Peter Connew Capricorn or Capricorn (the little of history of the team will not have made it possible to fix its name definitively) is an old stable of Formule 1, in activity lasting only the season of 1972 where it took part only at some Grands Prix.

History

The stable Peter Connew Capricorn concretizes the dream of Peter Connew of launching his own team in championship of the world of Formula 1. In 1969, Connew resigns of its work because its owner does not grant a leave to him to attend the GP of Italy. As of its return, it contacts John Surtees which engages it in its team as a draftsman of the models of F1 and Formula 5000. Peter Connew draws thus Surtees TS7, TS9 and committed TS9B of 1970 with 1973 but finally chooses to resign to only launch out in the great bath.

Connew, 26 years only, buys with credit an engine Cosworth DFV 902 of occasion in Mc Laren and is harnessed with the construction of its machine with only three " employees bénévoles" : Roger Doran (head mechanic), Ron Doran (the father of Roger, welder) and Barry Boor (cousin of Connew and cabinetmaker in load of the realization of the gauges out of wooden for the clothes industry of the moulds).

At the beginning of 1972, the PC1 is presented for the first time and draws the attention of the French pilot François Migault which had been invested in F2 with the support of Shell. Migault invests 60.000 francs in the adventure, which finally makes it possible to pay the employees (300 francs per week…) and to try the adventure in F1. The beginnings are envisaged with the GP of France with Charade, close to Clermont-Ferrand, with a meeting of tests in Mans the day before. Unfortunately, the truck of transport breaks down and the team does not rejoin Puy de Dôme, the first disillusion…

The team engages then for the GP of Great Britain (Brands Hatch) and of Germany (Nürburgring). But there still, not of race to the program following a problem of and breaking petrol station of suspension to the tests in England and a not-qualification in Germany.

It is with the GP of Austria on Österreichring that the PC1 takes part finally in its first race in F1. It gives up at the end of 22 turns and will not appear any more in championship of the world.

The team engages in the John Player Challenge Trophy, in Brands Hatch, race out-championship, François Migault having thrown sponge, it is David Purley have Formula 3, which takes the departure, but explodes her engine during the tests. Purley is also at the beginning of the last race of the team, Rothmans 5000 (race out-championship), always in Brands Hatch. The pilot insists to have a circuit breaker on the wheel, the mechanics arrange a system with haste, a few moments before the race, using a simple electric cable rolled up around the wheel. The car (which had been modified to become a single-seater of F5000), does not finish the warm-up because of the rupture of the cable… End of the history.

Connew estimates that its season of Formula 1 will have cost him between 100.000 and 200.000 francs of the time, of which a good part for the purchase of the engine with Mc Laren. After Rothmans 5000, Connew does not have any more one penny out of pocket, it resells then its engine with Tom Wheatcroft for the automobile museum of Donington, refunds all its creditors and leaves the world of F1.

Participations Formulates 1 of them (season 1972)

External bond

Connew PC1 by Barry Boor. Barry Boor, cousin of Peter Connew implied in the rocambolesque adventure in F1, proposes on its site of many images of Capricorn PC1 and various automobile tests which it followed. Some of its photographs are also visible on Wiki Commons, Mr Boor having accepted their free diffusion.

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