The Lola THL1 was a

Formula One Formula One (F1) is the highest class of worldwide racing for open-wheel single-seater formula Auto racing, racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one ...

racing car designed by Neil Oatley for Team Haas (USA) Ltd. during four of the last five races of the

1985 Formula One season The 1985 FIA Formula One World Championship was the 39th season of FIA Formula One motor racing. It featured the 1985 Formula One World Championship for Drivers and the 1985 Formula One World Championship for Manufacturers, both of which comme ...

. The Haas Lola team only had one car for 1985 and it was driven by World Champion,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

's Alan Jones who after having retired at the end of , plus his aborted comeback in early , was making a full-time comeback to Formula One at the age of 39. The THL1 used the ,

turbocharged In an internal combustion engine, a turbocharger (also known as a turbo or a turbosupercharger) is a forced induction device that is powered by the flow of exhaust gases. It uses this energy to compress the intake air, forcing more air into the ...

Hart 415T Straight 4 engine. The car was supposed to have the brand new,

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

TEC V6 turbo designed by

Keith Duckworth David Keith Duckworth (10 August 1933 – 18 December 2005) was an English mechanical engineer. He is most famous for designing the Cosworth DFV (Double Four Valve) engine, an engine that revolutionised the sport of Formula One. Early life ...

and John Baldwin. However,

Cosworth Cosworth is a British automotive engineering company founded in London in 1958, specialising in high-performance internal combustion engines, powertrain, and electronics for auto racing, automobile racing (motorsport) and mainstream Automotiv ...

lost some 4 months design and development time unsuccessfully trying to turbocharge an old 4-cylinder engine, thus delivery of the new V6 turbo was delayed until forcing the team into using

Brian Hart Brian Roger Hart (7 September 1936 – 5 January 2014) was a British racing driver and engineer with a background in the aviation industry. He founded Brian Hart Limited, a company that developed and built engines for motorsport use. Racing ...

's underpowered engines in the interim. This also caused a re-design of the cars rear end to accommodate the Straight 4 engine rather than the 120° V6.

1985

The THL1 made its debut at the

Italian Grand Prix The Italian Grand Prix () is the fifth oldest national Grand Prix motor racing, motor racing Grand Prix (after the French Grand Prix, the United States Grand Prix, the Spanish Grand Prix and the Russian Grand Prix), having been held since 1921 ...

Monza Monza (, ; ; , locally ; ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) on the Lambro, River Lambro, a tributary of the Po (river), River Po, in the Lombardy region of Italy, about north-northeast of Milan. It is the capital of the province of Mo ...

, with Jones qualifying 25th, 9.859 seconds behind pole sitter

Ayrton Senna Ayrton Senna da Silva (; 21 March 1960 – 1 May 1994) was a Brazilian racing driver, who competed in Formula One from to . Senna won three Formula One World Drivers' Championship titles with McLaren, and—at the time of his death—held ...

( Lotus-

Renault Renault S.A., commonly referred to as Groupe Renault ( , , , also known as the Renault Group in English), is a French Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automobile manufacturer established in 1899. The company curr ...

), but retiring after just 6 laps due to an overheating engine. The next race, the

Belgian Grand Prix The Belgian Grand Prix (; ; ) is a motor racing event which forms part of the Formula One World Championship. The first national race of Belgium was held in 1925 at the Spa region's race course, an area of the country that had been associated ...

, had been rescheduled from 2 June so the team were not allowed to compete because they were not on the original entry list. Jones then qualified 18th for the

South African Grand Prix The South African Grand Prix was first run as a Grand Prix motor racing handicap race in 1934 at the Prince George Circuit at East London, South Africa, East London, Cape Province. It drew top drivers from Europe including Bernd Rosemeyer, Ri ...

which saw the French Renault and

Ligier Ligier () is a French automobile and minibus maker created by former racing driver and rugby player Guy Ligier (1930–2015), specialized in the manufacturing of microcars. Ligier is best known for its involvement in the Formula 1 World Cham ...

teams boycott the race for political reasons, and the

RAM Ram, ram, or RAM most commonly refers to: * A male sheep * Random-access memory, computer memory * Ram Trucks, US, since 2009 ** List of vehicles named Dodge Ram, trucks and vans ** Ram Pickup, produced by Ram Trucks Ram, ram, or RAM may also ref ...

and

Zakspeed Zakspeed () is a motor racing team from Germany, founded in 1968 by Erich Zakowski and then run by his son Peter Zakowski. It is based in Niederzissen, Rhineland-Palatinate, around from the Nürburgring circuit. The team was, together with th ...

teams not enter, but withdrew before the race due to political pressure, however it was covered up as "illness" in order to not lose face, with the plan concocted by

Bernie Ecclestone Bernard Charles Ecclestone (born 28 October 1930) is a British business magnate, motorsport executive and former racing driver. Widely known in journalism as the "F1 Supremo", Ecclestone founded the Formula One Group in 1987, controlling the c ...

. Jones showed the potential of the car in the final race of the season, the first ever

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

Formula One Grand Prix (the 1985 AGP was in fact the 50th running of the race, but it was the first time it was part of the FIA World Championship). The Australian qualified 19th for his home race but stalled the car at the start leaving him dead last. After getting a push start and being almost a quarter of a lap behind, Jones fought his way through the field and was up to 6th and into the points by lap 20 before being forced to retire with electrical trouble.

