Ed Hugus

Ed Hugus
a 1960 Ferrari 250 in 2016
Born	(1923-06-30)30 June 1923 Pennsylvania, United States
Died	29 June 2006(2006-06-29) (aged 82) Pebble Beach, California, United States
24 Hours of Le Mans career
Years	1956 – 1965
Teams	Cooper Privateer North American Racing Team Ferrari
Best finish	1st (1965)
Class wins	2 (1957, 1965)

Edward James Hugus (J. Edward Hugus^[1] on his FIA CSI racing licence, 30 June 1923 – 29 June 2006) was an American racing driver and car dealer.

Hugus was a veteran of World War II^[2] and as a paratrooper with the 11th Airborne Division on February 16 was dropped on Corregidor for the Battle of Corregidor (1945).

In 1949, he discovered sports cars, got a MG TC, then started an MG dealership in Pittsburgh, also adding Jaguar to the lineup. Hugus was the first Shelby Cobra dealer.^[3]

By 1956, he started in two of the biggest sports car racing endurance events, 12 Hours of Sebring in Florida, and 24 Hours of Le Mans in France, and he even competed successfully in South America, where Hugus won his class at the 1957 Venezuelan Grand Prix^[4] in a Porsche 550, the type in which James Dean had died. His career as race driver ended after the 1964 Le Mans resp. the 1969 Sebring races.

About 34 years after the 1965 24 Hours of Le Mans, at age 75 and older, with most eyewitnesses already dead, he started to claim that he, too, had been a driver of the winning Ferrari during a foggy night, never getting credit for it. The media ^{[5] [6] [7]} did like to believe that Ed did drive that car ... with most of the press and officials either drunk, asleep or both, and picked up the tall tale. It was debunked in 2020 by Doug Nye based on official records of pitstops.

24 Hours of Le Mans

Between 1956 24 Hours of Le Mans and 1962 24 Hours of Le Mans, Hugus finished 7th, 8th or 9th overall for a total of five times, and two DNF. He won his class, 1.5 Liter Sportscars, together with Carel Godin de Beaufort on his private entry Porsche 550A Lucybelle at the 1957 24 Hours of Le Mans.^[4] In 1963 his AC Cobra Coupé was among the entrants DSQed for premature oil changes, and in the 1964 24 Hours of Le Mans, his Ferrari 250 GTO DNF with transmission failure, and his Le Mans driving career ended. At the time, Ferrari and Ford were changing over their customer race cars from traditional front engine GT cars to the mid engine designs that won since 1963.

The 1965 24 Hours of Le Mans was won by the No. 21 Ferrari 250 LM entered by North American Racing Team (NART) of Luigi Chinetti, driven by Masten Gregory and Jochen Rindt, after chasing the eventual 2nd place No. 26 250LM in the night and Sunday morning hours until a tyre failure settled the outcome in favor of the NART team that scored the first ever Le Mans win for Goodyear.^[8]

About 1999, after Rindt (1942–1970), Gregory (1932−1985) and Chinetti (1901–1994) had died, Hugus started to claim that he, too, had driven the winning car, and the story circulated, with some sources stating that he raced at Le Mans for 10 consecutive years starting in 1956.^[9]

According to Doug Nye in the October 2020 issue of Motor Sport^[10], in a 24 May 2005 letter^[11] to race fan Hubert Baradat, Hugus claimed that he was a reserve driver for the team, and when Gregory, who wore glasses, went out at 4 PM at night and came in when he could not see well, with Rindt absent, Hugus was told by Chinetti to get his helmet on and Go, finishing the last hour of Gregory's part. Chinetti supposedly had tried to inform the pit officials, but maybe they were too busy with a bottle of wine behind the pits, and both were disappointed, as Hugus wrote.

With help from the Automobile Club de l'Ouest Heritage Committee and the official 1965 Journal de Course race records from the ACO archives, Nye found out that Rindt had taken over from Gregory in the car’s eighth pit stop, at 01:59 Sunday morning, June 20, in a very short night with dawn in Le Mans at 04:18 UTC+1 and sunrise at 04:59. After a stop at 03:38, Rindt is named specifically as the incoming driver for the 10th stop at 05:14, and Gregory as the driver who then rejoined at 05:16 for a triple stint, stopping at 06:44 and 07:32 before ending his drive with stop 13 at 08:21 when Gregory is named specifically in the Journal as being the incoming driver. Thus, it must have been in broad daylight, not in night and fog, when Gregory and Hugus supposedly swapped places behind the wheel of a Ferrari that challenged for the lead, not once but twice unnoticed by officials, press, competition and spectators, but with pit stop times recorded in the sheets.

The magazine article photos, taken by Bernard Cahier, Luigi Chinetti Junior and others, show that Hugus, along with Rindt and other team members also dressed in Goodyear-sponsored shirts, were celebrating on and around the winning car steered by Gregory to the podium, but Hugus was dressed like a spectator, with golf hat and sunglasses and sneakers, not like active race drivers or mechanics.

