In 1972, the owners of the Brands Hatch circuit and the BRSCC motoring club joined forces and announced a different type of race for the August Bank Holiday meeting. It was decided to organise an open formula race (FIA Group 9) that accepted entries from every category. A total prize fund of £50,000 was offered with £20,000 going to the winner. With sponsorship from Rothmans, the ‘Rothmans 50,000’ race accepted a one hundred-car entry list that featured cars from Formula 1, Formula 2, Formula 5000 teams and sports cars from Lola and Chevron.
The organisers had hoped a few teams might build a ‘special’ for the race but time and cost ruled this out. Lap times indicated the F1 cars were quickest around the circuit with some of the faster F2 cars not far behind but ahead of the F5000 cars. The nature of circuit ruled out entries from world championship sports cars such as Porsche 917s and Cam-Am cars which were too large for the narrow Kent circuit. Once Colin Chapman was persuaded to enter a Lotus 72 for Emerson Fittipaldi, the result was a forgone conclusion, even though he ran the race at a much reduced pace to preserve the car and fuel over the 188 laps. Amongst the F1 teams, Frank Williams decided to entered a car in search of prize money and gave Carlos Pace’s team car, a March 711, to Henri Pescarolo. Henri had experience in numerous formulas from grand prix racing to long-distance sports cars so he was the ideal driver for such a race. The photograph shows Pescarolo in the Williams approaching Clearways during the race where he finished third, two laps behind the winner due to stopping to refuel.
From the book ‘Moments in Motorsport’ by Trevor Legate
