Autosprint on Andrea Moda!

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

I’m translating the Italian article linked by Valrys in the Forti Shannon Finfirst topic:
http://www.autosprint.it/upload/articol ... ssetti.swf
I’ve not finished yet, but I will translate the ending part soon. Enjoy it!
____




“Cuore da corsa” goes looking for the only Constructor struck off in F1 history. He has been silent since 1992. But now he has decided to tell his incredible history.

In Montecarlo he humiliated Damon Hill tank to S921. Andrea Moda’s boss changed his life and the one of the driver Perry McCarthy. He was the last human F1 team principal. Yeah, in good and in bad...

THE FIRST CLONE WAS CALLED ANDREA – the case from Kyalami 1992 remembers a lot the present argument of the paddock.
1992 Championship’s Eve: 32 cars are entered, but the Concord Agreement says that not more than thirty can drive during the qualifying session. So every Friday morning before the GP it’s necessary to do a prequalifying in order to eliminate two. A nightmare, a cut who involves all the angry backmarker teams. Anyway, there would be a remedy. Cut off wings to that Andrea Sassetti, a guy from the region of Marche, owner of a footwear factory, who bought the team of a tired Enzo Coloni, renaming it Andrea Moda. It’s enough to find a excuse to eliminate him and in the paddock everyone will be more relaxed. Anyway a little time before the South African grand prix it starts trouble for the team from Macerata. It’s excluded, with the drivers Caffi and Bertaggia, because it has not paid deposit for entering the championship, at the time just 100’000 dollars, not the 48 millions that would have been in the future. True. But just because Sassetti thinks that entering will be implicit, having bought a Circus team. And instead they say no. And there’s another little problem. For the first time in Formula 1 history it starts to think about intellectual property. So the same subject which sets against each other some more important team at the beginning of 2007 season. In a few words Sassetti bought the Coloni team and from it the Constructor licence number 89626H, legitimately released from CSAI to Andrea on 11th September 1991. But federals argued that Sassetti, so, has not the intellectual property of the project of the cars he would line up. They are two former Colonis with the back from 1991 Dallara. So clones. If Andrea Moda would race, it has to construct a F1 car from zero. In 21 days. The incredible is that Andrea Sassetti from San Rustico accepts the challenge. It takes one month, but he’s able to do it. In Brasil he lines up two new flaming F1 cars, all his. It’s logic. The footwear factory man’s place could be stolen by no one.

SPRING 1992. Perry McCarthy, Londoner with unimportant racing past, comes to a turning point. He as an objective: racing in F1. And a march table: if he went on so, in April he will have his bank credit off, in May his phone like will be disconnected and in mid-June his home will be distained.
But he’s a real warrior. He stays in dining-room wearing a dressing gown, with wide open eyes staring at the phone. Which starts ringing. He put on the receiver and thinks “God, five me a chance, once, at least in a mono-brand with regional importance.” “Hello. Fred Rogers from Jordan. Perry?” “It’s me.” “Compliments, you’re going to became a F1 driver.” “I’m arriving” McCarthy answers. Destination: Banbury, Simtek headquarter where the blind meeting will take place.
In the factory there’s the man who’s searching for him: Andrea Sassetti. It seems he went to the technician Nick Wirth saying: “I want two new F1 cars.” Wirth think he’s mad, but Sassetti isn’t. He has a plastic folder and knocks it over his desk, forming a banknotes-pyramid. “But I want it in twenty days” it’s the ending. Wirth starts quickly. He has pieces from a former BMW project. It’s irrational trying it, but it will be idiot to give up to those rustling coins. “I’ve got the engines yet”, Sassetti says, showing him a contract for 12 Judd units costing 800’000 dollars and deposit paid. Wirth starts swear. He won’t stop for four weeks. To let the coin pyramid become his, he starts a human chain with Egypt inspiration, formed by shifters from Benetton, Lotus, McLaren and Williams after-hours from 150 pounds.

“Andrea Moda wants me? Ehm, really? I’m not so beautiful. I’m just dreaming to become a Formula 1 driver”- Perry McCarthy.

