One of my earliest motor racing memories was my Dad taking me to Brands Hatch for the first time. Our family car at the time was a little grey A30 in which we would somehow squeeze my parents, four of us children and a dog. I was fascinated to see a saloon car race in which a very similar A35, painted bright red, crawled all over much bigger machinery including Jaguars and finally came across the finish line, the winner. The driver was, of course, John Sprinzel.
John was born in Berlin in October 1930 and celebrated his 80th birthday in October last at his home in Hawaii. His family moved to England in 1933 and he was educated at Christ’s College, Finchley and at the Regent Street Poly. Initially apprenticed as a printer, he then went into the RAF for his National Service and trained as a pilot. He returned to become Production Manager in a printing firm until in 1957 he founded Speedwell with Len Adams and George Hulbert ~ modifying A.35s and Morris Minors before moving on to Sprites. In 1959 he sold his share in the company to Graham Hill having been offered a job by the Donald Healey Motor Company as Manager of “Special Equipment” ~ modifying Sprites for race, rally and for fast-road use. When Healeys decided the London end of the operation was not paying, John bought that part of their business and set up on his own as John Sprinzel Racing. He went on to produce the successful Sebring Sprite Coupé with Paul Hawkins using Williams and Pritchard’s alloy bodywork. The car were raced by David Seigle-Morris, Ian Walker, Paul Hawkins, Vic Elford, Douglas Wilson-Spratt, Brian Culcheth, and others. Paddy Hopkirk, John Watson and many others were early Speedwell and Sprinzel Sprite winners. John Sprinzel won the British Rally Championship with a Sprite in 1959 and Brian Harper followed suit in a Sprinzel-prepared car the following year.
John’s hobbies as a young man were basketball and water polo as well as squash. Later on he took up windsurfing ~ actively. His first race was grass tracking a “Red Hunter” Ariel in 1949 with which he came 3rd. His first rally was with an A30 on the 1955 RAC rally when he was 6th in class, and his first car race was at Goodwood, on Whit Monday in 1957, when he took his A35 to an outright win.
