Two six-cylinder Formula 2 cars lead the practice pack at Thruxton over the April 19, 1976 Jochen Rindt Memorial Trophy Euro F2 round weekend.
Brian Henton in the Tom Wheatcroft Racing Wheatcroft Pilbeam R26 Abarth-Holbay Tipo 260 straight-six leads Jean Pierre Jabouille, Elf Jabouille 2J Renault V6 through the chicane; the latter was a rather successful car, the former was not!
The Wheatcroft was so hopelessly slow that Henton – the 1980 European F2 Champion – didn’t start the race won by Maurizio Flammini’s works March 762 BMW M12/7.
The Abarth-developed engine was a factory design led by ex-Ferrari engineer Stefano Iacoponi. The Fiat-Abarth L6-260 was a twin-cam, four-valve, fuel-injected alloy 1986cc straight-six with a bore/stroke of 86/57mm. The engine developed a claimed 316bhp at 10,400rpm. Holbay took over development of the engine after Fiat abandoned the project.
Fitted to the Mike Pilbeam-designed Wheatcroft R26 chassis the engine had crankshaft problems, persistent reliability troubles, and handling quirks due to the top-heavy design.
While making plenty of noise, the Wheatcroft managed little more than practice/early-season appearances before Tom Wheatcroft’s team abandoned the experiment and switched to Hart 420R power.
Mike Pilbeam designed and built R23/24/26/27 Formula Atlantic and Formula Two cars for Tom Wheatcroft in 1976. The R23 F Atlantic was never made. R24 – BMW-engined F2. R26 – Abarth-Holbay 6 cyl-engined F2 (only appeared in public at Thruxton practice). R27 – Hart-engined F2, driven by Bob Evans.
The prelude to the Wheatcoft Abarth exploration was the Lola T450 derived Lola T550 (HU2) built for Roberto Marazzi by Lola in 1977. Entered in the March 6, 1977 Silverstone International Trophy, he qualified 19th of 26 cars ‘but did not start as it blew both of its Holbay-tuned Abarth engines in the two days of practice.’
Aussie Bruce Allison was impressing in the UK at the time and jumped aboard the car at Snetterton to test T550 HU2 before a proposed entry in the April 9, 1978 Hockenheim Euro F2 round…but he bailed out of that. Alo Lawler was entered in the car at the Donington Euro F2 round that year, but he too jumped ship before the event. More about Lola’s also abortive race program with the engine here:https://www.lolaheritage.co.uk/type_numbers/t550/t550.html
Credits…
Ercole Colombo, MotorSport, Bruce Allison Collection, Mike Pilbeam-MotorSport, Lola Heritage
Finito…
