Hunt wrapped up his 1976 Championship racing to third place, after many delays, in the monsoon 1976 Japanese Grand Prix.

In the modern era, both Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna have shown their art in the wet.
Pen&ink and markers on Foamcore © Paul Chenard 2013

Senna’s drive of the 1993 European Grand Prix at Donington Park in the less-than-stellar McLaren MP4/8 is the stuff of legends, or should I say, “Rainmasters”!