MARKUS HOTZ, THE DRIVER WITH 100 LIVES

Multiple Swiss champion, including his first title in 1975, Markus Hotz distinguished himself both as a driver and as a constructor of around fifty Horag Formula V, Formula Super-V, F2, and Can-Am cars. Portrait of a true legend of Swiss motorsport.

The famous actress Claudia Cardinale, who recently passed away, said that “normally, we only have one life; however, I have had the privilege of having 100.” Markus Hotz could very well echo these words. Born on July 21, 1941, he not only competed in hundreds of races across Europe, but was also a race car builder, team manager, race official, and even a commentator at the Rangiers hill climb! And that’s not all, as Markus Hotz was also a pioneer in several fields. Starting with turbo engines in 1976 with his VW Golf GTI Horag Turbo, Horag standing for Hotz Racing AG, his company which, among other things, imports competition tires and maintains race cars.

Markus Hotz and future F1 world champion Jody Scheckter driving an HAS at Silverstone. Clay Regazzoni and Markus Hotz.

« NORMALLY, WE ONLY HAVE ONE LIFE; HOWEVER, I HAVE HAD THE PRIVILEGE OF HAVING 100.
Based in Sulgen, in the canton of Thurgau, Horag also markets renewable fuel under the Sustain Fuels brand, which enables current and historic racing cars to reduce their carbon footprint, an area in which Markus Hotz has been a pioneer since 2020 with the help of Mario Illien and Lorenz Heer. He was also a pioneer in building his own race cars, starting with a Formula Vee, a single-seater powered by an inexpensive Volkswagen engine and therefore capable of nurturing young talent. This was based on the same principle as Formula Ford in Great Britain and Formula Renault in France.

LA FIERTÉ DE MARKUS HOTZ

In 1966, Markus Hotz built his first Formula Vee, which he named HAS 1 (HAS stands for Hotz Automobile Sulgen), and drove it in the Rangiers hill climb race that same year. It was a success, as he went on to build five more single-seaters. And when Formula Super-Vee, a more powerful version of Formula Vee, arrived in 1971, Markus Hotz produced 33 of them between 1971 and 1974. “At the time, I built more cars than Peter Sauber,” Markus Hotz proudly points out as he shows us around his company. One of his Horag Formula Super-Vee cars was even driven by future F1 world champion Jody Scheckter! Formula Super-Vee quickly became a global success, and several winners of its championships in Germany, Brazil, and the United States went on to have careers in Formula 1, such as Keke Rosberg, Nelson Piquet, and Michael Andretti, who were crowned champions in the three countries mentioned above in 1975, 1976, and 1982.

After Formula Vee, where Markus Hotz met Niki Lauda, it was in Formula Super-Vee that he made a name for himself. In 1973, he was at the helm of his own team, which entered four Horag single-seaters, including for Pierre Dieudonné and Paul Blancpain. The results were very encouraging, and in 1975 and 1976, Fredy Lienhard and Markus Hotz moved up to the next level by participating in several races in the European F2 championship, the last category before F1.

“AT THE TIME, I BUILT MORE CARS THAN PETER SAUBER.”

6th IN ENNA IN F2

In 1976, on the Enna circuit, which hosted the ninth round of the European F2 championship, Markus Hotz finished sixth. The race was won by René Arnoux, ahead of Alex Ribeiro, Eddie Cheever, Jean-Pierre Jabouille, and Hans Binder. All five would go on to race in F1 a few years later. And in 7th place, just behind Markus Hotz, was Harald Ertl, who was already racing in F1.

If all the drivers who raced with him in F2 made it to F1, one might wonder why Markus Hotz didn’t. There are several reasons for this. As a family man and head of a company that was larger than Peter Sauber’s at the time, Markus Hotz certainly preferred a certain degree of professional security and becoming the number one F2 driver in hill climb racing in Switzerland and Germany, rather than qualifying at the back of the grid in F1 like his friend Harald Ertl. However, Ertl, who had raced in Formula Super Vee with a Horag, let Markus Hotz drive his Hesketh F1 car during private tests at the Hockenheim circuit.

Markus Hotz was also able to experience the thrill of driving an F1 car, and not just once, but twice. After trying out Harald Ertl’s Hesketh, he even drove the Ferrari 312 T4 in which Jody Scheckter became F1 world champion in 1979. This took place during a retrospective of the Erlen Grand Prix in the 1990s. It should be noted that it was in Erlen, a town in the canton of Thurgau that hosted the Eastern Swiss Grand Prix from 1948 to 1951, that the young Markus Hotz caught the motorsport bug. It was there that, as a spectator, he saw F1 greats such as Stirling Moss, Toulo de Graffenried, and Luigi Villoresi race.

