People

Peter Schetty

Peter Schetty was born into a long established textile family in Basel, Switzerland in 1942 and enjoyed a comfortable upbringing. In his early twenties he began competing in hillclimb events and in 1965 and 1966 was one of the drivers of the Scuderia Filipinetti team Shelby Mustangs, winning several events including the hillclimbs of Rossfeld and Gaisberg. He finished second in the GT class in 1966 and as a result was hired by Abarth in 1967 to develop the company's sports car and he finished third in the European series. He was then hired to drive in the series in a factory Ferrari 212E, developing the car in the course of 1968 and then dominating the 1969 European Hillclimb Championship, winning all the events that he entered and setting class records, some of which stood until for more than 10 years. In 1970 Schetty joined the Ferrari sports car team, racing a 512 to second pace with Jacky Ickx at Spa and finishing third at Monza with John Surtees. In 1971 he switched to the role of development driver for the new 312 and became team manager of the sports car and Formula 1 teams. At the end of 1972, however, he was called back to Switzerland to run the family firm and so disappeared from motor racing.