AN APOCRYPHAL RETRACT – Okay, but who’s this Sassetti? Impossible to say it. It’s only possible trying to guess what he seems. He gives out a magnetism which could be charming, like a protagonist of a documentary about the return of dance music. Invariably black-dressed, black hair ful of gel, enigmatic, silent. He’s tall, with large shoulders, and he smells like evening catwalk on coast, like mad nights on Adriatica, like sensational entries at Angels Bay while music-speakers playing at loud Gazebo and Gloria Gaynor. Like Picasso he has cubist-style successes, he has also the aplomb who makes the hairdressers dreaming. Different from others, better too. His looks is always hidden from enormous sunglasses. A life maybe full of mystery, but with eye-catching belts. He moves his boys with determined and monosyllabic orders. He’s introverted, doesn’t allow interviews. At least at now, it’s all.

MIRACLE IN BANBURY – Wirth succeeded. In one month two Andrea Moda S921 are ready. It’s the team of Sassetti, owner of a footwear factory with the same name, with headquarter in Morrovalle near Macerata, and his line made him magically rich. But not stupid. He proposed to Perry McCarthy – coming from a huge anteroom: “You will be my driver, but I won’t pay you. You have to pay your travels.” The deal has been done. Tuesday 31st March McCarthy receives his superlicence. And he asks his cousin to give him 800 pounds to pay his Varig traven from Brasil, in economic class. Then he drain two red wine bottles.
Sao Paulo, Friday 3rd April; Moreno’s Andrea Moda drives two lap, 14 second behind the second-slowest. It’s worst for his team mate McCarthy: Superlicence suspended. Perry breaks into tears in front of the world and Ecclestone, that sometimes he’s good. And he goes home with two certainties: he has not requirements to have the Superlicence, but he will have it back. Because Bernie went in front of one of the Formula One Commission members saying: “I introduce you Mr. McCarthy. Mr. McCarthy has a problem: you have to solve it.” Perry receives the authorization from fax.

NIGHTMARE AT SPANISH GRAND PRIX – “I watch the clock and I risk a stroke: I’m wearing my pyjama an I should wear my driving suit...” - Perry McCarthy.
Thursday 30th April at midnight McCarthy enters his hotel room, with five beds more than I thought. Okay, he will sleep with mechanics. He has a strange woke up: he’s alone and the clock says 7,25. He’s an hour far from the track and the session will start ad eight. He’s a lost man. Mechanics spent their night at the nightclub, going from dance to circuit, leaving him alone. Perry meets Sassetti’s brother. “Take me to the paddock”, he says. “At all costs.”
Sassetti’s brother drives in Barcelona 160 km per hour and leaves an afraid McCarthy in the garage, with a two minutes advance. Here we are. But the Andrea Moda doesn’t start. So they spray “quick start” in the airbox, who sets in fire, and with it the helmet too. Turned the fire off, the Judd starts. McCarthy sees the track and accelerates. Twenty meters and the car is stopped. He went over the pitlane line, so external assistance is forbidden. This is the shortest qualifying attempt of F1 history. Moreno – good luck – went on for three laps.
15th May, Imola. McCarthy goes for seven happy laps, before stopping because of a broken differential, the same for Moreno.
Montecarlo, 28th May. Perry goes for three laps, but he’s called from garage. Why? Who knows. He get off the car, he searches for Moreno, but doesn’t find him because he’s still on track and he’s driving like a damned soul. Afternoon of Saturday 16th May: the ending time let “Pupo” to qualify. He was faster than the future World Champion on the once-glorious Brabham. Andrea Moda’s garage explodes in a merited celebration from Macerata: “We did it, we will be on the track!” Sassetti’s dream becomes truth: it will be for eternity the one who had a his own car at the start of a grand prix. During the race, Moreno is out during the 12th lap, but the important thing has been done. Luckily, because in Canada McCarthy who travels doing the speaker for a tour operator which paid him with plane tickets, find the cars but not engines, because of late payments. So Sassetti hires a Judd from the dying Brabham and try to let Moreno drive. Out.
In France the lorry doesn’t arrive because – it seems – blocked by a local lorry drivers strike. So McCarthy try to do something that no one has never hazarded: talking with Sassetti. Perry’s phone-call to Andrea Moda is one of the most amazing moments of F1 history. Enjoy it!
“Hello, Andrea Moda Formula.”
“Hello. I’m Perry.”
“Perry... Perry who?”
“Perry McCarthy.”
“Yeah, but for which firm are you calling?”
“Well... I’d be your driver...”
“Oh, right. Well, Andrea is not here.”
Perry sees Sassetti at British Grand Prix. Their clarification lasts four seconds: Andrea gives him a hit and says: “well, don’t be worried”. In fact Andrea Moda win a never seen record, letting him drive with heavy rain tires under a sunny sky. Two laps, clutch broken. Not better for Moreno. The same things happens at Hockenheim: but there are slick tires and the distance driven is a half. The same in Hungary. McCarthy goes out 45 seconds before the session ending: let’s let it go. In Spa he breaks the steering-gear and risks his life brushing the barriers. In the garage he knows that Sassetti has been arrested for presumed fraud. The Andrea Moda adventure is going to an end. But watching the news Perry discover he has become a star: the authoritative Times defines him as the “most unlucky driver on Earth”, Daily Telegraph describes him as “cult hero from nowadays”, Sunday Express praises him as “comic actor chained to a driver suit”. Perry McCarthy from that day becomes a character. He will have decent signings, he will race for names as Panoz and Audi, he will write a successful book, he will have a his own home and a happy wife.

