1914 French Grand Prix

For several years, the Automobile Club de France (ACF) had been trying to reduce engine sizes in racing which it saw as increasingly dangerous with their higher speeds. In earlier French GP, the cylinder bore was limited. This year, for the first time, it mandated a maximum engine size of 4.5-litres along with an allowable weight range of (excluding fluids and tools). This obviously benefited the leading French racing manufacturers of Peugeot and Delage, that had dominated the recent years of nimble voiturette racing along with Sunbeam, at the expense of the big-engined cars of Italy and Germany. There was also an entry limit of five cars per manufacturer, and no privateer entries were permitted. The city of Lyon promised large subsidies to host At the end of June the two hairpin turns were concreted and the course was re-laid with granite chips to prevent its break-up and coated with calcium chloride to reduce the dust raised. The Grand Prix was to be twenty laps of the circuit, totalling 752.6 km. ==Entries==

On 28 June, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire was assassinated in Sarajevo. A week later, the French Grand Prix was held under an increasingly tense political situation across Europe. The race attracted one of the highest-quality fields hitherto assembled, of 37 starters from 13 manufacturers and 6 countries. Peugeot were the strong favourites to repeat their victories in 1912 and 1913. They arrived with the new EX-5 (or ‘L-45’, after its engine size) for team drivers Georges Boillot, Jules Goux and Victor Rigal. The 4.5-litre four-cylinder engine had a twin-overhead cam (DOHC) and generated 112 bhp. Now fitted with four-wheel brakes it also sported a streamlined extended tail. Boillot had tested it at Brooklands and found it lifted the top speed by 8%. Louis Delâge bought the new 5-speed Type S for Albert Guyot, Arthur Duray and Paul Bablot. Like the Peugeots and FIATs, it was sporting four-wheel brakes. New French company Alva convinced Ferenc Szisz, winner of the inaugural Grand Prix in 1906, out of retirement to lead their team. The most serious opposition to the French teams would come from Mercedes, returning to the Grand Prix for the first time since winning in 1908 with much bigger engines, well over 10 liter. Under the 4.5-litre capacity limit, higher revs were needed to get power, as superchargers were nearly a decade away. The company had not yet made a racing engine that revved over 1500rpm, so Paul Daimler engaged the aero-engine division to assist with engine development. French veteran Louis Wagner and Belgian Mercedes-agent Théodore Pilette. The new Opel was a development of the 4.0-litre 1913 model, retaining its single-overhead camshaft, with four valves per cylinder and a live rear axle like the Mercedes. They were the lightest cars in the field, well over 100 kg lighter than most others. Regular works driver Carl Jörns led a team of three cars. From Italy came FIAT (including veteran Alessandro Cagno), Felice Nazzaro's own team Automobili Nazzaro, and a single entry from Aquila Italiana. Great Britain was represented by Sunbeam (Resta, Lee Guinness and Chassagne) and Vauxhall who included American Ralph DePalma in their squad. ==Practice==

Mercedes knew that meticulous preparation would be needed if they were to beat the French cars. In January, the company had sent its team to France to reconnoitre the track to calculate gearing ratios. In contrast, the Mercedes’ lower centre-of-gravity would provide better road-holding to give it an edge over the French cars. They were also running on more durable Continental tyres while the French cars were on Dunlops. Thus, the Mercedes team calculated they would only need to make a single tyre-stop for each car during the race. During practice though the Peugeot drivers found their cars handled badly, with the poor weight distribution having the spare tyres stowed in the extended streamline tail. The only disruption for Mercedes was when Pilette missed a gear-change and over-revved his engine badly. ==The Race==

Race-day was hot and fine, and about 300,000 spectators lined the roads. So many were coming out on the trains from the city that many missed the 8am start. but Boillot was the first to arrive back at the finish-line. However, Sailer was ahead on elapsed-time with an 18-second lead and from the beginning he forced the pace, drawing Boillot into a speed-contest. setting the pace in his Mercedes at the Grand Prix When Boillot had to pit unexpectedly after an hour, on the third lap, it allowed Sailer to take the lead on the road. Pilette's Mercedes retired at the same time, the gearbox damage in practice proving terminal. (Sailer and no one else at Mercedes had said there was a deliberate plan to use a “hare” to break the Peugeots. The Peugeots’ stops lost their advantage and the Mercedes’ pursuit was relentless. Although Wagner had to pit on lap 15 to replace tyres, Salzer overtook Goux to move up to fourth. When Boillot then had to pit for tyres on the 17th lap Lautenschlager reduced the lead from 2 minutes to just 14 seconds. He overtook the Peugeot as they approached Givors. Boillot's car had been thrashed to its limits and was now falling apart, down to three cylinders. By the end of the 18th lap he was 30 seconds behind. Boillot kept pushing regardless but on the last lap his engine finally expired when he over-revved it on the climb out of the Gier valley. Boillot was distraught, hunched over the steering wheel weeping at his failure. So after seven hours of racing, Mercedes took a crushing 1-2-3 victory with Lautenschlager repeating his 1908 win ahead of Wagner and Salzer. The French crowd was silent, with Goux's fourth place nearly ten minutes back ahead of Resta's Sunbeam being scant consolation. ==Post-race==

Within a month of the race Europe had descended into World War I war and European racing ceased for four years. but then transferred to the French Air Force (''Armée de l'Air'') as a fighter pilot. He was shot down over Verdun in April 1916 in a dogfight and died in the wreckage. After being driven back to celebrations in Berlin, one of the Mercedes (probably Lautenschlager's) was sent on display at the dealership in London, and also two of the Opels.. Carl Fisher, on the Indianapolis 500 organising committee, purchased two of the Peugeot EX-5s. When they landed in the United States he handed them over to the Premier Motor Corporation for three replicas to be made. In the 1915 Indianapolis 500, DePalma drove the Mercedes to beat Dario Resta, in a Peugeot EX-5, by three and a half minutes. With DePalma holding out, Resta got his revenge the year after, in the shortened 1916 Indianapolis 500. A Peugeot won again in the 1919 race. == Classification ==