Harry Erich Merkel (10 January 1918 – 11 February 1995) was a racing driver from Germany.
His single entry to a World Championship Grand Prix was at the 1952 German Grand Prix, sharing one of Willi Krakau’s cars, a BMW-Eigenbau. He did not qualify, failing to set a time. Info from Wiki
Info by Hans Hulsebos
Harry Merkel was a German Racing Driver born in Leipzig. He raced motorcycles before the war. After the war he competed in sports car racing and hill climbs with a Porsche (see picture). In 1952 he attempted to qualify Willi Krakau’s BMW Eigenbau in the German Grand Prix. He failed to set a time.
He competed in the Mille Miglia three times, the Nurburgring 1000 km race three times, including the first running in 1953, and even drove in the Tourist Trophy in Ireland. He raced on until the early 1960s.
Later, he left East Germany for the West where he ran a number of dealerships with the franchises for Guzzi, Lancia, Panhard and Triumph. He re-married and emigrated to New South Wales, Australia where he died in 1995.
Harry Merkel: 1952 Formula One Season By Jeremy McMullen
Almost everything, especially motor racing, in Germany after World War II could be described by a single word—improvisation. Germany’s industries were slowly beginning to rebuild. Transportation was important, but not racing. Even the first motor race in Germany couldn’t be called as such. Therefore, the cars had to have license plates that indicated ‘test drive’. However, amidst the ravages of war-torn and divided Germany there was a spirit that was growing that couldn’t be snuffed out. It was the spirit of the privateer racing driver.
Amidst a nation without a lot of new technology there would come a lot of different designs and ideas. The design concepts were numerous just like the number of unknow
n German racers that would take to the wheel of the improvisational machines. One of those relatively known and unassuming drivers to appear in the pages of Formula One World Championship was Harry Merkel.
Born in Leipzig in 1918, Merkel’s path to grand prix racing wasn’t all that unusual. He would start out by racing motor cycles at the conclusion of World War II. Besides motor cycle racing, Merkel would also take part in a number of hill climb races. This is where he would become best known and would develop relationships that would come into play later.
In the early 1950s, Merkel began driving in sportscar races and would experience rather disappointing results. His first sportscar race would come in April of 1951. The race was the 1,000 mile Mille Miglia. Merkel would drive a Panhard Dyna and would actually finish in his first effort. However, he would end up 113th in the results.
While he would take part in the Mille Miglia in 1951, the majority of the very early 1950s would include Merkel taking part mostly in hill climbs and motor cycle races. However, after putting his toe in the sportscar waters, Merkel was intent on doing more of the racing and was making preparations to enter a number of other sportscar races going into the 1952 season. But, in 1952, Merkel would also be provided another opportunity for which the amateur German racers could have dreamed.
The Formula One World Championship was going to open its doors to the mostly isolated German racers. The move the governing-body and race organizers would take would end up opening the door of the World Championship to a number of racers in many different nations, but it almost seemed specifically suited for the generally isolated German racers that were otherwise unable to take part in races outside of their own borders.
The Formula One World Championship had visited Germany, and the Nurburgring, for the first time in 1951. However, despite the visit, only one German actually took part in the race. Paul Pietsch had driven with Auto Union before the war and was quite a famous German racing driver. He would be hired by Alfa Romeo for the first World Championship race in Germany.
The reason for the lack of Germans in the race was rather simple. Outside of its own borders, Germany’s money, either West or East, was worth virtually nothing. On top of it all, German industry was still trying to rise from the ruin. Therefore, there wasn’t the equipment and the facilities to mount a serious effort in World Championship grand prix racing. One of the few exceptions to this was Mercedes-Benz and Porsche in sportscars.
Therefore, Alfa Romeo’s departure at the end of the 1951 season, and the incredible costs associated with Formula One, actually acted like a wedge for German racers into the closed door of the World Championship. The tool that finally forced the door open was Formula 2 and its competitive regulations. The switch to Formula 2 regulations for the 1952 and 1953 seasons immediately made a number of Germany’s ‘home-built’ chassis legal for the World Championship overnight.
The decision to run the World Championship according to Formula 2 regulations meant German racers, like Merkel, could take part. But it wasn’t like the German Grand Prix was the only race on the season. Both East and West Germany had their own Formula 2 championship. While the nations had been divided, travel between the two German nations hadn’t been all that restricted in 1952. Therefore, East Germans could take part in West German Championship races, they just would not earn any points toward the championship. The same was true for when a West German went and took part in an East German Championship race.
Finances and equipment was hard to come by in post-war Germany. Therefore, there were few to no factory efforts in grand prix racing. This led to many Eigenbaus, or, ‘self-built’ chassis emerging on the scene. Even with the ‘self-built’ chassis, the owners and racers began to put together racing teams or ‘associations’ that would pool cars amongst a few drivers. Fritz Riess and Willi Krakau were two drivers that had come together and provided their cars for each other and for other drivers. Riess was an extremely talented driver who would also drive with Mercedes-Benz after the war. Willi Krakau was a privateer entry that had showed great success in the later-part of the 1940s and very early 1950s. It would be to these two men that Merkel would turn in to be able to race in Formula 2.
Fritz Riess would be employed by the Swiss team, Ecurie Espadon, to drive in the Eifelrennen at the end of May. Willi Krakau was intent on driving in the race with his AFM 50 chassis. This left a BMW 328 available. Merkel was given the opportunity to race the car and he would take it.
On the 25th of May, Merkel was with Riess and Krakau preparing to take part in the 16th Internationales ADAC Eifelrennen. This race was the first round of the West German Formula 2 Championship and was one of Merkel’s first Formula 2 races ever in his career.
While the majority of the German chassis available at the time were fragile and prone to failure, Merkel would be at an even greater disadvantage. He would be driving a BMW 328, which was a very good car; when it was introduced back before the start of World War II. Many German racers returned to the 328 after the war and did their best to extract every ounce of performance the car could give. Usually, that meant the car had been stretched way beyond its means. It was like a light bulb right before it blew. The car was capable of decent performance, but it just had a history of not being able to last very long.
The setting for the Eifelrennen wouldn’t help either. The site for the race was the demanding and dangerous Nurburgring. Built in the mid-1920s, the Nurburgring had a reputation as being the toughest, most-dangerous purpose-built circuit in all of Europe, possibly even the world. Consisting of 14 miles of constantly turning, rising and falling circuit, the Nordschleife, or, ‘North Course’ was a never-ending ‘Green Hell’ just waiting to pounce upon weakness and any lapses in concentration. Boasting of 170 corners and about a thousand feet of elevation change, the circuit was almost impossible to memorize, but very easy get wrong.
The Eifelrennen wasn’t just a German affair. In 1952, the Eifelrennen held a special significance. The first two rounds of the West German Championship would take place at the Nurburgring. The first round would be the Eifelrennen. The second round would be the German Grand Prix, which counted toward both the West German Championship and the World Championship. Therefore, there Eifelrennen was important for those that wanted to gain experience before the World Championship race. Therefore, there would be a few foreign entries in the Eifelrennen.
