Editing March Engineering (section)

==1970s==
[[File:March 701 Formula 1 1.jpg|thumb|March 701]]
March Engineering began operations in 1969. Its four founders were [[Max Mosley]], [[Alan Rees (racing driver)|Alan Rees]], [[Graham Coaker]] and [[Robin Herd]]. The company name is an acronym of their initials. They each had a specific area of expertise: Mosley looked after the commercial side, Rees managed the racing team, Coaker oversaw production at the factory in [[Bicester]], [[Oxfordshire]], and Herd was the designer.

The history of March is dominated by the conflict between the need for constant development and testing to remain at the peak of competitiveness in F1 and the need to build simple, reliable cars for customers in order to make a profit. Herd's original F1 plan was to build a single-car team around [[Jochen Rindt]], but Rindt became dismayed at the size of the March programme and elected to continue at [[Team Lotus]].
[[File:1971 Andrea de Adamich, March, Fuchsröhre.jpg|thumb|left|[[Andrea de Adamich]] driving a March-[[Alfa Romeo in Formula One|Alfa Romeo]] 711 at the [[1971 German Grand Prix]]]]
[[File:Andrea de Adamich, March 711 Alfa Romeo (1971).jpg|thumb|left|De Adamich going to practice in a March 711]]
March's launch was unprecedented in its breadth and impact. After building a single [[Formula Three]] car in 1969, March announced that they would be introducing customer cars for F1, F2, F3, [[Formula Ford]] and [[Can-Am]] in 1970, as well as running works F1, F2 and F3 teams.

The Formula One effort initially looked promising, with March supplying its [[March 701|701]] chassis to [[Tyrrell Racing|Tyrrell]] for [[Jackie Stewart]]. These cars were merely a stopgap for Tyrrell, who no longer had the use of [[Equipe Matra Sports|Matra]] chassis and were in the process of constructing their own car; March was the only option available given clashing fuel contracts. In addition, the factory ran two team cars for [[Jo Siffert]] ([[Porsche]] were paying for his drive) and [[Chris Amon]] sponsored by [[STP (motor oil company)|STP]]. A third STP car, entered by [[Andy Granatelli]] for [[Mario Andretti]], appeared on several occasions. [[Ronnie Peterson]] appeared in a semi-works car for Colin Crabbe when his works [[Formula Two]] commitments allowed; various other 701s went to privateers. The team constructed ten Formula One chassis that year, in addition to [[Formula Two]], Formula Three, Formula Ford and Can-Am chassis. Stewart gave the March its first Formula One victory, at the [[1970 Spanish Grand Prix]], and both Amon and Stewart took a non-championship race victory, but the works team did not win a Grand Prix. The 701 had distinctive aerofoil-profile fuel tanks at the sides of the car designed by Peter Wright of Specialised Mouldings; Wright had been involved with BRM's abortive ground-effect programme in the late sixties and later worked on the groundbreaking [[Lotus 78]]. The 701's tanks  lacked endplates and skirts to help generate any meaningful ground effect. Herd (in Mike Lawrence's history of the team ''Four Guys and a Telephone'') described the 701 as essentially a good 1969 car and not what he would have done had he been able to run a small team for a star like Rindt - the 701 was designed and built very quickly and he claims he would have built something more like the 711.

For the [[1971 Formula One season]] March Engineering came up with the remarkable 711 chassis, which had aerodynamics by [[Frank Costin]] and an ovoid front wing described as the [[Supermarine Spitfire|Spitfire]] (for its shape) or "tea-tray" (for its elevation from the car) wing. The car took no wins, but Peterson finished second on four occasions, ending as runner-up in the World Championship. [[Alfa Romeo (Formula One)|Alfa Romeo]] V8 powered cars were occasionally entered, to little avail (following on from an equally unsuccessful Alfa program with [[Team McLaren|McLaren]]).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ultimatecarpage.com/car/290/March-711-Cosworth.html|title=March 711 Cosworth|access-date=14 June 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://sportscardigest.com/march-ford-711/|title=March-Ford 711|date=5 December 2010 |access-date=14 June 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.oldracingcars.com/march/711|title=March 711|date=9 December 2020 |access-date=14 June 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.statsf1.com/en/march-711.aspx|title=March 711|access-date=14 June 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.raceart.eu/en/our-collection/march-711-2-f1#:~:text=Driven%20by%20Ronnie%20Peterson%2C%20the,F1%20cars%20of%20its%20era.|title=March 711-2 F1|access-date=14 June 2022}}</ref>

