1948 South American Grand Prix Explained

1948 South American Grand Prix
Native Name:Gran Premio de la América del Sur del Turismo Carretera
Round:8
Season No:9
Country: Argentina

Colombia
Ecuador
Peru
Startdate:20 October
Enddate:8 November
Stages:14
Stagekm:9,576
Surface:Asphalt, Dirt/Gravel
Time1:118 hours, 37 minutes, 18 seconds
Crewsreg:141
Teamsstart:138
Teamsfinish:44

The 1948 South American Grand Prix (Spanish: Gran Premio de la América del Sur del Turismo Carretera), also known as Buenos Aires–Caracas, was a motor race held as part of the 1948 Turismo Carretera championship.[1]

Entry list

DriverCo-DriverMarque
1 Juan Manuel Fangio Daniel UrrutiaChevrolet
2 Héctor Suppici Sedes Silvestre CalacheFord
3 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez Federico HerreroFord
4 Ernesto Hilario Blanco Atilio PliniFord
5 Arturo Kruuse Juan J. OteroPlymouth
6 Ricardo Leopoldo Risatti F. HugerzaChevrolet
7 Emilio Karstulović Raúl CestacFord
8 Pablo Guille Juan StroppianaChevrolet
9 Juan Gálvez Desiderio AvilaFord
10 Daniel Musso Ricardo GrattierFord
11 G. RivadeneiraFord
12 Domingo Marimón Pedro DuhaldeChevrolet
13 Luciano Murro Enrique CostaChevrolet
14 Eusebio Marcilla Miguel SalemChevrolet
15 Tadeo Taddía Cayetano CosimanoChevrolet
16 Fernando Nery D.J. RenaudChevrolet
17 Victor García Hilario MartínezFord
18 Henry Bradley Roberto GómezNash
19 Ricardo López R.J. FernándezFord
20 Rosendo Hernández Juan A. GrilloChevrolet
21 Angel Luis Pascuali E. CallegariFord
22 Jorge Rodrigo Daly Juan TenagliaDodge
23 Alberto del Caprio R. ArgandonaLincoln
24 Lorenzo G. VaroliFord
25 Luis Astengo A. J. Salinas VeraFord
26 Félix A. Peduzzi Alberto GómezChevrolet
27 Jordán Senes Humberto SenesFord
28 Miguel Beltrame V. RodríguezFord
29 Vicente Tirabasso A. MatíasFord
30 M. Beltrán Soulé J. VilarinoChevrolet
31 Antonio Gauthier Juan A. TenorChevrolet
32 Atilio Patrignani G. PatriganiChevrolet
33 Eduardo Della Magiora A. EtchegoyenFord
34 Luis F. González A. PanattiFord
35 Francisco Neumayer J.T. FasciFord
36 José Froilán González Bernardo PérezChevrolet
37 José F. Cafiero Alberto LuchesiFord
38 Carlos Lagorio M. BonacorsiChevrolet
39 José Muñiz Gabino GarcíaFord
40 Aurelio Spinetto José A. PetroneNash
41 Manuel Merino Remo GamaleroFord
42 Adolfo F. Fernández H. GutíerrezFord
43 Román Balta A. Román Balta A.Chevrolet
44 Benedicto Campos Andres PapaleoFord
45 Mercurio Guiliano José R. PereiraFord
46 Eduardo Orcola Guido AggazaniChevrolet
47 Raúl Jauregui F.A. QuirogaMercury
48 Atilio Cagnasso G. GelardiBuick
49 Esteban Sokol E. CimardiChevrolet
50 E. Sabbione Daly J.C. MijailidesLincoln
51 Octavio Moretti G.E. GonzálezChevrolet
52 M.C. de Vasconcellos José AriasFord
53 Joaquín Salas F. Jorge Sosa V.Ford
54 Rene Nicolás Faure Max E. MetzlerChevrolet
55 Ramón A. Gallo ?Chevrolet
56 Julián Q. Elguea Heriberto RománFord
57 Guillermo Martín Carlos JacobsChevrolet
58 Hermo Orihuela Alberto OrihuelaFord
59 Eduardo de Lelis E. GuerreroPlymouth
60 Américo Giménez Luis TolleruttiFord
61 Enrique Forno Víctor CornejoFord
62 Esteban Zamora Juan del RegnoChevrolet
63 Oreste C. Casaroli Florián UjhelyiChevrolet
