www.porscheroadandrace.com Never a dull moment – the career of Toine Hezemans Published: 24th May 2019 By: Kieron Fennelly Online version: https://www.porscheroadandrace.com/never-a-dull-moment-the-career-of-toine-hezemans/ Toine Hezemans in his Brussels home, 2015 One of the Netherlands’ most successful racers, Toine Hezemans is part of a motorsport dynasty that began with his father who raced Porsches in the 1950s. This family tradition continued with Toine who began racing 911s in the late ‘60s, but after his own career www.porscheroadandrace.com ended, his first son Mike, then picked up the baton and raced 964s in the early years of the Porsche Cup. Speaking with the effervescent Dutchman, one quickly gains the impression that there was never a dull moment in the career of Toine Hezemans. Hezemans was born in Eindhoven 1943, Porsche Road & Race’s Kieron Fennelly met him recently at his home in the Brussels suburb of Uccle. As well as racing a 911, Toine Hezemans also drove a Porsche 906 in the late sixties and spent three seasons driving works Alfa Romeos before competing briefly for Ford and BMW. From ‘75 to ‘79 he was one of Europe’s top three 911 racing exponents, driving privately entered RSRs, 934s and 935s to numerous podiums. When asked what got him interested in motor racing in the first place, Hezemans replied, “My father raced a Porsche 550 at Le Mans in 1956 with Carel Godin de Beaufort, and I was there with the stopwatch!” Hezemans senior was interested in cars and after the war he had a very successful business buying and selling war surplus vehicles. Eventually he made enough money to buy Porsches and he raced an 1100 cc 356, and this was followed by a 1300 cc version. Hezemans then went 50/50 with Carel de Beaufort and they bought a pre- Spyder open Barchetta built by Richard Trenkel, and entered this in the Le Mans 24 Hours. Hezemans again, “De Beaufort was from an aristocratic background and quite a character. His family wouldn’t pay for him to buy his share of the car, so my father told me that Carel quietly removed one of the paintings from the family chateau and sold it to raise the money. I remember too on another occasion he brought his single seater and drove it round our kart track!” Go-karts served as the introduction for a young Toine Hezemans into the world of motor racing and in 1966, he won the Dutch kart championships. This served as a springboard, and in 1967 and 1968 he raced various Fiat Abarths. An introduction to Porsche Hezemans had been driving a 911 belonging to his father for some time, and during his years with Abarth he lived in Milan for three years. What better way to commute between www.porscheroadandrace.com home and Milan, than in a Porsche 911. In 1968, Hezemans also raced a 906 belonging to Ben Pon (son of the Netherlands VW importer and a racer himself) and proved to be quite successful, with two wins and a second from seven starts. Int. ADAC 1000 km, Nürburgring, 1 June 1975: Toine Hezemans, Gijs van Lennep and Claude Ballot-Léna finished 11th overall in the #52 Porsche 911 Carrera RSR. This photo shows John Fitzpatrick at the wheel, as he explains, “With the RSRs we tended to drive both cars in qualifying, if not all three. Then before the race, he [Georg Loos] would decide who drove which car. If I am down as driving #51 in the race, then this photo must have been taken in qualifying or practice” He continues, “In 1968 I also bought a 1965 911 from Pon. I lightened it by 80 kg and put Carrera 6 brakes and crankcase and Minilite wheels on it. I fitted Plexiglass windows and www.porscheroadandrace.com installed another oil cooler at the front. It was a very fast car, and I beat Gijs van Lennep in a factory-prepared 911 quite a few times! Later he and I shared my 911 in the Brands Hatch 6 hours and the Nürburgring 6 hours (which they won) and van Lennep said now he understood why I had been able to beat him with it! The best part though was beating those works 911s! “I also bought a 906 from Pon, which cost me 40,000 guilders and it never broke. Porsche made the best racing cars in the world! The stupid thing is I kept it for a few years then sold it for the equivalent of $10,000 and look at what 906s go for now! I really don’t know what is happening to Porsche prices these days.” In the ’69 season, he was still driving