Bernard Unett
Bernard Unett | |
---|---|
Nationality | BSCC - Class A |
William Bernard Unett (22 July 1936 – 21 January 2000) was a British racing driver and development engineer, three times winner of the British Saloon Car Championship in 1974, 1976 and 1977.[1]
Unett was born on 22 July 1936 in Wolvey, Warwickshire. His parents ran a farm and it was being around, then helping repair the farm machinery sparked his interest in mechanics. Instead of following his parents into farming, he joined Humber as an apprentice at the age of 15 which was part of the Rootes Group organisation. He became development engineer,[2] one of a select few, known as 'The Set 'em Alight Boys' due to Rootes Chief Test engineer Don Tarbun's expression 'For **** sake, set 'em alight', often exclaimed by him when facing difficulties.[3] Unett was deputy head of the department for the development of the 'series' Sunbeam Alpine in 1958–1959.[4]
Career
He began motor racing in 1961. After competing and crashing in a disastrous Club rally, Rootes competition manager Mike Parkes encouraged Unett to attend a race meeting at the Goodwood Circuit, leading him to buy his first racing car,[5] a prototype from the Alpine development programme registration number XRW 302.[6] After developing it for racing it was in this car that Unett won his first trophy in 1964, the 'Freddie Dixon Challenge Trophy', one of the biggest prizes in motor club racing at the time.[7] The history of this surviving prototype can be found here. The site also has a film and pictorial history of Bernard Unett's career.
By 1965 Unett was married with three children and helped out on his parents' farm when there was time for relaxation. He was now working at Rootes' new technical centre at Whitley where he worked on vehicle evaluation under Graham Robson. During his four years there he was closely involved with the birth of the Hillman Avenger, doing a lot of the road testing.
In 1966 Alan Fraser signed a three-year contract with Rootes to manage their British and overseas racing programme, with Rootes Competitions department manager Norman Garrad continuing to manage the Rally programme. Unett was soon setting lap records in the Imp at Brands Hatch. At the 1966 Easter meeting he set a lap record of 59.8, an Imp becoming the first car in its class to lap Brands in under a minute, and also won the Edward Lewis Trophy. By August the team had won 16 first places, 2 seconds and 7 class lap records. Unett had also won the Westover Saloon car Championship, a 'free formula' Saloon car series run at Brans Hatch, with 41 points.[10] The Hillman Imp led in the British championship series.[10]
Unett was also having great success racing a Sunbeam Tiger, registration number ADU 180B, in the 1965 season. It was one of the two ill-prepared Tigers that had an embarrassingly short outing at the Le Mans 24-hour race the year before. Unett, having modified the car, had little trouble beating the competition, receiving glowing press reports. In just over 20 races he had eleven outright wins, nine-second-place finishes and never failed to get placed. He just fell short of winning the Autosport championship in the final race of the competition, due to a broken fan belt and a broken rear axle.[11] Details of this surviving ex-Le Mans car can be found here.[1]
For the 1966 season Unett and Alan Fraser built what was to become known as the 'Monster Tiger'. Driven by Unett and other drivers, it was very competitive, winning many races outright. But Unett lost out on a major title, using his original Tiger as in the previous year, in the very last race of the Autosport 1966 championship. Unett also finished 2nd overall in the Fred W Dixon Marque Trophy in the Monster Tiger.
Unett went on to race in the single seat Imp powered Vixen cars that dominated the
To end his retirement in 1971, Unett planned a big comeback in
Adopting the name Bernard 'Tiger' Unett (with a tiger script, then later, a tiger logo on his crash helmet) he was class winner in the 1972 'Britax' Saloon car championship in a MOPAR Hillman Avenger.[19] Unett also had great success in a Hillman Hunter. A film made in 1972 called 'Some go quicker than others' (available on YouTube) featured Unett, Des O'Dell and the Chrysler Dealer team Hunters in a heat of the Castrol Production Saloon car series, in which Unett was competition winner in his class in 1973.[16] Also in this year, Unett entered a Hillman Hunter in the Avon/Motor magazine 2000 mile Tour of Britain, with Brian Coyle as co-driver, and finished First in class, 9th overall.
His biggest success came with the
Unett sidestepped the Toyotas in the following two years by dropping a class racing a 1300 cc car. MOPAR, the parts and accessories firm sponsored the car, with Unett himself running the operation from his Wolvey home with mechanic Tony Bradshaw and Unett's wife Joan who managed the team.