“Sassetti gave me as a present a pair of boots from his factory. But they were uncomfortable. From this I should have understood my destiny” – Perry McCarthy.



_______
This is the part about the team. I will post the ending part about Sassetti as soon as possible.

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

Final part.
______

THE COMEBACK OF THE BLACK MAN
His press-silence lasted 15 years is ended. Sassetti finally reveal all the Andrea Moda history.

Andrea Sassetti, Andrea Moda’s patron, has not talked since fifteen years. Blinded, misterous, not accessible. Or maybe, to make it simple, unfairly forgotten. “And I recommend you”, says one of his collaborators, “don’t insist, because he drifts apart. Now he’s at a fair. Let him to decide if keep on silence or not about F1 world.” OK, done. And a day the cell-phone rings.
“Good Morning, it’s Sassetti. Andrea Sassetti.”
- It seems easy. We don’t take nothing for expected. Who’s Andrea Sassetti? Because no one has written a damn which is detailed and certain.
“I was born in San Rustico, hamlet of Montesanpietrangeli, near Fermo, in the region of Marche, on 14th February 1960.”
- At the end 1991, so 31 years old, you were the baby-boss of a F1 team. With what hinterland back?
“Hinterland? You can say it. I come from the country. My parents where peasants, but not landowners, they were just farmers. When I was young I spent my days feeding the cows.”
- Well, but from cowshed from championship paddock there was sure a turning moment, isn’t it?
“A night I won three millions lire {1500 euro circa} on poker, not an indifferent sum at that time. So I had an idea almost logic for a Marche people. In 1985 I bought machinery for shoes construction and I rented a shed. Things starts to going good and money is not a problem. But I’m still timid and introverted.”
- And at the end of 1991, you bought Coloni F1...
“One day a friend of mine tells me that the team searches for a partner. I propose myself. I enter the deal, but certain accounts are not balanced, so with a little ingenuousness and unconsciousness I decide to buy everything. Think, until that time I have seen F1 just on television.”
- Go on.
“It’s the same thing that Bernie Ecclestone says to me when I visit him in his office in London. So I really go on.”
- But in South Africa comes the first mess. The deposit to enter the championship is not paid and the team is accused not to own the intellectual property of cars. A problem who remembers the one of the cloned F1 in the 2007 paddock.
“I don’t surrender. Someone suggests me to go to Simtek, in Banbury, where they have a ready project that Wirth would sell to BMW. I come myself, paying all.”
- How many cars were realized?
“Two complete chassis.”
- At the beginning all car pieces don’t stays together.
“Logic. It’s necessary years to program F1 entry. I had to do it everything in a few months. Then I discover I have just three weeks.”
- At the beginning Moreno doesn’t prequalify, but McCarthy is comic. His Andrea Moda always breaks down after a few meters.
“Perry knew it. We weren’t strong enough to line up two cars.”
- McCarthy wrote a successful book about his adventure. Lively, amazing, irresistibly comical. Did you read it?
“No, but I know everything. And I can say that rumours told by Mr. McCarthy are exactly true. But I know something more than him. I sent to garage, missing other personal, some footwear factory workers and it happened everything. Even a lorry driver who finished all money because after two or three frontiers he made a mass with value changes...”
- Even the Andrea Moda boots that you gave as presents to McCarthy were uncomfortable?
(he laughs) “Perry is a nice fellow.”
- Even the mechanics who spent night in nightclubs and the prequalifying morning didn’t woke him at the hotel?
“Sorry, but they worked until midnight, so I didn’t treated him as they were friars. It’s true, I let them go party.”
- In Great Britain Perry even attempted to qualify with rain tires in a sunny day...
“It was what we had in that moment. At war, you use the weapons you have got, yeah, it’s true.”
- It’s certain that “Pupo” Moreno really qualified in Montecarlo. He did it and he drive for a few laps in the race.
“In my unconsciousness at the time I knew it could happened, because basically the car wasn’t bad. But we had not money for tests and development, so...”
- How did F1 people considered you?
“People like Dennis and Briatore gave themselves airs a lot, they considered me like an alien. A negative alien. Do you know who had consideration for me, instead? The greatest one, Ayrton Senna, a nice person and a friend of my driver Pupo Moreno.”
- You are picturesquely described by British Circus iconography as Flamboyant playboy.
“In my word, fashion, women are not a problem. But in F1 I seduced a few less. Because I have more things to think about.”
- Why your dark look?
“It’s from ever my working look.”
- It’s bad to remember, but you were the first to get on a prison van with alarm and a Belgian policemen driving it.
“In Spa we didn’t qualified so I decided to go home. They called me when I was 50 km far from the circuit. – There are some problems – they said. Okay, I come back and, having clear conscience and nothing to be afraid. Well, policemen come around me, handcuffed me, let me go on their van and went slowly throughout all the paddock. A show ready before, an art-constructed operation.”
- Fraud, the imputation.
“A supplier claimed that my presumed false invoices. But the false one was him, instead. Before, when it was useful to have us to make the right number, they let us enter. Then, at the opportune time, they forced us out.”
- Saying everything, to make it clear.
“Well, yeah, that I was in F1 to move illegal money. They said Sassetti brought drugs and some other delicious in the paddock. shite. Everything shite. Oppositely, we were not in the FOCA and all crates with my material always had customs problem and were always well controlled.”
- In Monza the Andrea Moda lorry was driven out and the team expelled for indignity.
“We had the right to stay in F1. In Belgium we were attached by magistrates and defeated by sport power, a few days later in Monza it happen the opposite thing. The moral is that they didn’t want us anymore. So okay, stop with GP.”
- How much did Sassetti spend in F1?
“Six billion lire (3 million euro circa), precisely. Mine. Later I was fiscally controlled so much, they was searching for I don’t know what. I had clear conscience and still have. The truth? In F1 there was a lot of money, but just for a few ones. They wanted little team to be dead. Certain things I claimed were discovered later.”
- What does Andrea Sassetti do at now?
“Apart from Andrea Moda I have five restaurants, some night locals and I’m in the construction business. So, I commit myself, I have a lot of commitments.”
- What happened to the both Andrea Moda F1 cars?
“One is in Milan, the other one in one of my sheds. Sometimes I drive it in Misano, to move a little.”
- Really? Aren’t you too... extralarge?
“I made the cockpit enlarged. Car development has been, now it didn’t break anymore. But years late.”
- Sassetti, would you did again what you did in F1?
“If I had my youth and unconsciousness back, my answer is yes.”