64 Darío D. Ramonda E.P. SuárezChevrolet
65 Juan Carlos Copello J. Mario MungariFord
66 A. Zarantonello E. MartínezFord
67 "Ampacama" A. SpampinatoChevrolet
68 Juan Carlos Gómez R.J. MoregaChevrolet
69 Domingo D'Angelo Salvador FiglioliChevrolet
70 Daimo Bojanich H.H. PiassalleFord
71 Luis Santos Pascual BosioFord
72 Herminio Magaracci José RacchumiFord
73 José A. Rapetti José P. MorelliFord
74 Félix Palacios Ruben AdámoliMercury
75 Manuel Cobas Rafael MelenFord
76 Alberto Fouiloux A.M. FernándezFord
77 José L. Rodríguez M.C. OrtizFord
78 Rafael Leizán F.J. LeizánChevrolet
79 M. Vinardell Molinero ?Ford
80 Carlos R. Alisal Jacinto MansoFord
81 Vicente Alfonsaro Rodolfo CarroChevrolet
82 Salvador V. Turano Balbino RoldánChevrolet
83 Angel R. Castano Angel MolinariFord
84 José Rubiol Roca ?Ford
85 José R. Naves Emilio TabaresDeSoto
86 Ernesto Baronio Dionisio CasteloFord
87 José Laberguere Oscar CarreroPlymouth
88 Pablo Trincavelli Carlos GrossoChevrolet
89 Florentino Castellani Ernesto SeguraFord
90 Julio Huasasquiche A. SamaniegoChevrolet
91 Alberto Provera Pablo ArataChevrolet
92 Alberto Mascarell M. SomervilleChevrolet
93 "Mumiteite" "Teitemumi"Chevrolet
94 Adolfo Mujica Angel BertelloFord
95 Carlos Benedetti E. San Pietro?
96 Hugo Lanteri Humberto JofreChevrolet
97 F. Fernández Walker Luis A. FerrarisFord
98 Domingo Sanguinetti Donato PanzaChevrolet
99 Almendor Maiharro José FranciaChevrolet
100 Juacinto Moss Domingo FancioFord
101 Domingo Candela Antonio MagoiaChevrolet
102 Hugo de Simone Ernesto MoralesChevrolet
103 Guido A. Maineri E. GiovaniniFord
104 Eugenio Bría Pedro CollazosFord
105 Enrique Quaglia Rafael EspejoChevrolet
106 Alfredo Denita Alfredo RozónFord
107 Germán Rivera Enzo O. FerroChevrolet
108 "Paradavalla" "Mañaz"Ford
109 Jose Manuel López A. TalaveraChevrolet
110 Juan Rodríguez Vera Silvano OjalvoChevrolet
111 José Sciarpelletti Manuel ArrougeChevrolet
112 Eleuterio Schvemier José A. SanariChevrolet
113 Italo V. Bizio Luis RepossiChevrolet
114 Américo Berta E. BioderbostChevrolet
115 José Lorenzetti Juan H. HermidaFord
116 Manuel Cubillos "Tito" CubillosChevrolet
117 Juan Marchini Hernando GalloFord
118 C. Solveyra Tomkinson ?Chevrolet
119 Bartolomé Ortiz Sanz Julio CastellaniFord
120 René Roux Oscar OtermínFord
121 Roberto Matassi Marcos CianiChevrolet
122 Alberto T. Palacios N. GiachettaFord
123 José Balcarce V.P. QuevedoChevrolet
124 Manuel Montes Raúl MárquezChevrolet
125 Rafael Staccioli D. ZappacostaFord
126 Pablo Mesples D.A. BragaFord
127 Martín Berasategui J. SchnarwillerBuick
128 Alberto Fava Gaitán MorelloFord
129 René Nelly Pfister René BarbaniChevrolet
130 Francisco Hernández Juan R. LuccaFord
131 Salvador Ataguile P.M. GutierrezFord
132 Victor O. Roudé Pedro MazzoniFord
133 Manuel Balta A. R. GutierrezChevrolet
134 Francisco Remondino Luis ZamoraFord
135 Manuel R. Lastra Ernesto CáceresChevrolet
136 Eduardo de Lusarreta José DemaChevrolet
137 Ricardo Harriague M.J. BergerettiFord
138 Adolfo Perazzo M. García ReyChevrolet
139 Ernesto Petrini Jesús HenryFord
140 Luis Echevarría Carlos RancalesChevrolet
141 Guillermo Marenghini E. SemperenaChevrolet
Source:[2]