Unett began to compete in rallies and in 1977 he took part in the
Unett became involved in world class competition when The Sunbeam Lotus took part in international rallying, going on to win the
Bernard Unett died of cancer in 2000.
Racing record
Complete British Saloon Car Championship results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap.)
Year | Team | Car | Class | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | Pos. | Pts | Class |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1966 | Alan Fraser Racing Team | Hillman Imp | A | SNE
|
GOO | SIL | CRY | BRH 15 |
BRH 18 |
OUL Ret† |
BRH ? |
19th | 12 | 5th | |||||||
1967
|
Alan Fraser Racing Team | Hillman Imp | A | BRH ? |
SNE ? |
SIL ? |
SIL 10 |
MAL ?† |
SIL ? |
SIL ? |
BRH 9 |
OUL 5† |
BRH 9 |
4th | 54 | 2nd | |||||
1971
|
Jean Denton Racing | Sunbeam Imp
|
A | BRH | OUL 6 |
THR 11 |
SIL | CRY | SIL | CRO | SIL | OUL | BRH | MAL | BRH | 20th | 15 | 5th | |||
1974
|
Chrysler Dealer Team
|
Hillman Avenger 1500 GT
|
A | MAL 4† |
BRH Ret |
1st | 69 | 1st | |||||||||||||
Hillman Avenger 1600 GT
|
SIL ? |
OUL ? |
THR ? |
SIL ? |
THR 10 |
BRH 14 |
ING 7† |
BRH 8† |
OUL ? |
SNE ? |
BRH Ret |
||||||||||
1975
|
Halesford Motors Ltd. | Hillman Avenger 1600 GT
|
A | MAL 4† |
BRH Ret |
OUL 4† |
THR 13 |
SIL ? |
BRH 7† |
THR ? |
SIL ?† |
MAL 3† |
SNE ? |
SIL ? |
ING | BRH | OUL | BRH | 6th | 63 | 2nd |
1976
|
Mopar
|
Hillman Avenger 1300 GT
|
A | BRH ? |
SIL 16 |
OUL 1† |
THR 15 |
THR ? |
SIL ? |
BRH 11 |
1st | 90 | 1st | ||||||||
Chrysler Avenger 1300 GT
|
MAL 4† |
SNE 3† |
BRH ? |
||||||||||||||||||
1977
|
Mopar
|
Chrysler Avenger 1300 GT
|
A | SIL Ret |
BRH ? |
OUL 1† |
THR ? |
SIL ? |
THR ? |
DON 2† |
SIL 13 |
DON 2† |
BRH ? |
THR ? |
BRH 12 |
1st | 52 | 1st | |||
Source:[31]
|
† Events with 2 races staged for the different classes.
References
- ^ a b c d e British racing drivers club
- ^ sportscar magazine, Doug Nye, Oct 1966
- ^ Don Tarbun, Alpine horn, 50th anniversary edition supplement July 2009.
- ^ Cars and car conversions, June 1977
- ^ Doug Nye Sportscar magazine, Oct 1966
- ^ Alpine the classic Sunbeam by Chris McGovern
- ^ Doug Nye, Sportscar magazine Oct 1966
- ^ car and car conversions June 1977
- ^ Cars and car conversions June 1977
- ^ a b c http://www.imps4ever[permanent dead link]
- ^ Sportscar magazine. Oct 1966, Doug Nye
- ^ http://www.webeden.xrw302.co.uk[permanent dead link]
- ^ a b British Racing Drivers Club
- ^ Motoring News, 7 Dec 1967
- ^ Autocar 4 January 1968
- ^ a b c Car and car conversions June 1977
- ^ Formula 2 regester
- ^ Car and car conversions May 1971
- ^ Autosport 31 October 1974
- ^ Motor Magazine, 2 August 1975
- ^ Avon/Motor magazine tour of Britain 1973–1975 Duke video
- ^ motoring news 1976
- ^ a b Autosport 19 January 1978
- ^ a b Galway Advertiser archive
- ^ 25 Years of the Manx Rally by Doug Baird
- ^ British racing drivers club.
- ^ Sunbeam Lotus owners club
- ^ a b "WRC - World Rally Championship". WRC - World Rally Championship.
- ^ autosport
- ^ autosport 27 January 2000
- ^ de Jong, Frank. "British Saloon Car Championship". History of Touring Car Racing 1952-1993. Retrieved 11 October 2022.