Oscar Alfredo Gálvez (17 August 1913 – 16 December 1989) was a racing driver from Argentina. He participated in one Formula One World Championship Grand Prix, on 18 January 1953, in which he scored two championship points.
He was a very popular driver, a regular entrant and champion in the Turismo Carretera series, like his brother Juan.
He died from pancreatic cancer at the age of 76. The Buenos Aires circuit was renamed with his name. Info from Wiki
Oscar Alfredo Gálvez – When a heavy Indy 500 car won the 1949 F1 Grand Prix of Argentina
Oscar Alfredo Gálvez, five times argentine Stock Car champion (always with Ford), by far the most beloved and idolized Argentinian driver of our nation history, who was not sent to run to Europe because he demanded that he be paid a salary for it, (Aware of that, Fangio appeared that same day at the offices , and offered to run for free, that’s why the government chose it), this gentleman Oscar Alfredo Galvez bought the same mastodóntico and heavy Alfa Romeo 308-8C Indy Speziale, 890 kilos of weight, 8 cylinders in line 3.0 liters supercharged, as the that Walt Brown finished seventh in the 1947 Indy 500, and Johnny Mauro came eighth in the 1948 Indy 500. With this mastodon of only four gears and poor brakes, Don Oscar faced the light and maneuverable Ferrari 166 V12 1.5 supercharged of only 600 kilos, and the legion of Maseratis 4CLT 4 cylinders with double supercharger with centrifugal turbine, extremely light and very fast car, which weighed only 580 kilos …. but let’s also see, who had to face Don Oscar Galvez … Alberto Ascari, the young protected and supported by Enzo Ferrari like a own son, then twice World Champion and childhood idol of Mario Andretti, … Giuseppe “Nino” Farina, who the following year would be win as F1 World Champion, Luigi Villoresi, 4 times Italian Free Formula Champion and winner of the Targa Florio, Juan Manuel Fangio .. Prince Bira, Reginald Parnell, 3 times British Formula A champion, Felice Bonetto, another winner of the Targa Florio and the Coppa Acerbo, the Baron De Graffenried the great Swiss champion , Nello Pagani, three times 500cc Motorcycle World Champion, and etc and etc.
86,000 spectators squeeze into the intricate street circuit of the Palermo neighborhood (the Beverly Hills of Buenos Aires), the President of the Republic and his wife are already installed in their roofed box … when suddenly a heavy rain falls that was in nobody’s plans. Aware of the difficulties of the track and the 890 kilos and poor brakes of his car prepared for ovals, Don Oscar took it easy and took advantage of what was going on. Villoresi and Giuseppe Farina (Ferrari V12 1.5 lts supercharged) retired, and Oscar thus became the escort of Ascari, pointer from the fourth lap. The mood of the people gave its result: Galvez approached the Italian round after lap and surpassed him in the 26th straight ahead taking advantage of the fact that the Maserati was injured by the breakage of the exhaust pipe. Four turns later he made history by becoming the first Argentine to beat the Europeans. The strawberry of the dessert was the second place of Fangio, who had lost time after making a spin when dodging Villoresi when he entered the pits.
The 86,000 people present went crazy, so crazy that Oscar Galvez carefully completed the lap of honor because the large number of spectators who invaded the track. Curiously, the historic day was not treated by the newspapers of the time as it really deserved because there was a strike by graphic workers.
text and photo from Eduardo Luis Angeleli
Oscar Alfredo Gálvez (‘El Aguilucho’, the Small Eagle) became one of Argentina’s most celebrated drivers, becoming a champion in the Turismo Carretera series though only participated in one World Championship GP in 1953, scoring two championship points. Born in Caballito, Buenos Aires, on the 17th August 1913, his interest in cars led him to buy a Model T Ford in 1934 with money that he earned while working in his father’s engineering workshop. In 1937 he read a newspaper advertisement for a race between Buenos Aires and Santa Fe (almost 300 miles) and built his own Ford engined car to enter it.
He went on to compete in Turismo Carretera races (‘road racing’) which became the world’s oldest active racing series but though the first event is often considered to have been held in 1937, the series was named Campeonato Argentino de Velocidad (the ‘Argentine Speed Challenge’). The first race of the series was the Gran Premio Argentino where 72 drivers entered, with Oscar driving a 1935 Ford Voiturette. He and his younger brother Juan co-drove (co-drivers were called acompañantes) in 1937’s Mil Millas Argentina (the Thousand Mile Argentinas) which included road and circuit events. The Turismo Carretera races were gruelling and extremely dangerous events, with the most famous being the International Gran Premio Internacional del Norte. Its 5920-mile route started in Buenos Aires and went across the pampas plains over the Andes mountains and then turned north to Lima in Peru, before turning south back to Buenos Aires and 1940’s event took 13 days and was won by Fangio.
Oscar and Juan would both go on to star in Turismo Carretera series over the following years, while two other brothers, Humberto and Roberto became involved in several categories of racing. The Galvez brothers took their first victory in 1939’s Argentine Grand Prix, run by the Automobile Club Argentino. It was the most important race of the season and was scheduled to be almost 7,200 kilometres long, divided into eleven stages. Because of the heavy rain, the start was delayed by a week but it was eventually ended when the second stage was completed and Oscar and Juan were the first to arrive at Concordia and only forty five of the one hundred and thirty 130 competitors made it to the finish. The race was also the first of seventeen Turismo Carretera races Juan Manuel Fangio would enter.
