The Healey Race Women
Pat and her brother Stirling Moss
Pat Moss-Carlsson is one of the most famous women in motorsport. Sister of Stirling Moss, her rally driving career in the 1950s and 1960s brought her victories in prestigious events such as the Liège-Rome-Liège, the German and Tulip rallies, not to mention countless Coupes des Dames.
But her first love was horses and during her early years she regarded cars solely as a means of getting from A to B, preferably with a horse trailer in tow.
Her first driving lesson was taken at the age of seven, from her brother. "It was in a Willys Jeep, on the lawn, and I thought it was very boring," she recalls. Nevertheless, by the age of 13 or 14 she was driving the family Land Rover around the farm.
"Driving was part of life because dad used to race and mum was doing rallies and hillclimbs. And Stirling, of course, was car mad - from the age of seven he had an Austin 7 with two seats and no body." So how did Pat get into motorsport? "When I was 17, Ken Gregory, Stirling's manager, took me on a rally and I thought it looked fun, so I decided to have a go."She started competing in her own Morris Minor but "thrashed it a bit" and soon wanted something faster. Eventually she managed to buy a Triumph TR2, raising the cash by selling the Minor to her father, along with a half-share in a horse.She competed in the TR2 and was soon offered a drive in the RAC Rally by the British Motor Corporation. "I suppose it was good publicity. Stirling was getting to be famous, so they gave me a MG TF - and the rest is history."
Real success came when she finally got her hands on an Austin Healey in 1958, finishing eighth in the Alpine Rally and fourth on the Liège, which she won in 1960. She also drove Mini Coopers, Ford Cortinas, Saabs and Lancias.
She respected the Big Healey and admired the Mini, which she describes as a "twitchy little box" whose main redeeming feature was the fact that "you could spin it and not hit anything, because it was so small", but for pure enjoyment she liked the European models. "I loved the Lancia. Everything fell off - the gears jumped out and the co-drivers had to hold it in gear - but I still loved it."
In fact, the way Pat describes most of her cars makes them sound like people rather than machines. Most of them had names: a Morris 1100 christened "Dirty Gerty", a Saab known as "Bloody Mary" and a Healey called "URX" after its number plate. "We all named them then," she says. "David Seigle-Morris had a Healey called Sophie..."
When Pat talks about her motorsport career, it sounds very different from what goes on today. "We were paid and dedicated but we had camaraderie. Now they're so single-minded, I don't think they enjoy it. If you look at the interviews, none of them would dream of cracking a joke."
It was on the world rally circuit that Pat met her famous Swedish husband, Eric "On the roof" Carlsson, who she married in 1963. "Rallying was like a circus, with groups of Germans and Swedes and French all mingling with each other."
Pat Moss died on Thursday 17th October 2008, age of 73
(source telegraph.uk)