[AndreaModa]

Fascinating. Especially seeing how honest he is with the truth about McCarthy's situation at the team and how poorly organised it all was. I almost feel sorry for him because he clearly wanted to go racing, and the cars were inherently good, they just had no-where near enough time or money to do it properly.

Thanks for the translation!

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

Fascinating. Especially seeing how honest he is with the truth about McCarthy's situation at the team and how poorly organised it all was. I almost feel sorry for him because he clearly wanted to go racing, and the cars were inherently good, they just had no-where near enough time or money to do it properly.

Thanks for the translation!

You're welcome.
I found it fascinating too, it's a shame that no one (except F1 Rejects) seems to care about this team.
After reading this article I'm even more convinced than before that the backmarker teams of nowadays as HRT and Virgin are not so fascinating and charming as backmarker teams of the past. It would be great to have teams like Andrea Moda back in F1.

[Stramala]

All I would say is, don't be entirely surprised if you see a documentary on BBC Four about Andrea Moda in future...its one of two projects I'm very slowly putting together

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

don't be entirely surprised if you see a documentary on BBC Four about Andrea Moda in future...

this would be the best documentary ever!

[eurobrun]

don't be entirely surprised if you see a documentary on BBC Four about Andrea Moda in future...

this would be the best documentary ever!

I would fly to England just to watch it

[AdrianSutil]

Great read. He really is honest about all the problems the team had, and some of the comical moments like setting Perry's car on fire at Spain!

[Pointrox]

That's a good read - thank you very much for translation
I always considered Sassetti as a buffoon, but after reading this he at least seems to be sincere about what happened to Andrea Moda.