Report

Stage 1

Two entrants withdrew prior to the race starting – Ernesto Hilario Blanco with illness, and Esteban Sokol having crashed his car before the departure.

The first stage was also the longest; just over 1,000 mi from Buenos Aires to Salta. José Froilán González took the start in a Chevrolet, but withdrew not long after as he allegedly didn't realise the race was going all the way to Caracas and didn't believe such a journey could be done – calling his rivals "crazy". Oscar Alfredo Gálvez and Juan Manuel Fangio led the way, but Fangio's charge was halted with differential problems and the Balcarceño lost four hours repairing it. Gálvez thereafter remained unchallenged to the stage finish, with Fangio's Chevrolet stablemate Domingo Marimón finishing second and Gálvez' brother Juan third.

As soon as the race had started however, problems were already emerging. Large crowds thronged the roads outside of Buenos Aires, resulting in two spectator fatalities – one when Octavio Moretti lost control of his Chevrolet and ran over a group of bystanders, and another when an allegedly drunken man crossed the road in front of Daniel Musso's Ford. A distressed Musso abandoned the race at the end of the stage.

Stage 2

Stage 2 took the crews from Salta to the Argentine border town of La Quiaca. Oscar Gálvez claimed his second successive stage victory on the gravel country roads, but Uruguayan star Héctor Suppici Sedes crashed in Maimará and immediately withdrew – returning home to Montevideo.

Stage 3

94 crews crossed the La Quiaca River into Bolivia to recommence the race from Villazón. The 460 km route to Potosí was treacherous at over 3,000m above sea level, and ultimately claimed the lives of Ford team Julián Elguea and Heriberto Román – they failed to negotiate a hairpin outside the town of Culpina and fell 200m into a ravine. Elguea's brother-in-law Domingo Fancio was competing as co-driver to Juancito Moss and the crew immediately withdrew from the race. Oscar Gálvez extended his lead with a third-straight stage win, ahead of Pablo Gulle in second and Marimón third.

Stage 4

Juan Gálvez claimed his first stage win on the road from Potosí to the Bolivian capital La Paz as his brother Oscar struck trouble. The #3 Ford hit a rock and required repairs to the steering rack, but he retained the overall lead heading into a rest day.

Stage 5

Fangio had recovered to 40th after his first stage woes, and went on the attack on the fifth stage over the Peruvian border into Arequipa. The Gálvez brothers consolidated the pace across the Altiplano, but Fangio passed 30 cars over the Andes to claim his first stage win and the first for Chevrolet.

Stage 6

The second-longest stage of the race saw competitors descend to the Pacific coast into the Peruvian capital Lima. Fangio – now inside the top-30 overall – continued to press on until a rollover near Nazca forced him to back off, finishing the stage 23rd and still sitting over 6 hours behind leader Oscar Gálvez, who claimed his fourth stage win. The 25,000-strong crowd that gathered in the capital to see the spectacle were rewarded for their support when local driver Arnaldo Alvarado Degregori came home third.

