Winner at La Sarthe in 1959, the British driver Roy Salvadori died on Sunday, 3rd June, just as the Test Day for the 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans was at its height.

Born in 1922 to Italian parents, British driver Roy Francesco Salvadori started racing in 1946.  He may have taken part in 46 Formula One Grands Prix between 1952 and 1962 (achieving 4^th place in the 1958 Championship), but it was in sports cars that his career truly blossomed.  He was picked out in 1952 by John Wyer, the Aston Martin Team Manager of the day, and the following year he took part in his first 24 Hours of Le Mans, alongside his compatriot George Abecassis.

His first six entries at Le Mans ended in retirement but in 1959 Roy Salvadori at last took the chequered flag in the twice-round-the-clock Le Mans race…and won it!  That year he had as team mate the American Carroll Shelby and this duo, as big in height as in talent, came out on top after a duel with the Gendebien-Hill Ferrari, winners from the previous year.  Salvadori and Shelby claimed the lead after the retirement of the Belgian and American with a broken engine.  Between 1958 and 1965 it was the only victory at Le Mans to slip out of the hands of Enzo Ferrari!  Roy Salvadori took part in a further four 24 Hours, finishing third in 1960 with a future double F1 World Champion named Jim Clark.  After having hung up his driving helmet in 1965, Roy became Sporting Director of the Cooper F1 team for two seasons before retiring to Monaco at the beginning of the 70s.

Behind the wheel, Roy Salvadori showed determination and outstanding courage, but his career was marked by several accidents of which one, at Silverstone in 1951, rendered him partially deaf and he was even given the last rites.  He has passed on three weeks after Carroll Shelby, who died on 10^th May, and with whom he shared his 1959 Le Mans victory.  To his family and those close to him, the Automobile Club de l’Ouest expresses its deepest sympathies.