Henri Julien (motor sports)
Henri Julien ( born September 18, 1927 in Gonfaron, France, † July 13, 2013 in Hyères) was a French race car driver and team boss. He founded and led the team Automobiles Gonfaronnaises Sportives (AGS ), which was engaged in the 1970s and 1980s in the Formula 2 European Championship and Formula 1. AGS was the smallest formula 1 team of the 1980s.
Biography
Henri Julien's father ran in the Provencal village Gonfaron a gas station with an attached car workshop, bore the name of the Garage de l' Avenir ( " Workshop of the Future "). After an apprenticeship, which he completed in Toulon, among others, took over the company in 1947 Julien.
1946 Julien visited the Grand Prix of Nice, one of the first Grand Prix that took place after the end of World War II. The event sparked his interest in motorsport. Julien constructed in the following years race cars that were named JH ( Julien Henri ) and were numbered consecutively. Initially received each chassis JH own number, since the 1970s, however, several identical specimens were grouped under one number. With some of these cars Julien took part in car races as a driver.
Racer
1950 Julien constructed his first race car, based on a Simca components seater that was intended for junior classes with an engine capacity limit of 500 cc. With this vehicle, the learned various modifications, Julien was active as a driver for several years. In 1952 another vehicle, this time with a BMW engine. In 1957 he established a new car, which became known as Julien- Panhard and is retroactively called JH3. The car had front wheel drive and used various components of contemporary models of the Panhard. Was powered by a 850 cc two-cylinder engine great Panhard, who was sitting on the front axle. The front overhang was considerable; over the entire width of the car pulled a massive cooling vent, which was initially only grate coarsely.
End of the 1950s, Julien concentrated its commitment to the newly established Formula Junior. He adapted his cars to the rules of this class, took itself but only participate in a few races. They were each about events that took place in southern France.
In 1959, Julien Julien with the Panhard at the Monaco Grand Prix for Formula Junior ( Grand Prix de Monaco Junior) part. He qualified and finished the race in 19th place with four laps behind the winner Michael May, who drove a Stanguellini. The following year, Julien reported the car in a modified version as JH 4 with a slightly smaller cooling opening again for the event in Monte Carlo, took part in the race but not in part. The reasons for this are not clear. Some sources indicate that he was not qualified, while others believe he was not even started.
1959 ended Julien's first attempts to construct your own race cars. In the 1960s, Julien went irregularly racing cars from other manufacturers in smaller classes. He played in the early 1960s, among other things, individual race of the Formula 3
1964 Julien reported to two southern French Formula 3 race with a Lotus 22 Ford engine. In the Coupe de Vitesse in Pau, he fell after 13 laps with a brake defect. At the tendered for the Formula 3 Grand Prix of Monaco, where he wanted to start for the team Écurie Méditerranée, he could not qualify.
1965 Julien started only once in Formula 3 to Coupe de Vitesse in Pau, he reported an Alpine 270 with Renault engine. Here Julien had already failed in qualifying. After finished Julien, now 38 years old, his active racing career.
Some documentation report that Julien then coached the French racing driver of the French Formula 3 Championship at the time.
Team boss
End of 1969, founded the company Automobiles Julien Gonfaronnaises Sportive, which was housed in his garage de l' Avenir. Together with the mechanic Christian Vanderpleyn, who had graduated in 1959 and in 1960 an apprenticeship with Julien, he took over the production of his own race car again. AGS started off with smaller classes as the Formule France, Formula Renault and Formula 3, 1978 it was involved in Formula 1, Formula 2 and 1986-1991.
AGS entertained at this time regularly a factory team, so went in all series factory at the start. Henri Julien was until 1989, team principal and athletic director of the racing team.
In Formula 2, directed by Julien team AGS reached in seven years with three wins, two scored Richard Dallest in the 1980 season and a Philippe Streiff in the season 1984 Here Streiff wrote something like motorsport history because he reached his victory at the last race. formula 2
1986, showed the possibility of the rise in the Formula 1 French Formula 1 Renault F1 Team had retired at the end of the 1985 season of Formula 1 and sold substantial parts of the equipment to Julien. They were based on the Formula 1 involvement of AGS, which began in 1986 at the Grand Prix of Italy. AGS was at that time the smallest Formula 1 Team: Julien had - including the pilot - only six employees. The established teams had at the same time more than 100 employees. In the six- year-long commitment AGS Formula 1 World Championship scoring two points, namely one by Roberto Moreno at the Grand Prix of Australia in 1987 and another by Gabriele Tarquini two years later at the Grand Prix of Mexico.
Julien type of team leadership is described in the literature as good-naturedly:
" Se battre oui, mais ne pas de bien manger oublier après et bien boire »
" Measure yourself with others: Yes. But it must not be forgotten afterwards to eat well and good to drink it. "
Retirement
AGS was restructured after a re- sale and the closing of the racing team in 1991 to a leisure companies. It offers individuals the opportunity to take the company's racetrack in Le Luc Formula 1 cars. Henri Julien was honorary president of this company.
In the 1990s, Julien developed broke a race car with 500 cc capacity, which at the Circuit Automobile Morte Fontaine, an average speed of 222.557 km / h achieved in 1997 and thus one existing for 44 years record for vehicles in this class along with Bernard Boyer.
Julien lived until shortly before his death in Gonfaron in an apartment above the garage de l' Avenir. He died after a long illness in a hospital in Hyères.