Monday 7th June 1948

Chico Landi (81), the first Brazilian driver to win a Grand Prix race, taking a Ferrari to victory at the Bari Grand Prix in 1948, died.

Landi came from a modest middle class family, and got into racing through owning a garage. Along with wealthy diplomat’s son Manuel de Teffé he popularized motor racing in Brazil in the late mid-thirties. Landi had left school at eleven to work as a mechanic, and later began illegal street racing at nights, where he had frequent run-ins with the police. In 1934 he made his racing debut, at the second Rio Grand Prix in 1934. He led until eight laps from the finish, when his engine gave out. He was the most popular Brazilian driver of his time, as many considered Teffé a wealthy expat rather than an actual Brazilian, as he had started his racing career while living in Italy. Irineu Corrêa, who ended up winning the 1934 Rio Grand Prix, died in a crash on the first lap of next year, leaving Landi as the undisputed master of pre-war racing in Brazil. Landi went abroad in 1938, finishing eighth at Bern in what is generally considered the first Brazilian Grand Prix entry (Teffé had raced abroad earlier but is generally thought of as an Italian with Brazilian parents). Landi’s first Brazilian Grand Prix victory came at the 1941 Rio de Janeiro Grand Prix.

Landi was the first Brazilian driver to win a Grand Prix race, taking a Ferrari to victory at the Bari Grand Prix in 1948, run that year to Formula Two regulations. He also finished second in the 1952 (non-championship) Albi Grand Prix in a Ferrari 375.

Landi also won the 1960 Mil Milhas Brasil in a Alfa Romeo JK 2000, together with Christian “Bino” Heins. This was the first time that a Brazilian-made car won this prestigious race, rather than an American-based “Carretera” special.