k l au s l u dw i g
Ludwig scored backto-back Le Mans wins in Joest Porsche (left), before the DTM and Mercedes beckoned
Improbably at this large but determinedly grass-roots meeting, Klaus Ludwig bounces into view. That’s three-time Le Mans winner, triple DTM champion, double DRM champion and FIA GT Champion Klaus Ludwig. Even more implausibly and for one race only, we are to be team-mates. You can find out how that worked out overleaf, but for now the chance to download the man known in his homeland as ‘König Ludwig’ and here simply ‘King Klaus’ is not to be missed. Rather charmingly for its debut into the world of historic motor racing, Mercedes-Benz has brought along no trucks, transporters, motorhomes or any of the paraphernalia you might expect from such an organisation. Like almost every car in the race, the Fintail has been
towed here behind a van, while the back of another van, a converted post van with a table and chairs in the back to be precise, will provide a more than adequate environment for our interview. Indeed these back to basic surroundings rather suit our subject. Not for him the wealth to wheel route to motor sport success preferred by his mainly monied contemporaries. “When I was young I couldn’t even think about racing,” he now recalls. Agonisingly he grew up almost next door to the Nürburgring and lost no opportunity to visit the track as a child. His one bit of luck was that his father’s best friend married the daughter of the ’Ring’s racing director – which is how, after the 1957 German Grand Prix, a seven-year-old Klaus found himself sitting on the very next table to Juan Manuel Fangio, who had just won the race of his life. “I remember looking up at him and
seeing this old man sitting there and he just looked tired. So tired. He wasn’t giving any autographs at all. But he did one for me and I still have it.” But that was it. While the men who would become his rivals worked their way up through the usual formulae of racing, Klaus earned a living selling toasters in the family shop. “There were five of us, my mother, father, me and two others. I did no karting, no nothing while I was a kid. I sold radios and food mixers.” Indeed he was 18 before he could afford any kind of car at all. It turned out to be an NSU TT. “I did a few slaloms, won them all easily and thought, ‘I can do this.’” The NSU merely lit the fire. It was too complicated and unreliable to use as a proper racing car, so he got a BMW 2002 and started proper racing on his beloved Nürburgring. “I did 12-, 24-, and 36-hour races with the BMW club of Bonn, made a bit of a name for w w w. m oto r s p o r t m ag a z i n e . c o m
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