Emilio Materassi was an Italian Grand Prix motor racing

Grand Prix motor racing

Grand Prix motor racing has its roots in organised automobile racing that began in France as far back as 1894. It quickly evolved from a simple road race from one town to the next, to endurance tests for car and driver...

 driver.

Early life

Born in Borgo San Lorenzo

Borgo San Lorenzo

Borgo San Lorenzo is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 20 km northeast of Florence...

, near Florence, Italy, Emilio began working in a bicycle shop, learning the basics of applied mechanics. Later, he went to work in a car garage, where he developed a strong love for engines and cars.

When he was in his twenties Materassi took over the administration of his family business, selling wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

, ropes and twine

Twine

Twine is a light string or strong thread composed of two or more smaller strands or yarns twisted together. More generally, the term can be applied to any thin cord....

.

Poor economic condition forced him to work as a bus driver for local services.

Racing career

The racing debut came at the Gentlemen Grand Prix at Brescia

Brescia

Brescia is a city and comune in the region of Lombardy in northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, between the Mella and the Naviglio, with a population of around 197,000. It is the second largest city in Lombardy, after the capital, Milan...

, September 11, 1921, driving an aged car from the Turin automaker Itala. Unfortunately the car broke down after three laps.
Materassi had better fortune the following June when he finished 8th overall at the Mugello Circuit

Mugello Circuit

Mugello Circuit is a race track in the Mugello region of Italy near Florence. Its length is . It has 15 turns and a long straight.Grand Prix motorcycle racing host an annual event here . Also, the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters hold an annual event. The track is property of Scuderia Ferrari which...

In 1923 Materassi, with the help of some wealthy friends, opened his own workshop in Via dei Poggi 12, in Florence. He called it "L’Autogarage Nazionale", and signed a dealership contract with Itala.
During World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 Itala had built Hispano-Suiza

Hispano-Suiza

Hispano-Suiza was a Spanish automotive and engineering firm, best known for its luxury cars and aviation engines in the pre-World War II period of the twentieth century. In 1923, its French subsidiary became a semi-autonomous partnership with the parent company and is now part of the French SAFRAN...

 aircraft engines under license. After the war the company had a surplus of spare engines, and Materassi succeeded in buying one of those at a very low price.
Materassi heavily modified the engine, and built a car based on an Itala chassis around it, calling his construction "Italona".
The car was quite heavy, weighing over 2 tons. Nevertheless, the 3 liters aviation engine was powerful enough to allow good performances even in hill climbing

Hill climbing

In computer science, hill climbing is a mathematical optimization technique which belongs to the family of local search. It is an iterative algorithm that starts with an arbitrary solution to a problem, then attempts to find a better solution by incrementally changing a single element of the solution...

 races.

With the Italona, Materassi won a lot of important, but local, races from 1924 to 1926, including two Mugello Grand Prix and three hillclimbs at the Pistoia

Pistoia

Pistoia is a city and comune in the Tuscany region of Italy, the capital of a province of the same name, located about 30 km west and north of Florence and is crossed by the Ombrone Pistoiese, a tributary of the River Arno.-History:...

n Hills (Coppa della Collina Pistoiese). In 1926 he managed to get a fourth place in the prestigious Targa Florio

Targa Florio

The Targa Florio was an open road endurance automobile race held in the mountains of Sicily near Palermo. Founded in 1906, it was the oldest sports car racing event, part of the World Sportscar Championship between 1955 and 1973...

.
He won the Coppa Montenero at the difficult Montenero Circuit

Montenero Circuit

The Montenero Circuit was a motor racing road course at Livorno, Italy. Sometimes referred to simply as "the Livorno Circuit", it was the scene of several Grand Prix races from 1921 until 1939, mainly the annual Coppa Montenero/Coppa Ciano...

 in 1925 and 1926, earning the nickname "King of Montenero”.

Materassi had become close friends with Alfieri Maserati

Alfieri Maserati

Alfieri Maserati was an Italian automotive engineer, known for establishing and leading the Maserati racing car manufacturer with the other Maserati Brothers....

 and was given the opportunity to race with the Maserati

Maserati

Maserati is an Italian luxury car manufacturer established on December 1, 1914, in Bologna. The company's headquarters is now in Modena, and its emblem is a trident. It has been owned by the Italian car giant Fiat S.p.A. since 1993...

 team on a number of occasions, among them the 1925 and 1926 Italian Grand Prix

Italian Grand Prix

The Italian Grand Prix is one of the longest running events on the motor racing calendar. The first Italian Grand Prix motor racing championship took place on 4 September 1921 at Brescia...

. Sadly, he had to retire from all of those races, most of the time due to mechanical failures.

Impressed by the skills of the young pilot the team manager of the Bugatti

Bugatti

Automobiles E. Bugatti was a French car manufacturer founded in 1909 in Molsheim, Alsace, as a manufacturer of high-performance automobiles by Italian-born Ettore Bugatti....

 racing team asked Materassi to join them in 1927.
In his first race with the brand new Bugatti T35C

Bugatti Type 35

The Type 35 was the most successful of the Bugatti racing models. Its version of the Bugatti arch-shaped radiator that had evolved from the more architectural one of the Bugatti Type 13 Brescia, was to become the one that the marque is most known for though even in the ranks of the various Type 35s...

, he won the Tripoli Grand Prix

Tripoli Grand Prix

The Tripoli Grand Prix was a motor racing event first held in 1925 on a racing circuit outside Tripoli, the capital of what was then Italian Tripolitania...