The [[1972 Formula One season]] completely failed to capitalise on the promise March showed in 1970-71. Three distinct models of the car were used, beginning with the 721, which was a development of the 711.  Peterson and [[Niki Lauda]] then drove the disappointing experimental 721X factory cars (using an Alfa Romeo transverse gearbox and intended to have a low [[Polar moment of inertia|polar-moment]], anticipating in some ways the much more successful [[Tyrrell Racing|Tyrrell]] 005/006 series). [[Frank Williams (Formula One)|Frank Williams]] ran regular 711 and 721 customer cars for [[Henri Pescarolo]] and [[José Carlos Pace|Carlos Pace]]. The 721X was deemed to be a disaster and abandoned, but the team saw a way out; customer [[Mike Beuttler]] and his backers ordered an F1 car, and the team produced the 721G in nine days (the ''G'' stood for ''[[Guinness World Records|Guinness Book Of Records]]'' as the car was built so quickly) by fitting a [[Cosworth]] DFV and larger fuel tanks to the 722 F2 chassis (not as desperate an experiment as it may have sounded -- [[John Cannon (auto racer)|John Cannon]] commissioned a [[Formula 5000]] car which was built to a very similar scheme). The 721G was light and quick, and the works team soon built their own chassis. The 721G set the trend for future March F1 cars, which for the rest of the 1970s were essentially scaled-up F2 chassis. Meanwhile, March was going from strength to strength in Formula Two and Formula Three.

Also, the German team [[Eifelland]] entered under its own name a 721 much-modified with distinctive and eccentric bodywork by designer [[Luigi Colani]] for its driver [[Rolf Stommelen]]. This car was extremely unsuccessful, and later reverted mostly to conventional 721 form and was used by [[John Watson (racing driver)|John Watson]] to make his F1 debut for John Goldie's [[Goldie Hexagon Racing]] team.

March's only notable result was Peterson's third place in Germany.

[[1973 Formula One season|1973]] was the low point for March in Formula One. The four extant 721Gs were re-bodied and fitted with nose-mounted radiators and the crash-absorbing deformable structures that became mandatory that season; although no new chassis were built, they were re-designated 731s. Without significant STP money, the March factory team was struggling, running an almost unsponsored car for [[Jean-Pierre Jarier]] (who mainly concentrated on F2, winning the championship in a works March-BMW), while [[Hesketh Racing|Hesketh]] bought a car for [[James Hunt]] to race. Jarier was replaced by [[Tom Wheatcroft]]'s driver [[Roger Williamson]], who suffered a fatal accident in [[Circuit Park Zandvoort|Zandvoort]] (at which race March privateer [[David Purley]] attempted to rescue Williamson from his burning car). The Hesketh team, after an initial non-championship outing using a [[Surtees Racing Organisation|Surtees]], bought a March which was heavily re-developed by [[Harvey Postlethwaite]] and became a regular points-scorer, again hinting that there was little wrong with the basic concept of the 721G/731. 1973 marked the first year that F2 became more important to March than F1, with the new two-litre rules heralding the beginning of a long relationship with [[Paul Rosche]] at BMW. March undertook to buy a quantity of BMW engines each year in exchange for works units for their own team; the BMW unit was standard-issue for the 732 F2 car and to use up the rest of the units March also manufactured a two-litre prototype until 1975. Some of these had an unusually long life and were still competing (albeit much-modified) in Japan in the early 1980s.

In 1974, the factory team ran [[Howden Ganley]] until he left, having signed with Maki as their number-one driver. Then March ran [[Hans-Joachim Stuck]] in a [[Jägermeister]]-sponsored car and [[Vittorio Brambilla]] in a [[Beta Utensili|Beta Tools]]-sponsored car. Both drivers were exuberant and occasionally quick, but proved expensive in terms of accident damage. BMW was starting to exert pressure on March to quit F1 and concentrate on F2. [[Patrick Depailler]] took the F2 championship in an Elf-sponsored March-BMW, the marque's last title for several years as the Elf sponsorship programme and (in 1976) the arrival of Renault engines turned the formula into a French benefit. Some discontent arose in the March customer ranks in F2 since the works appeared after the first couple of F2 races with cars that differed significantly from the customer vehicles.
[[File:Lella Lombardi 1975 RoC.jpg|thumb|[[Lella Lombardi]] at the [[1975 Race of Champions]] in a March 751]]
In the following year Brambilla and [[Lella Lombardi]] made March Engineering history. At the [[1975 Spanish Grand Prix]] Lombardi became the first woman to score a championship point in Formula One while Brambilla scored a surprise victory at the [[1975 Austrian Grand Prix]], giving the team its maiden win. (As both races were rain-shortened, all participants received only half of the points). During the same weekend of the Austrian Grand Prix, [[Mark Donohue]] died after a practice accident in a [[Penske Racing|Penske]]-owned March. Penske had abandoned their own car and bought a March to allow them to continue competing. Through the mid-1970s, March provided privateers with simple, fast, and economical cars; at one point [[Frank Williams (Formula One)|Frank Williams]] bought an allegedly brand new 761B only to discover that it still had orange paint on it from its time as a 751 with Brambilla driving.{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}

