eifelland / scale 1/43 / the collection

Eifelland was named after its owner Günther Hennerici's caravan manufacturing company. The name Eifelland was chosen after the Eifel mountains close to the Nürburgring.

Eifelland were a team backed by caravan and camping magnate Gunther Henerici under his company name and were most famous for buying an F1 March 721 and fitting it out with supposedly aerodynamic bodywork developed by Luigi Colani.

In 1971 Günther Hennerici decided to expand his activities to motor racing and founded his own team, Eifelland. Initially the team competed mostly in Formula Three, with drivers such as Willi Deutsch, Gerd Koppenhauser, Erwin Derichs, Hans Hargarten and Werner herself. In 1972 he chose to graduate to Formula One and field one single car with Rolf Stommelen at the wheel. The car was based on a March 721 Formula One car, redesigned by German designer Luigi Colani.

After a couple of unsuccessful seasons, in 1974 Hennerici sold the team and his caravan company and retired.

Headquarters; West Germany, 1971-1974

e21 1972

The Eifelland E21, also known as the Eifelland-March E21, is a Formula One racing car built by the German racing team Eifelland Racing to compete in the 1972 Formula 1 World Championship.

Designed by Luigi Colani, it used a Ford Cosworth DFV engine in V8 configuration with a 90° bank angle of 2993 cm³ that delivered a power of 450 hp at 10.800 rpm.

Based on the March 721, the E21 was entrusted to the German driver Rolf Stommelen. The car was distinguished by its single central rear-view mirror positioned right in front of the driver and its air intake positioned in front of the steering wheel.

For the debut at the South African Grand Prix, March rear and front wings had to be mounted so that the car received sufficient downforce. The curved cockpit surround remained, but had to be rebuilt several times until the middle of the season because the engine got too little cooling. An important detail of the car, which was officially launched as the Eifelland Type 21, was the powerful central rear-view mirror, which was mounted just in front of the steering rim. Rolf Stommelen described this mirror as at least taking some getting used to.

Great successes were not to be achieved with the car, but Stommelen reached six finishes in eight starts. When Hennerici sold his caravan business in the summer of 1972 and apparently also lost interest in motorsport, the end of the team was foreseeable. The Austrian Grand Prix was the last race of the Eifelland team in the Formula 1 World Championship.