Racing driver, professional footballer and rally driver. Klaus Fritzinger's story is unique, just like the Saab in which he competes in the Planai-Classic.
Touring car and rally professional Klaus Fritzinger ...
It is a well-known fact that there are only a few rally drivers who have also been able to celebrate great success on the circuit, and vice versa. Klaus Fritzinger is one of them and before his career as a racing driver, he played for 1. FC Kaiserslautern in the top German soccer league. Fritzinger was born in Kaiserslautern in 1937 and drove his first touring car race in a Ford GT40 in 1966. In 1971, he switched to a Ford Capri RS2600 and competed in the first season of the legendary German Racing Championship.
Regular podium finishes in the fiercely contested Group 1 and the runner-up title underlined Fritzinger's unique talent. In 1974, he entered rallying, where he also achieved notable successes. He won the Tour d'Europe rally three times and competed in ten WRC events, eleven of them at the Monte Carlo Rally.
This is Klaus Fritzinger's first time in the Dachstein region to compete in the Planai-Classic. " I watched the Planai-Classic a few years ago, when there was still real snow, but unfortunately it's already spring this year. I used to drive a lot of rallies, but now we've unfortunately gotten older and only compete in historic events, we're historic now too."
... at the age of 77 at the Planai-Classic
When asked why he still gets behind the wheel of a rally car despite his advanced age, he said: "Because you're part of it. If you've learned nothing else in life but to drive cars, you're part of the family and you stick with it. I'm 77 years old now and still as crazy as ever."
The Saab 96 V4 rally car
The Saab 96 V4 in which Klaus Fritzinger competes in the Planai-Classic also has an eventful past behind it. None other than Per Eklund sat behind the wheel of this car. The Saab 96 V4 made rally history because, despite the four-cylinder Ford engine from the Granada model, it was much better motorized than the three-cylinder two-stroke engine, but it was still inferior to the competition.
It took a spirited foot on the gas to make the humpbacked Saab a serious contender for victory in rallies, and men like Erik Carlsson managed to do just that. Thanks to the "left-hand braking" technique, which he used for the first time in this car, he was able to squeeze the maximum out of the little Swede and even achieve WRC successes, thus writing a piece of rally history.
.... and Dieter Quester
Incidentally, Dieter Quester, who actually wanted to spend a relaxing weekend in Vienna with friends from the USA, will also be back in 2014. The old racing fox could not turn down the offer to drive the Planai Classic in a Volvo P 1800 S.
"If Ulli Glöckner is my co-driver, then I'll come," said Quester. And Ulli Glöckner, an experienced Ennstal-Classic navigator who drove with Klaus Wildbolz for years, had time.
Dieter Quester is a case for the "Guinness Book of World Records." Born in 1939, the Viennese was already European motorboat champion at the age of 20. He was European Touring Car Champion in a BMW in 1968, 1969, 1977 and 1983. No one drove more 24-hour races. He won at Le Mans, the Nürburgring, Aspern, Macao, Monza, Spa and Riverside.
No one drove more racing series than him: Formula 2, IMSA, ALMS, US Sportscar Championship, FIA-GT, Procar and DTM. He beat Clay Regazzoni after a collision in the Formula 2 race at Hockenheim (1970) and finished third behind Reutemann-Peterson in the F2 European Championship in 1972.
And he is still racing today: Classic car racing...
All news about this year's Planai-Classic can be found on the organizer's website.
