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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My Summer “Vacation”

This past Summer, I travelled to the United Kingdom and Belgium to attend events and sketch what I found interesting.

I’ve been working at refining the idea of “live” sketching, where I sketch an interesting motorized vehicle on-the-spot, no matter what the context or situation.

The most interesting aspect of it is the not-knowing what will happen next, and be able to adapt to any changes, whatever they may be.

There are always spectators who have questions, or who want to chat, which I very much appreciate; it’s comforting as an artist to have so many people interested in what you do. There are also the professional photo-journalists who look for that different image to make their story-telling more unique.

There are the changing weather conditions (especially in the UK and Belgium!); wind, rain, the movement of the sun … they all impact the final result.

Other things that impact the art, or more accurately, the artist, are the noises of racing engines being tuned, exhaust fumes that burn the eyes, flames coming out the exhaust pipes, or even the race car being moved.

Finally, there is the time crunch of trying to get 2 artworks done in one day, for which I don’t always have much control over.

Sometimes the car is racing within the 2 hours, so there is a minimum amount of the art-piece that needs to be finished. For a land speed record car at the Brooklands Reunion, I had to reset up 3 or 4 times to get the artwork finally finished.

Below are the 16 artworks that I created at these 5 events … my summer “Vacation” …

Silverstone Classic




Brooklands Reunion



Goodwood Revival





Spa Historic 6 Hours



Sywell Classic Pistons & Props

Bira the racing Prince

Born in 1914, Birabongse Bhanudej was a Grand Prix and Formula 1 racecar driver from Siam (now Thailand).

Better known as Prince Bira, or his racing name "B. Bira", he raced a Riley, Maseratis, Connaughts, Gordinis, but is best known for successfully racing E.R.A.s.

After his formal education in the United Kingdom, he raced with his cousin Prince Chula Chakrabongse's White Mouse Racing team. In 1935-36, the team started acquiring E.R.A.s, and Bira gave a name to each; first was the R2B "Romulus", followed by R5B "Remus", and lastly, R12B "Hanuman".
Bira racing Romulus

14.5"x 11" limited edition print

© Paul Chenard 2011

I did this sketch on the outside of the package of my new book and an original art-piece that a client had ordered. He owns the car in the sketch, so I thought I'd thank him with a sketch of it. Couriers also take much better care with the package when I do that.

Prince Bira found most success racing "Romulus" throughout 1936, with 3 wins, including Monaco and Brooklands, and a second and third place finish.

Post-war, Bira won the Grand Prix des Frontières on the Chimay road circuit in 1954, racing a Maserati 250F and the New Zealand Grand Prix in 1955. He retired at the end of the 1955 season.

Prince Bira died of heart failure in London in 1985 at the age of 71.