, with an average speed of 132 km/h, and in April the same year he finally won the Targa Florio. He also won another Coppa Montenero.
Those victories, along with others, gained him the title "Absolute Champion of Italy".

In 1928 Materassi founded his own racing team, buying cars and material from the bankrupt Talbot

Talbot

Talbot was an automobile marque that existed from 1903 to 1986, with a hiatus from 1960 to 1978, under a number of different owners, latterly under Peugeot...

 team. Materassi worked on the engines and the chassis himself, modifying the old cars to make them 30 kilograms lighter. Apart from himself, Luigi Arcangeli

Luigi Arcangeli

Luigi Arcangeli was an Italian motorcycle racer and race car driver, his first notable appearance was a win in 1928 at the Circuito di Senigallia with a 2 litre Bugatti. After Bugatti he drove...

, Antonio Brivio

Antonio Brivio

Antonio Brivio was an Italian bobsledder and racing driver.-Auto racing career:...

, Gastone Brilli-Peri

Gastone Brilli-Peri

Count Gastone Brilli-Peri was a famous Italian racing driver, who won the 1925 Italian Grand Prix in an Alfa Romeo P2, securing the inaugural World Manufacturers' Championship title for Alfa Romeo. Known simply as “Brilli,” his face had been permanently scarred in an accident during a Tour of...

 and Gianfranco Comotti became drivers for Scuderia Materassi.

In June 1928 he won the Grand Prix of Mugello driving a Talbot

Talbot

Talbot was an automobile marque that existed from 1903 to 1986, with a hiatus from 1960 to 1978, under a number of different owners, latterly under Peugeot...

 and finished second in the Coppa Acerbo

Coppa Acerbo

The Coppa Acerbo was an automobile race held in Italy, named after Tito Acerbo, the brother of Giacomo Acerbo, a prominent fascist politician. Following Italy's defeat in World War II, and the consequent demise of fascism, the race was renamed the Circuito di Pescara, and in some years was also...

 in August then that same month he won his fourth Coppa Montenero, beating both Tazio Nuvolari

Tazio Nuvolari

Tazio Giorgio Nuvolari was an Italian motorcycle and racecar driver, known as Il Mantovano Volante or Nivola. He was the 1932 European Champion in Grand Prix motor racing...

 and Giuseppe Campari

Giuseppe Campari

Giuseppe Campari was an Italian opera singer and Grand Prix motor racing driver.-Racing career:Born Giuseppe Campari near the city of Lodi southwest of Milan, as a teenager he went to work for the Alfa Romeo automobile company...

.

Death

On the 17th lap of the 1928 Italian Grand Prix held at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza

Autodromo Nazionale Monza

The Autodromo Nazionale Monza is a race track located near the town of Monza, north of Milan, in Italy. The circuit's biggest event is the Formula One Italian Grand Prix, which has been hosted there since the sport's inception....

, Materassi lost control of his Talbot 700 when he tried to overtake Giulio Foresti’s Bugatti T35C

Bugatti Type 35

The Type 35 was the most successful of the Bugatti racing models. Its version of the Bugatti arch-shaped radiator that had evolved from the more architectural one of the Bugatti Type 13 Brescia, was to become the one that the marque is most known for though even in the ranks of the various Type 35s...

 on the main straight at over 200 km/h.
The Talbot swerved to the left, jumped over a three-meter deep and four-meter wide protection ditch and a fence and crashed into the grandstand.

Materassi was killed instantly along with twenty spectators and a large number of people were injured. The other drivers of the Scuderia Materassi withdrew from the race immediately after the accident, but the event continued and it was won by Louis Chiron

Louis Chiron

Louis Alexandre Chiron was a Grand Prix driver.-Career:As a teenager, Louis Chiron fell in love with cars and racing. He learned to drive at a young age and joined the Grand Prix circuit after World War I where he had been requisitioned from the artillery section to serve as a chauffeur...

. Three days later one of the injured spectators died in hospital, making the total death toll 22. Other sources state that 27 spectators were killed all in all.

By either estimation this is the worst accident, with respect to the number of lives lost, to occur at a Grand Prix and it is only surpassed by the 1955 Le Mans disaster

1955 Le Mans disaster

The 1955 Le Mans disaster occurred during the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans motor race, when a crash caused large parts of racing car debris to fly into the crowd. The driver was killed, as were 83 spectators. A further 120 people were injured...

 in the history of motor racing. As a result the Italian Grand Prix was cancelled in 1929 and 1930.

Notable race victories

• Coppa della Consuma : 1924
• Coppa della Collina Pistoiese : 1924, 1925, 1926
• Coppa Perugina : 1924, 1926, 1927
• Circuito del Savio : 1925
• Grand Prix of Mugello : 1925, 1926, 1928
• Coppa Montenero : 1925, 1926, 1927, 1928
• Tripoli Grand Prix
  Tripoli Grand Prix
  The Tripoli Grand Prix was a motor racing event first held in 1925 on a racing circuit outside Tripoli, the capital of what was then Italian Tripolitania...
  
   : 1927
• Targa Florio
  Targa Florio
  The Targa Florio was an open road endurance automobile race held in the mountains of Sicily near Palermo. Founded in 1906, it was the oldest sports car racing event, part of the World Sportscar Championship between 1955 and 1973...
  
   : 1927
• Bologna Grand Prix : 1927
• San Sebastian Grand Prix
  San Sebastián Grand Prix
  The San Sebastián Grand Prix was an automobile race held at the Circuito Lasarte near San Sebastián, Spain.During most of its existence, it was the main race event in Spain, since the Spanish Grand Prix had not yet been properly established as a grand prix race...
  
  : 1927