Stage 7

Thursday October 28 was scheduled as a rest day, however the start of Stage 7 was brought forward from 5am on Friday to 10pm that night due to a coup d'état in Peru that resulted in the installation of Manuel Odría as President. Sleep-deprived crews were ill-prepared for the change of plans, with misty coastal roads adding to the challenge of the last 1,000 km+ stage.

Still recovering lost ground, Fangio was pushing hard – so much so that he and co-driver Daniel Urrutia missed a refuelling point and had to backtrack. Just outside of Huanchaco, on the northern outskirts of Trujillo, Fangio lost control on a left-hand bend and rolled down an embankment at 140kph. Co-driver Urrutia was ejected from the car through the windscreen in the incident, and landed heavily in scrubland. Oscar Gálvez, who had been battling Fangio earlier in the stage, witnessed the accident and stopped to help – much to the objection of Fangio, who wanted the race leader to continue. Having found a badly injured Urrutia, Eusebio Marcilla and Luciano Murro then stopped to help transport Fangio and Urrutia respectively to a hospital in Chocope. Urrutia became the events' fifth fatality having suffered cervical and basal skull fractures, whilst Fangio also suffered neck injuries but these were not life-threatening.

Despite many wanting to withdraw from the race after the incident, Fangio urged his rivals to continue. Juan Gálvez eventually led 53 crews to the end of Stage 7 and the halfway point of the event in the Peruvian border town of Tumbes. Fangio's crash was not the only terminal one in the stage, with four other crews – including the hero of Lima, Arnaldo Alvarado Degregori – forced to retire.

Stage 8

A ship then carried the competitors to the Ecuadorian port of Guayaquil, where the race resumed en route to Quito. Juan Gálvez made it back-to-back stage wins to reduce his brothers' lead to 1h11m. Pablo Gulle retired from 8th overall with a mechanical failure.

Stage 9

Upon arrival in Quito, the field faced significant economic problems. In order to ensure the race continued, Argentine President Juan Perón personally decreed a donation of AR$100,000 to competitors. Oscar Gálvez led brother Juan over the border into the Colombian town of Pasto to finish 1–2 for Ford. There were further spectator problems in the final kilometres – Víctor García crashed into a crowd killing one and injuring four others, whilst a wooden platform overlooking the finish collapsed and seriously injured multiple.

Stage 10

The tenth stage to Cali proved the races' slowest, with stage winner Juan Gálvez traversing the mountainous route at an average of just under 62kph.

Stage 11

The Gálvez brothers continued their dominance of the race into the Colombian capital Bogotá, race leader Oscar this time leading Juan through the low-altitude Andes passes.

Stage 12

Following a rest day in Bogotá, crews travelled through the mountains to Cúcuta on the border with Venezuela – Juan Gálvez claiming his fifth stage win.

Stage 13

The penultimate stage crossed the border into Venezuela and onto the town of Valera. Oscar Gálvez claimed his seventh stage win as brother Juan went off the road and into an embankment, but recovered to finish the stage having lost two hours to be 2h25m behind his brother in the overall classification. Salvador Ataguille finished the stage in a surprise second and consolidated his place inside the top 10, but still sat a long way behind third-placed Domingo Marimón – Marimón remained some 5h off the lead.

Stage 14

The final stage into the Venezuelan capital Caracas proved dramatic. Juan Gálvez, undaunted by the seemingly insurmountable margin to his brother, pushed his way to the lead of the stage. At the halfway mark entering San Rafael de Onoto, Gálvez misjudged his speed over a series of speed humps – crashing into a ditch and breaking his differential. Organisers had put up signs to warn the drivers of the speed humps the day before the race, but spectators had removed them. Marimón was next on the scene and blocked the road in order to force his competitors to help. Víctor García, who had nearly withdrawn after his crash into Pasto about a week earlier, avoided the incident zone and drove on to win the stage – and became only the fourth entry to win a stage.