the 911 and the 906, with occasional outings for Abarth, but Ben Pon entered a 908/2 for Hezemans/van Lennep to drive at Le Mans. They failed to finish that race, but in their second race in the 908, the Paris 1000 km at Montlhéry, they set the fastest lap and finished fourth. www.porscheroadandrace.com Le Mans 24 Hours, 14-15 June 1975: John Fitzpatrick, Toine Hezemans, Gijs van Lennep, Manfred Schurti and Georg Loos were all listed as drivers of the #58 Porsche 911 Carrera RSR 3.0 – they finished in a fine fifth place overall and first in the GT class As the decade of the ’70s broke, Hezemans found himself driving for Alfa Romeo. “The Italians already knew me through Abarth, and at Montlhéry we beat all the Alfas, so Autodelta offered me a contract. It was a chance to be a professional race driver so I took it,” he offered. The Dutchman stayed with the Italian team for three seasons, driving the GTV in lesser events and with more success than the Tipo 33 sports racer. “For the sports car championship, in 1970 I was paired most often with Masten Gregory who’d come over to Europe and we became friends. He’d blown all his money and had various personal difficulties. He was an aspirin addict and totally crazy and I like to think we helped him out www.porscheroadandrace.com for a while. He had been an exceptional driver and I remember seeing him at the Grand Prix of Cuba in 1960 where my father was racing his Spyder. Driving Maseratis, Gregory was even faster than Moss. Masten and I were third at Sebring in the T33, that was our best result,” he added. Nürburgring 1000 km, 30 May 1976: On the grid before the race are Toine Hezemans (left) and in the centre is Georg Loos in the red jacket In ‘71, he drove most races with Nino Vaccarella and they won the Targa Florio that year. The following year, his best results were third places at Sebring, the Targa Florio and the Nürburgring. In 1973, he raced for BMW Motorsport and had four wins with the 3.0 CSL and then he moved to Ford and shared a works Capri with a variety of drivers including Niki Lauda. “Lauda and I were second in the ’Ring 6 hours, but the Ford was neither reliable nor www.porscheroadandrace.com nice to drive, certainly the worst race car I have driven,” Hezemans admitted. It was during the ’74 season that Hezemans got his hands on a 911 RSR. “I raced a couple of times for the Gelo Racing team in ’74 and then full time in 1975. The RSR was a brilliant car, it always finished. I was fifth at Le Mans and had two wins and two seconds in the rest of that season. Looking back, the RSR was my favourite race car, even better than the BMW 3.0 CSL,” Hezemans admitted. Nürburgring 1000 km, 30 May 1976: Toine Hezemans and Tim Schenken finished second overall in the #6 Porsche Gelo Racing Porsche 934/5 That was followed by Hezemans’ best year, “In 1976, I won the GT championship in the Georg Loos 934 with seven wins and four seconds from about 20 starts. Ferry Porsche presented me with the inscribed picture you see on my desk at the end of that season. The www.porscheroadandrace.com 934 was Porsche’s first racing turbo 911, a brutal car, with almost 500 bhp after the 300 bhp of the naturally aspirated RSR. You never knew when the boost was going to come in, which made it quite difficult to drive. The 935, which we got in 1977, had more power still but it was altogether a more balanced car.” Georg Loos was a Cologne property developer, and had been a reasonable racing driver, notching up his first win at Zolder in a Porsche 910. In 1974, Loos stopped driving and set up his own team, Gelo Racing (‘Gelo’ is made up from the first two letters of his name GE- LO), which was very successful for several years. “Loos was very determined, an impossible guy. He’d been to Weissach and seen Porsche testing a twin turbo version of the 935 for the 1978 season. When he tried to order one for Daytona, they wouldn’t let him have one, but he threatened lawyers and all sorts of legal consequences, because after all, his 935s had just won the Deutsche Rennmeister championship. So, Porsche conceded in the end, it was typical Loos,” Hezemans revealed. www.porscheroadandrace.com Le Mans 24 Hours, 11-12 June 1977: Tim Schenken, Toine Hezemans and Hans Heyer did not have a happy race in the #38 www.porscheroadandrace.com Porsche Gelo Racing Porsche 935.