Peter Elleray (born 30 June 1958) is an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

engineer and race car designer particularly known for designing the

Bentley Speed 8 The Bentley Speed 8 (developed from the Bentley EXP Speed 8) is a Grand Touring Prototype race car that was designed by Bentley. It has a strong resemblance to and shares some technology with the Audi R8C, which had raced only once before Audi ...

race car Race, RACE or The Race may refer to: * Race (biology), an informal taxonomic classification within a species, generally within a sub-species * Race (human categorization), classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, and/or s ...

. Elleray, who worked for Racing Technologies Norfolk (RTN), also designed the

Audi R8C The Audi R8C is a Le Mans Prototype racecar that was built by Audi and designed by Peter Elleray to compete in the 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans under the LMGTP category. It was developed alongside the open Audi R8R LMP category Roadster (automobile), ...

and the British

Radical SR9 The Radical SR9 is a sports prototype race car, designed, developed and produced by Radical for sports car racing Sports car racing is a form of motorsport road racing that uses sports cars with two seats and enclosed wheels. They may be eit ...

. On 14 September 2007, his involvement was announced in the design of the WF01-Zytek for

Embassy Racing Embassy Racing was a British auto racing team founded by Jonathan France in 2003. Initially created as a conjunction with Xero Competition in the British GT Championship, the team expanded to become an independent team and began to win races ...

, which had a best finish of 4th in its LMP2 category at the 1000 km of Nürburgring during the

2008 Le Mans Series season The 2008 Le Mans Series was the fifth season of ACO's Le Mans Series. It was a series for Le Mans Prototype and Grand Touring style cars broken into 4 classes: LMP1, LMP2, GT1, and GT2. It ran from 6 April to 14 September 2008 with five rounds tak ...

Biography

Elleray attended

Hutton Grammar School Hutton Grammar School is an 11–18 boys voluntary aided, state-funded Church of England comprehensive day school. It is located south west of Preston, Lancashire, in Hutton, England. It provides education for boys from the age of 11 to 16, ...

before earning a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

degree in

applied mathematics Applied mathematics is the application of mathematics, mathematical methods by different fields such as physics, engineering, medicine, biology, finance, business, computer science, and Industrial sector, industry. Thus, applied mathematics is a ...

from

Durham University Durham University (legally the University of Durham) is a collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university in Durham, England, founded by an Act of Parliament (UK), Act of Parliament in 1832 and incorporated by r ...

in 1979. After spending several years in the

aerospace Aerospace is a term used to collectively refer to the atmosphere and outer space. Aerospace activity is very diverse, with a multitude of commercial, industrial, and military applications. Aerospace engineering consists of aeronautics and astron ...

field, Elleray took a job with

Tyrrell Racing The Tyrrell Racing Organisation was an auto racing team and Formula One constructor founded by Ken Tyrrell (1924–2001) which started racing in 1958 and started building its own cars in 1970. The team experienced its greatest success in the e ...

in 1982 analyzing ground effect tunnels. In 1983 and 1984, he was involved with amateur racing teams before being employed as a designer and

race engineer A race engineer is a motorsport team member who analyses data to achieve the best performance from the vehicle and driver. The race engineer communicates with the team's data analyst, mechanics, and driver, both between and during races. Off the ...

by Arrows F1. In 1999, he became Chief

Designer A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exper ...

for

Bentley Bentley Motors Limited is a British designer, manufacturer and marketer of Luxury vehicle, luxury cars and Sport utility vehicle, SUVs. Headquartered in Crewe, England, the company was founded by W. O. Bentley (1888–1971) in 1919 in Crickle ...

's prototype program.

Designing the Bentley Speed 8

According to Elleray, he had the basic ideas for the Bentley Speed 8 even before launching the design work in August 2001 with Gene Varnier, the assistant chief designer on the project. By 2003, the vehicle had evolved to accommodate a change from Dunlop

tire A tire (North American English) or tyre (Commonwealth English) is a ring-shaped component that surrounds a Rim (wheel), wheel's rim to transfer a vehicle's load from the axle through the wheel to the ground and to provide Traction (engineeri ...

s to

Michelin Michelin ( , ), in full ("General Company of the Michelin Enterprises P.L.S."), is a French multinational tyre manufacturing company based in Clermont-Ferrand in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes '' région'' of France. It is the second largest t ...

tires and also to adapt the front diffuser to the doored-

coupe A coupe or coupé (, ) is a passenger car with a sloping or truncated rear roofline and typically with two doors. The term ''coupé'' was first applied to horse-drawn carriages for two passengers without rear-facing seats. It comes from the Fr ...

design. The ''Los Angeles Times'' praised Elleray's design as exhibiting a "kind of inexpressible British flair and beauty." The car received the Autosport Racing Car of the Year Award for 2003, the first non-F1 car for 14 years to win the award, breaking

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 ...

's streak.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Elleray, Peter Living people English engineers 1958 births People educated at Hutton Grammar School Formula One engineers Alumni of Collingwood College, Durham