1986

The car was to be replaced for the start of the season but the new

Lola THL2 The Lola THL2 was a Formula One racing car designed by Neil Oatley for FORCE and was used by Team Haas (USA) Ltd. during the 1986 Formula One season. Two of the FORCE aerodynamicists who worked on the car during its countless hours of Wind tu ...

was delayed meaning that the THL1 was pressed into service for the first three races of the season, its last race being the

San Marino Grand Prix The San Marino Grand Prix () was a Formula One championship race which was run at the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari in the town of Imola, near the Apennine Mountains, Apennine mountains in Italy, between 1981 and 2006. It was nam ...

. Joining the

ex-World Champion in a second car was ex-

Ferrari Ferrari S.p.A. (; ) is an Italian luxury sports car manufacturer based in Maranello. Founded in 1939 by Enzo Ferrari (1898–1988), the company built Auto Avio Costruzioni 815, its first car in 1940, adopted its current name in 1945, and be ...

and

driver,

Frenchman French people () are a nation primarily located in Western Europe that share a common French culture, history, and language, identified with the country of France. The French people, especially the native speakers of langues d'oïl from nort ...

Patrick Tambay Patrick Daniel Tambay (; 25 June 1949 – 4 December 2022) was a French racing driver Auto racing (also known as car racing, motor racing, or automobile racing) is a motorsport involving the racing of automobiles for competition. In North ...

. The car would still use the turbocharged Hart engine, but when the THL2 appeared in

San Marino San Marino, officially the Republic of San Marino, is a landlocked country in Southern Europe, completely surrounded by Italy. Located on the northeastern slopes of the Apennine Mountains, it is the larger of two European microstates, microsta ...

for Jones to drive, it was powered by the new,

TEC V6 turbo designed by

and John Baldwin (Duckworth was one of the designers of the highly successful

Cosworth DFV The DFV is an internal combustion engine that was originally produced by Cosworth for Formula One motor racing. The name is an abbreviation of ''Double Four Valve'', the engine being a V8 development of the earlier four-cylinder FVA, which had f ...

engine - the other being Mike Costin). Neither Jones or Tambay would score a point with the Lola Hart THL1. Despite Jones praising the new car and its engine, the team had finally got some speed out of the THL1 with Tambay qualifying 11th, some 2.226 faster and 12 places better than Jones in the THL2. The car was called a Lola but its only connection to the famous

Lola Cars Lola Cars Limited is a British automobile manufacturer founded in 1958 by Eric Broadley in Bromley, England. The company is now owned by Till Bechtolsheimer, who purchased it in 2022. Lola Cars endured for more than fifty years to become one of ...

was because of car owner

Carl Haas Carl Arthur Haas (February 26, 1929 – June 29, 2016) was an American auto racing impresario. He co-owned the Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing team in the Champ Car and IndyCar Series with Paul Newman and Mike Lanigan. He also owned Carl A. Haas ...

's previous close association with Lola founder

Eric Broadley Eric Harrison Broadley MBE (22 September 1928 – 28 May 2017) was a British entrepreneur, engineer, and founder and chief designer of Lola Cars, the motor racing manufacturer and engineering company. He was arguably one of the most influential ...

, who was also named as chief engineer for the team in 1985. The THL1 was actually designed by Haas-owned design and construction company known as FORCE (Formula One Race Car Engineering). A member of Neil Oatley's design team was an up-and-coming

Ross Brawn Ross James Brawn (born 23 November 1954) is a British Formula One managing director, motor sports and technical director. He is a former motorsport engineer and Formula One team principal, and has worked for a number of Formula One teams. Teams ...

, the team's lead aerodynamicist who did most of the

wind tunnel A wind tunnel is "an apparatus for producing a controlled stream of air for conducting aerodynamic experiments". The experiment is conducted in the test section of the wind tunnel and a complete tunnel configuration includes air ducting to and f ...

testing of both the THL1 and THL2. Lola however earned the team's points towards the Constructors Championships as the team's designated constructor.

Aftermath

During a 2012 interview series with Formula One legends, Alan Jones described the underpowered Hart 415T engine as like "sending a boy to do a mans job", adding that it was an old

Formula 2 Formula Two (F2) is a type of open-wheel formula racing category first codified in 1948. It was replaced in 1985 by Formula 3000, but revived by the FIA from 2009 to 2012 in the form of the FIA Formula Two Championship. The name returned aga ...

engine that someone had thrown a turbo on and said "lets go and do Formula One". Up against the financial and technical resources of Ferrari, Renault,

Honda commonly known as just Honda, is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate automotive manufacturer headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in October 1946 by Soichiro Honda, Honda has bee ...

BMW Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, trading as BMW Group (commonly abbreviated to BMW (), sometimes anglicised as Bavarian Motor Works), is a German multinational manufacturer of vehicles and motorcycles headquartered in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. Th ...

and TAG-

Porsche Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, usually shortened to Porsche (; see below), is a German automobile manufacturer specializing in luxury, high-performance sports cars, SUVs and sedans, headquartered in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Th ...

, results were few and far between for those using

's engines. The THL1 was the last car to use the turbocharged Hart engine in Formula One.

Complete Formula One results

( key) * season points all scored using

References

{{F1 cars 1986 1985 Formula One season cars 1986 Formula One season cars THL1