Nye did emerge from this investigation 99 per cent sure that Ed Hugus’ claim simply cannot stand. On the evidence, Masten Gregory and Jochen Rindt won Le Mans 1965, unrelieved by any other driver.

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1956	Cooper Car Company	John Bentley	Cooper T39	S1.1	252	8th	2nd
1957	E. Hugus (private entrant)	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche 550A	S1.5	286	8th	1st
1958	E. Hugus (private entrant)	Ray “Ernie” Erickson	Ferrari 250 TR	S3.0	278	7th	4th
1959	E. Hugus (private entrant)	Ray “Ernie” Erickson	Porsche 718 RSK	S1.5	240	DNF (Engine)
1960	North American Racing Team	Augie Pabst	Ferrari 250 GT SWB	GT3.0	299	7th	4th
1961	North American Racing Team	David Cunningham	O.S.C.A. Sport 1000	S1.0	125	DNF (Clutch)
1962	SEFAC Ferrari	George Reed	Ferrari 250 GT SWB Bertone	GT3.0	281	9th	3rd
1963	E. Hugus (private entrant)	Peter Jopp	AC Cobra Coupé	GT+3.0	117	DSQ (Premature oil change)
1964	North American Racing Team	José Rosinski	Ferrari 250 GTO	GT3.0	110	DNF (Propshaft)

Complete 12 Hours of Sebring results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1956	Cooper Car Company	John Bentley	Cooper T39	S1.1	117	DNF (Flat battery)
1957	C. Flynn	Chester Flynn	Mercedes-Benz 300 SL	GT3.5	138	33rd	3rd
1958	Harry Kullen	John Fitch	Ferrari 250 TR	S3.0	85	DNF (Engine)
1959	Chester J. Flynn	Ray “Ernie” Erickson	Porsche 718 RSK	S1.5	170	10th	4th
1960	North American Racing Team	Augie Pabst	Ferrari 250 GT SWB	S3.0	185	4th	2nd
1961	North American Racing Team	Alan Connell	Dino 246 S	S2.5		DNF (Transmission)
1962	Scuderia Bear	George Reed	Ferrari 250 GT SWB EXP	GT3.0	187	8th	3rd
1964	William McLaughlin	Enus Wilson William McLaughlin	Iso Grifo A3C	P+3.0	110	39th	7th
1965	Ed Hugus (Ferrari Owners Racing Association)	Tom O'Brien Charlie Hayes Paul Richards	Ferrari 275 P	GTP	182	12th	5th
1966	Ed Hugus	Lake Underwood	Porsche 906	P2.0	204	8th	4th
1967	Ed Hugus	John Cannon	Porsche 906	S2.0	138	DNF (Engine)
1969	Elsco Corporation	Chuck Dietrich Eugene Nearburg	BMW 2002	T2.0		DNF (Oil pump shaft)

References

1. https://stories.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/origin-204.jpg ^{[bare URL image file]}
2. Goodwin, Carl (July 21, 2011). They Started in MGs: Profiles of Sports Car Racers of the 1950s. McFarland. ISBN 9780786486243 – via Google Books.
3. Gilad, Yoav (May 19, 2014). "The Unconfirmed True Story of Ferrari's Last Le Mans Win". Archived from the original on April 10, 2021.
4. "Riverside to Le Mans and everywhere in between: Ed Hugus's busy year racing sports cars". hemmings.com. September 10, 2017. Archived from the original on March 4, 2021. Retrieved August 18, 2021.
5. Spurring, Quentin (2010). Le Mans: The Official History of the World's Greatest Motor Race, 1960-69. Haynes Publishing, Yeoville, Somerset, GB. pp. 178–9. ISBN 978-1-84425-584-9.
6. Pete Vack (July 12, 2006). "Ed Hugus, Obituary and Appreciation". www.velocetoday.com. Archived from the original on December 31, 2019. Retrieved February 16, 2015.
7. "News: Ed Hugus". www.jochen-rindt.at. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved February 16, 2015.
8. https://www.24h-lemans.com/en/news/todays-photo-story-goodyears-first-win-at-the-1965-24-hours-of-le-mans-44941
9. Evans, Art (July 17, 2006). "Obituary for Le Mans Winner Ed Hugus - Sports Car Market". sportscarmarket.com. Archived from the original on January 22, 2021. Retrieved August 18, 2021.
10. Nye, Doug (October 1, 2020). "Mystery of the third man in Rindt & Gregory's Le Mans 1965 win for Ferrari". motorsportmagazine.com. Archived from the original on April 27, 2025. Retrieved December 7, 2025.
11. https://web.archive.org/web/20160304120009/http://www.jochen-rindt.at/Main/In_Memoriam/Curt_Lincoln/Pete_Kerr/Pete_english/body_ed_hugus.html

External links

• Ed Hugus at racingsportscars.com.

Further reading

• Walker, Robert D. (2017). Cobra Pilote: The Ed Hugus Story. Illinois, US: Dalton Watson Fine Books. ISBN 978-1854432834.