The touring car professional Ruedi Eggenberger (obituary)
02/14/2018
Another big name has left the Swiss motorsport scene forever. Ruedi Eggenberger lost his battle against a serious illness on February 9, just two days after his 79th birthday. He was a true fighter and brought countless motorsport titles to Lyss, Switzerland, with his fighting spirit.
In the 1980s, Ruedi Eggenberger's team won the then still very important European Touring Car Championship several times, initially with BMW cars and drivers Helmut Kellners and Umberto Grano at the wheel.
After the successes with BMW, the fourth European Championship title was won in 1985 with the so-called "refrigerator" Volvo 240 Turbo (Brancatelli/Lindström), before the really big successes came with the Ford Sierra RS 500.
Klaus Niedzwiedz, Klaus Ludwig and Steve Soper won pretty much everything there was to win in the world with a touring car in the Eggenberger-Sierra in 1987. Victories in Japan and New Zealand, plus the important 24-hour race at the Nürburgring in Europe (Ludwig/ Soper/Niedzwiedz) and the race at the notorious Bathurst in Australia. In 1988, the previously missing overall victory at the 24 Hours of Spa with Schneider/Biela/Percy was also added to the palmares.
In 1988, Steve Soper won the World Touring Car Championship for the small but always feared Swiss team. Ruedi Eggenberger then switched to the DTM. Niedzwiedz was supposed to win the title, but was beaten by the BMW of Italian Roberto Ravaglia despite four race wins.
From the end of the nineties, he was no longer frequently present at the racetracks in person, but instead concentrated on supporting customer projects. The great demand led him to found Eggenberger Motorenbau AG, or "Egmo" for short, which he handed over to the German Lothar Rothenheber at the end of 2008 and then retired.
Team Zwischengas sends its condolences to Eggenberger's wife Gisele, their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