[[File:StuckHansJ1976-07-31.jpg|thumb|left|[[Hans-Joachim Stuck]] driving a March 761 at the [[Nürburgring]] in 1976]]
In [[1976 Formula One season|1976]], Peterson, unhappy with the uncompetitive Lotus, left the team early and returned to March for whom he scored the team's second and last win at [[Autodromo Nazionale Monza|Monza]]. The 761 was fast but fragile, with the F2 components starting to show the strain; by this point the F1 effort was being run on a small budget with a two-car works effort featuring Peterson and Brambilla, the cars tending to turn up in different liveries as race-by-race sponsorship deals were signed, and a B-team entered under the [[March Engines]] banner for Stuck and [[Arturo Merzario]]. By now the F1 effort as a whole was under fairly severe pressure from BMW, which wanted Herd to concentrate entirely on the works' Formula Two effort, which was starting to be outpaced by French constructors (Martini and Elf) and the new [[Ralt]] marque.

That year Peterson scored only one other point in 1976 before being brokered back into a deal with Tyrrell for 1977. Although he felt most at home at March, it was clear that the team did not have the resources to do Formula One properly.

In the off-season of 1976-77, March engineer Wayne Eckersley constructed a rear end for the 761 chassis that had four driven wheels (designated the [[March 2-4-0]]) to Robin Herd's design. Unlike the six-wheeled [[Tyrrell P34]], the 2-4-0 had four 16-inch driven wheels at the rear (the same size as the front wheels). The theory behind the design was that this arrangement would offer improved traction and reduced aerodynamic drag (compared to the Tyrrell, which used ultra-small front wheels and normally sized rears). The chassis was tested at Silverstone circuit in early 1977 by both Howden Ganley and Ian Scheckter but the project was curtailed in favour of further development of the conventional chassis. The car made March more profit than many of its successful racing cars as it was licensed by [[Scalextric]] and became one of their most popular models. The 2-4-0 rear end was later used in hillclimbing by various drivers including [[Roy Lane]].

A token F1 effort with [[Rothmans International|Rothmans]] sponsorship was run in 1977 for [[Alex Ribeiro]] and [[Ian Scheckter]], but nothing worthwhile was achieved.  Yet, as the works were fading from F1 the 761, by virtue of being cheap, simple and readily available, became the tool of choice for privateers, notably [[Frank Williams (Formula One)|Frank Williams]] who after his acrimonious split with [[Walter Wolf]] needed a car to get back into racing before his own vehicle was ready.
[[File:1978 March-Triumph F3 car heritage motor museum gaydon.jpg|thumb|right|1978 March-Triumph F3 car, as raced by [[Nigel Mansell]], on display at the [[British Motor Museum]], Gaydon]]

[[Merzario]] later built his own unsuccessful F1 car based on his old 761, which he and Simon Hadfield attempted to develop into a [[ground effect in cars|ground effect]] car. This programme was completely unsuccessful.

At the end of the [[1977 Formula One season|1977 season]], the F1 team's assets and FOCA membership were sold to [[ATS (wheels)|ATS]] (who had bought the Penske cars); Herd was retained by them as a consultant and was hence in the curious position of developing a development of his own 1975 car - and the 1978 ATS had some features reminiscent of contemporary March thinking. Mosley left the company to concentrate on [[Formula One Constructors Association|FOCA]] matters. The F2 car had reached the end of a train of development that had started with the 732 and was becoming seriously uncompetitive; the works team abandoned the evolutionary 772 in favour of a smaller, neater car built around an old [[Formula Atlantic]] monocoque, the 772P. This was more than a match for the Martini opposition and formed the basis of the next year's dominant 782.

From 1978, March concentrated on Formula Two, running the works BMW team. A 781 chassis was occasionally campaigned in the minor [[Aurora F1]] series. March also assisted in the production of the [[Group 4 (racing)|Group 4]] and [[Group 5 (racing)|Group 5]], racing versions of the [[BMW M1]] sports car, which as well as running in mainstream endurance races also ran in the one-make Procar series as supporting events in many F1 races. The F2 cars of this era, particularly the 782, were often superb, and March regained its dominance of the formula - [[Bruno Giacomelli]] took the F2 title.

Ground effects came to F2 in 1979 but were widely misunderstood; for a while it looked like [[Rad Dougall]] in the [[Toleman]] team's conventional 782 would beat not only [[Brian Henton]] in Toleman's own car but also March's new 792 to the title. In the end, however, [[Marc Surer]] prevailed for the works.