Robert La Caze died on 1 July 2015 at the age of 98. His Formula 1 record was limited to one start, but it remains unique: he is the only Moroccan driver to have competed in a World Championship Grand Prix.
La Caze was born in Paris and raced under the Moroccan flag. His single Formula 1 appearance came at the 1958 Moroccan Grand Prix at Ain-Diab, the only World Championship race held in Morocco. He drove a privately entered Cooper and finished outside the points, in a race better remembered for Mike Hawthorn securing the world championship and for the fatal accident suffered by Stuart Lewis-Evans.
A one-race national footnote
One-start drivers can easily become statistical dust. La Caze’s case is more distinctive because the race itself sits at the edge of Formula 1’s geography. The Moroccan Grand Prix appeared on the championship calendar once, then disappeared. La Caze appeared with it. Neither returned.
His wider racing life was broader than that single line. He competed in rallying and sports cars, and was a two-time winner of the Rallye du Maroc. That made him less a Formula 1 specialist than a versatile regional and international racer who intersected with the World Championship when it briefly came to North Africa.
By the time of his death, La Caze had also been one of the oldest surviving former Formula 1 drivers. The longevity added another layer to a career that otherwise might be filed simply as one start, no points. His Formula 1 footprint was tiny, but it belonged to a Grand Prix that carried a whole country’s only direct driver link to the championship.
Reader signal