Baron Emmanuel ‘Toulo’ de Graffenried (18 May 1914, Paris, France – 22 January 2007, Lonay, Switzerland) was a Swiss motor racing driver.
He participated in 23 World Championship Grands Prix, debuting on 13 May 1950, and scored a total of nine championship points. He also participated in numerous non-Championship Formula One races. Info from Wiki
Bio by Stephen Latham
Born in Paris in 1914, Baron Emmanuel Leo Ludwig de Graffenried (nicknamed ‘Toulo’ de Graffenried) won the inaugural British GP at Silverstone in 1949, a year before the official championship began. It was attended by the entire royal family. Although born in Paris he grew up in Switzerland and was educated at the Institut Le Rosey, where fellow pupils included the future Shah of Iran. When he celebrated his 80th birthday, the King of Spain travelled to Switzerland to visit him.
Having been inspired by races at Bremgarten, he began his racing career in his 20s and in 1936 won the Prix de Berne at Bremgarten, with an Alfa Romeo, though eventually switched to Maseratis. Some of his best results came at this daunting, cobbled 4.5-mile street circuit. He had also raced an Alfa Romeo 6C in 1936’s Mille Miglia and was later involved in sportscar racing around pre-war Europe with an American friend, John Dupuy, in Maseratis. He told how they “went everywhere: Italy, Germany, France. The old Donington you went under that narrow bridge part way round the track. And the Isle of Man, in the pouring rain, where I first met Prince Bira. He became a very good friend, and eventually my team-mate.”
After the war he and Christian Kautz formed Team Autosport and raced a 1.5 litre Maserati in Voiturette racing, mostly at Bremgarten though he finished fifth in the Prix de Geneva in 1946 and third at Lausanne in 1947. In 1948 he was second in Geneva’s Grand Prix de Nations and third in the Monaco GP but the team disbanded when C.Kautz was killed in the Swiss GP at Bremgarten.
Just after the war, at a race in Marseilles he met Enrico Plate who was a Maserati driver plus also a great mechanic. He wanted to give up driving, and offered Toulo his car for a race in Geneva and they became a team, later becoming a two-car team, with P.Taruffi, H.Schell or Prince Bira in the second car.
Although he took the memorable win at Silverstone in 1949, he and B.Bira had raced Maserati 4CLTs there the year before, though Toulo went off the track and severed the cable to the public-address system. During 1948, having driven across France they docked tired and hungry at Dover and went in search of a meal. But, in a time of post-war austerity, they were presented with porridge; he told how “Plate had never seen such a thing before. He thought it was some strange sort of pasta, and trying to make it eatable he poured olive oil over it. After that we learned to stop at those, you know, transport cafes, and there the food was fine.” In 1949, driving on the country roads from Dover to Silverstone, they got lost a number of times as many signposts had been removed as a wartime security measure and not been replaced. Due to this they missed the first day’s practice and in the second day’s session he and B.Bira qualified fourth and second on the front row of the five-four-five grid. In the race, B.Bira and L.Villoresi had a wheel-to-wheel battle for the lead while Toulo ran in fourth place until Villoresi had an engine problem and Bira hit a marker barrel and bent his front axle. Eventually Toulo found himself leading, though made two fuel stops; (in one of them jumping from the car for a quick drink and to change goggles) then rejoined and pushed to take victory ahead of B.Gerard’s ERA and L.Rosier’s Talbot. After winning the pre-World Championship Silverstone race, he readily admitted it was a fortunate victory, as his rivals Luigi Villoresi, Reg Parnell and Prince Bira had all been leading at various points before encountering mechanical problems. During that year he also took third place with a Stanguellini in the GP de Madrid.
