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| Last updated: 31-October-2004 | |
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Background
Royal weddings may be fairytales, but few dreams come true in F1 |
Although F1 Rejects is based in Australia, we now of course have an ever-so-slight affinity with Denmark, since mid-2004 when Aussie Mary Donaldson married Crown Prince Frederik, heir to the Danish throne. Theirs was a fairytale marriage: the Tasmanian real estate agent meeting the Danish royal in a Sydney pub during the 2000 Olympics. Needless to say, not everything in the world has such happy endings. And that is especially the case in the harsh world of Formula One.
With this royal wedding in mind, we turn our attention to one of the four Danes who have competed in F1. Indeed, we focus on the very first to grace the Grand Prix stage, subsequently (to this date) followed by Jac Nelleman, Jan Magnussen, and Nicolas Kiesa. The biography of Tom Belsø from Copenhagen, however, is anything but a fairytale. His is a story which has become all too common in motor racing circles, tinged with the cruel reality of a promising career cut short by a lack of finances. |
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1960-71
Starts out in touring, becoming a saloon car champion |
Belsø started out as a mechanic in the 1960s, but after proving his worth in that capacity he was given the chance to race the Volvo he had prepared. With that, Belsø's ability was unearthed, as he won first time out! So began a touring car career in earnest, which included driving a Ford Shelby Mustang for Ford Denmark, although he crashed and rolled that car in a race in Norway. By 1969, though, he had become Scandinavian saloon car champion in a Ford Escort.
From this point on, Belsø embarked on a career in single seaters, racing a Hawke in Formula Ford 1600 in 1970, but by the end of that year he was already 28 years old, which in truth was quite old to be just starting to climb the open wheeler ladder. With no time to waste, he sold off his business interests and relocated to Britain. There in 1971 he raced a Brabham BT28 in the Yellow Pages British Formula Atlantic championship, finishing 3rd overall with 47 points behind series victor Vern Schuppan. |
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1972
Racing for Team Viking, but little pillaging of the F2 scene |
Unusually but understandably skipping Formula 3, Belsø jumped straight into the European Formula 2 series in 1972 under the Team Viking banner. In the first race at Mallory Park, where he campaigned his Brabham BT28 with a Ford BDA engine, he retired with mechanical failure in both heats. It was a sign of things to come. In subsequent British and European F2 championship events at Oulton Park and Thruxton, despite upgrading to a BT38, his races ended in accidents.
Tom's fortune improved when the F2 fraternity went to Germany. 8th and 9th in the two heats at Hockenheim meant an aggregate result of 5th, scoring two points, whilst he also came 9th in the non-title race at the Nurburgring. But then, in three of the following four races, mechanical retirements in his heat meant non-qualification for the final. To make matters worse, budgetary restraints saw him miss four of the five events after that, and the in one he did enter, at Mantorp Park in Sweden, he failed to make the grid. |
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1972
Top effort in France, before making the move to F5000 |
Another retirement in the British F2 round at Oulton Park compounded the disappointment, before his BT38 finally held together at the European round at Albi in France, allowing him to shine. After coming 6th in his heat, in the final he placed a superb 4th in what was a class field. Jean-Pierre Jaussaud won the final ahead of Patrick Depailler, Bob Wollek, and Belsø, with James Hunt in 5th. But, perhaps predictably, Belsø's season rounded out with another DNF at Hockenheim.
All this left him in equal 17th place in the European F2 championship with Hunt, on 5 points each. During the year he had also taken part in the one-off Formula Libre 'Rothmans 50,000' race at Brands Hatch, where he had acquitted himself well by finishing 8th, the second F2 competitor home. However, having not quite done enough to convince F1 team managers to take him on for 1973, he was snaffled up by Jackie Epstein for his British F5000 Shellsport team instead. |
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1973
A busy year with decent finishes from lower grid spots |
Belsø was given a Lola T330 Chevrolet V8 to drive, and, saddled with a fairly reliable car in contrast to 1972, he showed his worth as a racer. As a qualifier he lacked speed over a single lap - his best grid positions were only two 4ths - but come race day he often made up a huge number of places. In the first half of the season, highlights included 4th at Silverstone from 9th on the grid, and two 2nds at Brands Hatch and Mallory Park, both after having started 4th.
But in the latter half of 1973 he starred. At Brands Hatch, he came from 11th to finish 2nd. Then at the Jyllandsring in his native Denmark he came 6th and 3rd in the two heats and 4th on aggregate, before two great drives at Zandvoort and Snetterton, where he started 17th and 13th respectively but finished 4th and 5th. With 97 points, he claimed 6th place overall. Add to that a 7th and an 8th in the Race of Champions and the International Trophy, where he took on F1 cars as well, and it had been a very satisfying year. |
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1974
Takes long-awaited first F5000 win at Snetterton from 9th |
Belsø stayed with Epstein's Shellsport team for 1974, and despite only a limited number of starts his trend of being a poor qualifier but a tremendous racer continued. Of the eighteen rounds, Tom only competed in eleven of them. But Thruxton saw him start and finish 5th, whilst at Mallory Park he took the flag in 4th having started 8th. At a second race at Thruxton he drove from a starting position of 7th to claim 3rd, and at Brands Hatch he started 10th but finished 4th.