Oscar had helped to retrieve his brother, but put excessive wear on his engine in the process and later broke his crankshaft in the village of Los Guayos just 60 km from the finish. He was pushed to the finish line by a spectator in a Buick, resulting in the disqualification of the race-long leader as he failed to cross the finish line under his own power. Gálvez appealed to none other than Juan Perón to have the decision overturned, but Perón insisted in a telegram that the organisers upheld the regulations. As a result, Domingo Marimón and co-driver Pedro Duhalde – despite having not won a single stage – were crowned the winners, finishing with a time of 118 hours, 37 minutes and 18 seconds. Marimón's team-mate Eusebio Marcilla was classified second just 12 minutes behind, followed by Juan Gálvez in third – who lost 3 hours in his final-day drama to finish half an hour behind Marimón.[3] [4]

Results

Stage winners

StageStartFinishDateWinning crewWinning carStage timeDistance
1 SaltaOctober 20–21
Federico Herrero
Ford13h52m47s1,692 km
2 SaltaOctober 22 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez
Federico Herrero
Ford4h47m21s380.1 km
3 Villazón PotosíOctober 23 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez
Federico Herrero
Ford7h12m15s459.8 km
4 Potosí La PazOctober 24 Juan Gálvez
Desiderio Avila
Ford6h44m10s543.4 km
5 La Paz ArequipaOctober 26 Juan Manuel Fangio
Daniel Urrutia
Chevrolet7h01m09s546.2 km
6 Arequipa LimaOctober 27 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez
Federico Herrero
Ford9h43m36s1,092 km
7 Lima Tumbes Juan Gálvez
Desiderio Avila
Ford11h49m42s1,322 km
8 Guayaquil QuitoNovember 1 Juan Gálvez
Desiderio Avila
Ford5h56m14s421 km
9 Quito PastoNovember 2 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez
Federico Herrero
Ford5h56m59s392 km
10 Pasto CaliNovember 3 Juan Gálvez
Desiderio Avila
Ford7h06m20s440 km
11 Cali BogotáNovember 4 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez
Federico Herrero
Ford7h26m23s527 km
12 Bogotá CúcutaNovember 6 Juan Gálvez
Desiderio Avila
Ford8h46m53s599 km
13 Cúcuta ValeraNovember 7 Oscar Alfredo Gálvez
Federico Herrero
Ford8h24m00s484 km
14 Valera CaracasNovember 8 Víctor García
Hilario Martínez
Ford7h46m56s677 km
Source:

Outright

Final standings (positions 1–10)
PosDriverCo-DriverCarOverall timeDifference
1 Domingo Marimón Pedro DuhaldeChevrolet118h37m18s
2 Eusebio Marcilla Miguel SalemChevrolet118h49m59s+12m41s
3 Juan Gálvez Desiderio AvilaFord119h07m59s+30m41s
4 Salvador Ataguille P.M. GutierrezFord122h21m45s+3h44m27s
5 Daimo Bojanich H.H. PiassalleFord122h30m58s+3h53m40s
6 Manuel Merino Remo GamaleroFord123h58m47s+5h21m29s
7 Víctor García Hilario MartínezFord124h02m00s+5h24m42s
8 Ricardo López R.J. FernándezFord124h14m58s+5h37m40s
9 Guido Maineri E. GiovaniniFord125h00m32s+6h23m14s
10 Tadeo Taddía Cayetano CosimanoChevrolet126h01m03s+7h23m45s

Notes and References

  1. News: Buenos Aires-Caracas: La gran aventura del TC. Spanish. SportDigital. 17 April 2020.
  2. News: Turismo de Carretera Gran Premio de la América del Sur 1948. Spanish. F1-web.ar. 1 September 2023.
  3. News: Daniel Urrutia. English. Motorsport Memorial. 2 September 2023.
  4. News: Crónicas del Automovilismo: Gran Premio de la América del Sur, 1948 (Buenos Aires-Caracas). Spanish. EL LOCO FIERRERO on YouTube. 16 January 2021.