He contested five rounds of 1950’s championship, taking sixth places in Switzerland and Italy plus at Goodwood was second in the Formule Libre Chichester Cup and the Richmond Trophy F1 race plus third in the Woodcote Cup and fourth in its Goodwood Trophy. He continued to drive in occasional races over the next six years and in 1952 took a second place at Silverstone with a Jaguar XK120 and, with the new F2 rules in force had third places at Cadours and Aix-les-Bains in non-championship races with Enrico Platé. In 1953 he drove a Maserati A6GCM to victories in the Syracuse GP (ahead of Louis Chiron’s OSCA) and an Eifelrennen F2 race plus achieved his best world championship GP result with fourth in Belgium. There was a busy schedule at Goodwood, winning an F2 Lavant Cup in a Maserati A6GCM, won again with a strong drive in the Formule Libre Chichester Cup (holding off the BRM V16s and the ThinWall Special Ferrari V12 ) then was third in the Richmond Trophy and fourth in a handicap race. He also took a Maserati sports car to South America, enjoying the experience of travelling by sea there with his colleagues, in the age before jet aircraft, and won the 1954 Circuit of Gavea race at Rio and the Sao Paulo GP.
During his time with Scuderia Plate, their resources were often limited, usually with Enrico and two mechanics to look after the two cars. Toulo often drove the van as well in order to give the weary mechanics some sleep before they reached the races. He and Enrico Plate became good friends and the partnership lasted virtually his entire racing career, apart from 1951 when he stood in for an injured Consalvo Sanesi at Alfa Romeo and took fifth place in his home GP. Sadly, in 1954, in the Temporada race series, Enrico Platé was standing in front of the pits during the Buenos Aires City GP when an out of control car spun into the pit lane. The car struck him from behind, inflicting fatal head injuries and a grieving Toulo immediately began considering retirement.
He raced little after this, having some sports car drives in Ferraris and Maseratis and was second in Lisbon with a Maserati 300S plus third and fourth with a Ferrari 750 Monza in the Venezuelan GP at Caracas and the GP Bari.
His final Grand Prix appearance came in 1956’s Italian GP in a Scuderia Centro-Sud Maserati 250F, finishing seventh but before this he acted as a double for Kirk Douglas in the action scenes during the making of the movie ‘The Racers’ in 1955. It was said this was the first time in the history of cinema that an on-board camera was used. He recalled it being “enjoyable, but I didn’t much like the idea of cutting off my moustache in order to double for Kirk Douglas. I drove one lap behind the field after the start of the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa, and I had to reach down and actually activate the camera when I needed it”.
Following his retirement from racing, he managed his car dealership in Lausanne, selling Alfa Romeos, Rolls-Royce and Ferraris. In 1962 he was a co-founder of the Club International des Anciens Pilotes de Grand Prix F1, becoming President from 1980 to 2002 then subsequently as Honorary President. In the 1970s he began attending races when he became an ambassador for the Lausanne-based Philip Morris tobacco company; his son would also become involved in a press liaison role for the Marlboro-Lancia rally team. In recognition of his win at the first British GP, he made his last appearance at the wheel of a racing car during the 1998 celebrations of Silverstone’s 50th anniversary.
Toulo passed away in 2007 in Lonay, Switzerland; a month after fellow Swiss driver Clay Regazzoni was killed in a road accident in Italy.
A particular anecdote Toulo enjoyed telling involved World Champion Nino Farina, on his way home after an early postwar British race. “It was at Heathrow Airport which in those days just had big canvas marquees as the terminals. I walked in and there was ‘Nino’ – you know, typical Farina, still in his racing overalls, crash helmet over his arm, striking the pose – ‘Io’, the great racing driver. But he said to me ‘Ugh, Toulo, I don’t feel so good, terrible stomach pains…’ and he was rubbing his tummy. But I had some of those new Alka Seltzer tablets in my bag and I said ‘Here, take two of these’ intending he should get some water, you know, to dissolve them before drinking. But instead, he just said ‘Aah, thank you” and immediately popped both tablets straight into his mouth. And so it was that within moments there was the World Champion racing driver-Io, the Great Farina-in his racing overalls, helmet over one arm, in the check-in area at Heathrow…foaming at the mouth.”