All this time he had been knocking on the door of a race win, and finally it came at Snetterton, where he only qualified 9th but brilliantly scythed through the field to claim his first victory. There was no doubt now that Belsø could handle the more powerful machinery. With 72 points at season's end, he placed 8th in the series, but considering his limited starts that was no mean feat. And those races he had missed were because, as a reward for his hard graft, Formula One had finally come calling. |
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1973 Iso-Marlboro Belsø comes to the Williams party in Sweden |
It was mid-1973, and Frank Williams was not a happy man. The then-struggling privateer owner had started the year full of hope, having joined forces with the Italian car maker Iso-Rivolta, and found backing from Marlboro and from Italian driver Nanni Galli. His team had become known as Iso-Marlboro and had commissioned the FW01. However, the car had proven off the pace, Galli's money had never arrived, and a second car, the FW02, had been hurriedly built.
In short, Williams needed a pay driver, and for the Swedish GP at Anderstorp he invited Belsø to drive the FW01, provided he could bring some cash. Being as close to Denmark as the World Championship would get, this was virtually Belsø's home race, and a great place for him to make his debut. In practice, though, he was slowest of all 22 entrants, over three seconds shy of Howden Ganley in the FW02. Nevertheless, he would have been allowed to start. |
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1973-74
Money comes up short, but Frank offers a second chance |
That was until the deadline for his sponsorship money came and went, at which point Belsø had sadly been unable to pay. Thus he was forced to watch from the sidelines, as Ganley became the only Iso Marlboro driver in the race. But Williams had not forgotten the likeable Dane, and, in a business not known for second chances, gave Tom another opportunity to run at the start of 1974. For the third round in South Africa, Belsø was back in the FW01, now with Arturo Merzario as his team-mate in the second car.
On a track he had never seen before, it was not a surprise that Belsø struggled, only qualifying 27th and last on the grid even behind locals Dave Charlton, Eddie Keizan and Paddy Driver. However, it was not as bad as it looked: Belsø was only 3.22s off pole, and Merzario had flattered the team by qualifying a stunning 3rd. But come race day, disappointment struck again, when Tom's clutch failed on the very first lap. Two entries down, and he had yet to complete a single racing lap. |
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1974
Bad luck afflicts Tom's efforts to finish a racing lap |
He was out of luck as well at the next race in Spain, where he had retained his spot in the team, although by now Merzario had been given the new FW03 and Belsø had moved up to the FW02. But it amounted to naught when he was again the slowest in the field, although only 0.2s away from Tim Schenken in the Trojan who was the last man allowed to start. Sure, he may not have been the best qualifier in the world, but his F1 career was quickly looking as though it was cursed.
And it certainly seemed that way after practice for the Swedish GP, round seven and Belsø's next appearance. Here he had a new team-mate again, Richard Robarts stepping in for an injured Merzario. Sure enough, Belsø out-qualified the unimpressive British F3 champ by over a second, with a time good enough for 21st on the grid. But in searching for that extra few tenths, Tom pushed a little too hard and crashed, damaging his car beyond repair. For his unusually pleasant demeanour, Belso had been nicknamed 'Smiling Tom', but the prospect of not starting again must have elicited a frown or two. |
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1974
Robarts to the rescue; Williams looks elsewhere for cash |
But Williams took pity on him, and realising that he was a much better prospect in the race than Robarts, he handed the Englishman's car to him for the race. Finally, it was a lucky break, and Belsø took full advantage. He circulated steadily and moved up the field as others dropped off, and eventually made it to the flag for his one and only Grand Prix finish. 8th place, separated from the points by only the two Embassy Hill Lolas of Graham Hill and Guy Edwards, and only 1 lap down, was a fine achievement.
There was to be one more F1 attempt for Belsø, in round 10 for the British GP, but it was an event where ten cars failed to qualify, and it was little surprise that Tom was amongst them. Though it had only been an off-again, on-again tenure in F1, that was fair enough; already in his thirties, he was no spring chicken, and the truth was that it had always been a struggle to constantly gather the sponsorship required, whilst Williams had a queue of other pay drivers lining up for his seat and was obliged to take their money. |
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1975-77
Returns to F5000, but is forced to sit out 1976 |
F5000 was clearly a much more happy hunting ground for the Dane, and indeed his great win at Snetterton had, strictly speaking, come after his F1 sojourn. So he continued for a third season in the Epstein Shellsport Lola in 1975. But perhaps, having had to find the cash for his F1 efforts, Belsø's monetary support was starting to run out. That may explain his limited appearances in 1975, in which he only raced nine times and missed out on the top ten of the British F5000 championship.
Belsø had also raced the car at the 1975 Race of Champions, where he started 9th but was eliminated on the first lap at Paddock Bend in an incident that also involved Jochen Mass' McLaren. But by the end of 1975, Tom had well and truly exhausted his supply of finances, and he was forced to altogether sit out the 1976 season, a year in which the F5000 series morphed into the Shellsport G8 British Championship and welcomed F1, F2 and Atlantic cars to bolster grids. |
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1977-2001
Leaves motorsport to concentrate on his bakeries |
However, John Jordan threw him a lifeline in 1977, and brought Belsø back for the 1977 Shellsport G8 series. Tom found himself behind the wheel of a Lola T330 Chevrolet once again, but not the same car as before. Previously, his Epstein car had been chassis HU2; now he was in HU6, but it was a car of similar vintage. Competing in the first 10 races before the left the scene again, Belsø recorded a 6th, two 5ths, a 4th and a 3rd, scoring 45 points, good for 10th in the final standings.
By now Belsø was finding motorsport a costly pastime. Too costly perhaps, and with that he seemingly walked away from competition. Since then, he has focussed on business interests, developing the Belsø Foods and Belsø Cereals companies in England, as well as a chain of bakeries there and a health food factory in Denmark. He lives in Cambridgeshire, and very occasionally returns to the tracks in historic meetings, such as in 2001 when he raced a Volvo Amazon 122S in the Goodwood revival meeting. |
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