1919 Ballot Indy Racer Boattail

Before the First World War, Ernest Ballot made his name building engines for several European car manufacturers. When peace returned in 1918, Ballot decided to build his own motorcars for racing and made the wise decision to employ Swiss engineer Ernest Henry as his designer. Henry had already developed several racing engines for Peugeot that were dominating road racing. The first Ballots were created for the 1919 Indianapolis 500-Mile Race; a team of four, 5-liter, straight-eight racers were built in record time and shipped across the Atlantic. These Ballots proved to be the fastest car in practice, all qualifying in the front two rows on the grid - but they suffered from mechanical setbacks in the race. In the end, one Ballot driver, Albert Guyot, finished in fourth place behind two Peugeots and a Stutz. Paul Bablot, the driver of this car, crashed on the 63rd lap. The Ballot team returned to Indy the following year and the French driver Rene Thomas finished in second place, while the other Ballots finished fifth and seventh. Over the next decade the two Ernests, Ballot and Henry, entered their cars in many other European and American races and built their own fast road cars until, in 1931, the company was taken over by Hispano-Suiza.