Norman Casari

2/3/1936 - 31/12/2005

Record updated 02-Mar-23

Versatile Brazilian racing driver. He started racing cars in 1960 with a VW but soon switched to a DKW. He raced in Formula Ford in England in 1970 but returned home to race a Lola T70

Norman Barbosa Casari was born in São Paulo, the son of an Italian industrialist, Antonio Casari. He started driving at the age of ten, in 1946.

In 1950, at 14, shortly after moving to Rio De Janeiro, he entered a motorcycle race but didn't enjoy it.

His first car race was in 1960, with a VW, in a race to comemorate the inauguration of Brasilia. Later he bought a DKW-Vemag, running with the number 96, his lucky number. He impressed in the car and was offered a works drive with Vemag.

In 1965 Jorge Lettry, Head of the Competitions Department of Vemag, wanted to build a streamlined car with the aim of setting a Brazilian speed record. After 8 months of work in secret the Carcará was ready.

On the 29th of June of 1966 the original driver, Mário César de Camargo, withdrew and Casari stepped in to set the record at 212.9 kph on a stretch of road now called the Avenue de Americas.

In 1966 Norman Casari won the Carioca Championship after winning four of the five races, three of them with the DKW Malzoni, and the another one with a DKW Vemag. Norman Casari was the favourite again for Carioca Championship in 1967.

Later Norman ran Formula V, he was owner of kart tracks in Rio and in Itaipava, he manufactured karts and also he ran a Lola T70.

At the end of 1967 he travelled to Europe along with Luiz Pereira Bueno, Milton Amaral and Roberto Achcar, to race in the Ford Formula Championship.

In 1970 he went to England and did three Ford Formula races in a Titan Mk-6 rented from Valentino Musetti. Despite the good results, he came back to Brazil.

In 1970 the Casari-Brahma team was running the Lola T70 in the Mil Milhas Brasileiras, as always with the number 96. In May of 1971, in the 300 Quilômetros de Tarumã,, the Casari-Brahma team entered two cars, the Lola T70 that Norman drove and the Casari A1, for Jan Balder. The Casari A1 used the chassis of the Carcará and the engine from a Ford Galaxie.

In his last years as a driver he ran a Ford Maverick.

At the end of the 70's, he was managing the Autódromo Internacional do Rio de Janeiro.

Norman Casari died on the 31st of December 2005, in Petrópolis from respiratory failure brought on by cancer dscovered only three weeks before. He was 69.



Translated from the work of Paulo Roberto Peralta