I wonder if someone caught Sassetti driving around Misano in S921 - I'd love to see this car running after all those years

[tommykl]

All I would say is, don't be entirely surprised if you see a documentary on BBC Four about Andrea Moda in future...its one of two projects I'm very slowly putting together

That makes me glad to be able to catch BBC4 here

[Stramala]

Eh, don't get your hopes up too high, it will be a long time in the future yet. But rest assured, someone is working to make it happen

[Pieman]

don't be entirely surprised if you see a documentary on BBC Four about Andrea Moda in future...

this would be the best documentary ever!

I would fly to England just to watch it

I don't own a TV set, but I would buy one just to watch that!

[midgrid]

Thank you for translating this article - it's fascinating to read the other side of the story after so many years. It reminds me of the extended interview with Ricardo Rosset that was published a few years ago.

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

Thank you for translating this article -

You're welcome. It has been a pleasure for me to translate it.

[East Londoner]

A very good read indeed. I miss the golden days of rejects. F1 is all the poorer without these teams. It's yet another reason why modern life is rubbish.

[eurobrun]

A very good read indeed. I miss the golden days of rejects. F1 is all the poorer without these teams. It's yet another reason why modern life is rubbish.

[Wizzie]

A very good read indeed. I miss the golden days of rejects. F1 is all the poorer without these teams. It's yet another reason why modern life is rubbish.

Where he hell did you find that?

[FMecha]

A very good read indeed. I miss the golden days of rejects. F1 is all the poorer without these teams. It's yet another reason why modern life is rubbish.

Where he hell did you find that?

See EL's sig.

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

I miss the golden days of rejects. F1 is all the poorer without these teams.

I agree with you. Teams as Marussia and HRT will never be as charming as 80's and 90's reject teams.

[Klon]

I agree with you. Teams as Marussia and HRT will never be as charming as 80's and 90's reject teams.

I can only partly agree with this statement. For me, HRT has that 80's and 90's reject style. Now Marussia are a different topic, alright.

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

I agree with you. Teams as Marussia and HRT will never be as charming as 80's and 90's reject teams.

I can only partly agree with this statement. For me, HRT has that 80's and 90's reject style. Now Marussia are a different topic, alright.

Well, I agree partly with yours: HRT reminds me a little of 80's and 90's rejects. This is probably the reason why it's my favourite present reject team.

[tzerof1]

Amidst all this speak of how 90's rejects were better than in the 2000's let us not forget SOOOOOPAH AGURI! where do they land on the scale?

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

Amidst all this speak of how 90's rejects were better than in the 2000's let us not forget SOOOOOPAH AGURI! where do they land on the scale?

You're right. It was a cool team too.

[eurobrun]

You would never fine the great 80's and 90's reject teams. They were cool!!!

Yes, like this team

[Wizzie]

You would never fine the great 80's and 90's reject teams. They were cool!!!

Yes, like this team

Well spotted, young Eurobrun. Uncle Melrose will send a cookie through the mail when he can be bothered

[eurobrun]

You would never fine the great 80's and 90's reject teams. They were cool!!!

Yes, like this team

Well spotted, young Eurobrun. Uncle Melrose will send a cookie through the mail when he can be bothered

The lack of spam recently has caused me to lose my job on the welcoming committee, so I noticed it quite quickly.

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

Spam makes me thinking about "the wonderful world of shoe spam" thread, which because of shoes is related to Andrea Moda.

[golic_2004]

don't be entirely surprised if you see a documentary on BBC Four about Andrea Moda in future...

this would be the best documentary ever!

I would fly to England just to watch it

same here

[golic_2004]

You would never fine the great 80's and 90's reject teams. They were cool!!!

Yes, like this team

Well spotted, young Eurobrun. Uncle Melrose will send a cookie through the mail when he can be bothered

Now who DROVE the Spam car? For 1 million points.

[tommykl]

Well spotted, young Eurobrun. Uncle Melrose will send a cookie through the mail when he can be bothered

Now who DROVE the Spam car? For 1 million points.

Mike Wallace (thank you Racing-Reference)

[Jeroen Krautmeir]

This has to be one of the most interesting things I have read in awhile. One of the reasons F1R is the best forum around is because you get great stuff like this. Thanks Sunshine Baby!

[Sunshine_Baby_[IT]]

This has to be one of the most interesting things I have read in awhile. One of the reasons F1R is the best forum around is because you get great stuff like this. Thanks Sunshine Baby!

You're welcome