Oscar first tried single seater racing in 1947, driving an Alfa Romeo 308 in Temporada Argentina events. The car had originally been owned before the War by an Argentine lawyer, Dr.Italo De Lucca, but he never drove it and instead had it raced by a number of drivers of that time. After the War, Oscar obtained the 308 and took it to Dr.De Lucca, making a full update of the car and purchasing several spares from Alfa Romeo in Milan. He retired from the first two races but was then third at the Copa Acción de San Lorenzo at the Circuito Parque de la Independencia, behind Varzi and Villoresi. Following this he took four consecutive victories at the Autódromo Ciudad de Rafaela, the Circuito de Bell Ville and the Circuito Rambla Sur plus the Circuito de Mar del Plata at Playa Grande.
Continuing with the 308 the following year there were retirements in the Gran Premio del General Juan Perón at Parque Palermo and the Copa Acción de San Lorenzo at Circuito Parque de la Independencia. Finishes included second in the Gran Premio de Eva Duarte Perón at Parque Palermo, fourth in the Gran Premio del General San Martín at Circuito El Torreón plus he won the 100 Millas Playas de Necochea at Autódromo de Necochea. The Gran Premio de la America del Sur was a twenty day, 6000 mile, race from Buenos Aires to Caracas, through La Paz, Lima, Quito and Bogota and saw a field of one hundred and thirty eight cars, consisting of Chevrolets, Fords, Buicks, Nashes, DeSotos, Lincolns, Mercurys, Plymouths and Dodges. In Peru, Fangio lost control of his Chevrolet and flipped down an embankment and Oscar was first on the scene and stopped to help him. Fangio was injured, though awake and alert but his co-driver Daniel Urrutia had been thrown through the windscreen and was unconscious; he suffered a basilar skull fracture and sadly died later that night. Oscar and a number of others wanted to retire from the race but Fangio set a radio message from his hospital bed asking them to continue. Oscar became as much an idol in Argentina as Fangio himself and during that year visited Europe with Fangio on a fact finding mission sponsored by the Argentinian Automobile Club.
He raced a Ferrari 166 in two Temporada races at the Circuito Costanera Norte in 1951 where he was fourth in the Gran Premio del General Juan Perón but retired from the Gran Premio de Eva Duarte Perón.
1953 saw his only World Championship outing, when he was invited to join the Maserati team for the Argentine GP at the Autódromo 17 de Octubre circuit. The circuit, completed in late 1951, could be reconfigured to have multiple different track courses and its first event was the Juan Perón Trophy in 1952 then in the following year was the venue for the opening round of 1953’s World Championship. Unfortunately the race was marred by a number of accidents which resulted in the deaths of at least ten people and thirty-six others injured while other reports said it could have been twelve fatalities as two spectators were hit and killed by an ambulance that entered the track. Maserati entered four A6GCMs for Fangio, Froilan Gonzalez, Felice Bonetto and Oscar and qualifying saw Fangio second to Ascari with the front row completed by the Ferraris of Villoresi and Farina. Gonzalez was fifth alongside Hawthorn and Trintignant on the second row with Oscar in ninth place on the third with Manzon, Menditeguy and Behra though Bonetto suffered transmission problems and lined up on the last row of the grid. In a bid to promote Argentina’s new championship and GP status, Juan Perón declared that the race would be free to attend. It was estimated over 300,000 people attended but the large numbers made it difficult to control and spectators stood on the grass verges along the edge of the tarmac. As the race start approached, some drivers wanted to postpone or abandon it but it was feared that not putting on a race might cause a riot. Ascari took the lead at the start and as the race progressed he began opening a gap over Fangio, Farina, Bonetto and González who were all battling for third place. As the race progressed, the spectators became more reckless and Mike Hawthorn told how “time after time I waved at them to get out of the way, but this only made them worse. They began standing in the roadway holding shirts and pullovers, which they snatched away at the last moment like a toreador playing a bull”. On the twenty first lap, Adolfo J.Schwelm Cruz’s Cooper lost a wheel, which hit spectators though fortunately without fatal consequences. Then, disaster struck on lap thirty two when Farina had to swerve to avoid a young boy who had wandered onto the circuit, but lost control and skidded off the course into the crowd. He only suffered minor injuries but almost fifty spectators were hit by the car though the race was not stopped and chaos ensued when other people, marshals and rescuers came came to help, while ambulances entered the track. Shortly after this, another young spectator was struck and killed by Alan Brown’s Cooper (though he continued and would finish ninth, after three stops to top up a leaking radiator). Despite the tragedies the race continued and Gonzalez finished third behind Ascari and Villoresi and Oscar was fifth behind Hawthorn, taking two points in his only World Championship race, though Fangio and Bonetto both retired with transmission issues. In 1955, Perón was forced into exile and the circuit became known as the Autódromo Municipal. It then became the Autodromo General San Martin after a military coup in 1976 but reverted to the Autódromo Municipal name again in 1983. In 1989 it was announced that it would be named in memory of Oscar but in 2008 it was changed to the Autódromo Juan y Oscar Gálvez in honour of both brothers. Also in the year he was sixth in a non championship Gran Premio Ciudad de Buenos Aires at the Autódromo Municipal del Parque Almirante Brown and fifteenth in a Lincoln Capri in the Carrera Panamericana.
