Gustav Brunner

Who is Gustav Brunner?

Gustav Brunner is an Austrian Formula One designer and engineer. He started his career in racing car design at the German-based constructor McNamara. He first entered F1 in a brief spell working for the ATS team in 1978, before designing cars for Formula Two and sportscar racing. He came to prominence in Formula One in 1983, by returning to ATS. He would design two chassis for the team, the 1983 D6 and the 1984 D7, before quitting after a number of arguments with team principal Hans Gunther Schmidt. 1985 would see him joining RAM Racing, designing the RAM 03 car. By now he was gaining a reputation within the sport for designing good chassis on a limited budget, even if the teams he had worked for had a conspicuous lack of results.

He then worked for Arrows and Ferrari, before reuniting with ATS boss Schmidt as designer for his new Rial F1 outfit in 1988. He fell out with Schmidt again and became Technical Director of the Zakspeed team. When the team folded at the end of the 1989 season, he moved on to Leyton House, staying as they reverted to March Engineering - during this period, he is perhaps best remembered for vaulting the pitlane wall and running on to the track when Ivan Capelli finished 2nd in the 1990 French Grand Prix. With March Engineering folding, he moved to Minardi for 1993, designing their successful M193 chassis, before another switch, to Ferrari's Research & Development department, eventually returning to Minardi as chief designer in 1997 to help new technical director, Gabriele Tredozi, and became the technical director in 1999.