THREE TIMES VICTORIOUS AT THE RANGIERS

More than his two experiences in F1, Markus Hotz is particularly proud of his three overall victories in F2 hill climbs, at Schauinsland, Germany, in 1976, 1980, and 1982, as well as at Les Rangiers, also three times, in 1975, 1977, and 1978. In the latter race, Markus Hotz set a new course record of 1’54”77, at an average speed of over 157 km/h (!), beating the three Frenchmen Michel Pignard, Marc Sourd and Jacques Laffite. “Jacques Laffite, one of the main stars of Les Rangiers in his capacity as an F1 driver for Ligier, paid me a great compliment by pointing out that I had managed to beat Pignard and Sourd, the two best drivers in the French hill climb championship, with an F2 in circuit configuration and not with an F2 specially prepared for hill climbs, as was the case for Pignard and Sourd,” Markus Hotz told us.

From left to right: Markus Hotz, Herbert Müller, Toulo de Graffenried, and Clay Regazzoni were all winners of the BP Racing Trophy, the highest honor in Swiss motorsports.

From left to right: Johnny Cecotto, Marc Surer, Markus Hotz, Hans Stuck (behind Hotz), Niki Lauda, Harald Grohs, and Jan Lammers before the BMW M1 Legends race held as the opening event of the 2016 Austrian F1 Grand Prix. Photo: Red Bull Content Pool

 

“IT GAVE ME THE CHANCE TO SEE NIKI LAUDA AGAIN, WHOSE SIMPLICITY I HAVE ALWAYS ADMIRED. HE COULD HAVE BEEN THE STAR OF THE SHOW AND LOOKED DOWN ON ME, BUT THE OPPOSITE WAS TRUE. HE WAS VERY WARM TOWARDS ME AND, DURING THE GROUP PHOTO, HE SAID TO ME: ‘YOU’RE SMALL, SO STAND IN FRONT.’”
And although Markus Hotz did not end up racing in F1, he did have the opportunity to participate in the BMW M1 Procar races at the opening of the F1 Grand Prix in 1979, thanks in part to the support of Fredy Lienhard, the boss of Lista. That year’s competition was won by Niki Lauda, and the image of the three-time Austrian F1 champion is often associated with that of the BMW M1. As a result, the organizers of the Austrian Grand Prix set up a “Race of Legends” in 2016, contested at the wheel of BMW M1s, as the opening event of the F1 race. They invited former F1 drivers such as Niki Lauda, Jos Verstappen, Gerhard Berger, Hans-Joachim Stuck, and Marc Surer, as well as drivers such as Markus Hotz, who had raced with these magnificent BMW M1s at the time.

“It gave me the chance to see Niki Lauda again, whose simplicity I have always admired. He could have acted like a star and looked down on me, but the opposite was true. He was very warm towards me and, during the group photo, he said to me: ‘You’re short, so stand at the front,’” laughs Markus Hotz, who may be short in stature but is tall in talent and versatility. It is no coincidence that in 1977 Markus Hotz received the BP Racing Trophy, the highest distinction in Swiss motorsport, an award that had also been given in the past to Jo Siffert, Clay Regazzoni, Herbert Müller, and Toulo de Graffenried.

There is much more that could be said about Markus Hotz. For example, at the age of 84, he still participates in historic races, as was the case this year with his Formula Super-Vee Horag in Ollon-Villars, where he had already raced in 1971 in a similar single-seater. We could also mention that Markus Hotz finished fourth in several rounds of the World Endurance Championship, notably at the Nürburgring in 1976, with Claude Haldi in a Porsche 934/5. And that, at the head of his F2 team, he raced Swiss drivers Clay Regazzoni, Marc Surer, and Loris Kessel, as well as international stars such as Johnny Cecotto, Stanley Dickens, and Mike Thackwell. We could also add that, as head of the Horag team, he entered Ferrari 333 SPs and Porsche RS Spyders in races in Europe and the United States in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

 

The Porsche RS Spyder LMP2 entered in Europe and the United States by Markus Hotz, far right

Markus Hotz, this year at the Ollon-Villars hill climb with a self-built HAS. Photo Studio Patrick/SMO

 

Markus Hotz with two of his three sons, David (left) and Benjamin (center). Photo: Laurent Missbauer

 

It is not easy to summarize the very long career of Markus Hotz, who, like Claudia Cardinale, has had 100 lives, in a single article, but you should know that he takes great pleasure in the fact that his wife Ursula and their three children Lukas, David, and Benjamin work with him at Horag, and that the youngest has been its managing director for several years. ●