Photo by Dave Hamster, licensed under CC BY 2.0. Original image available on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/davehamster/25572388347/
Photo by Dave Hamster, licensed under CC BY 2.0. Original image available on Flickr
Many teams came and went during the 60s and 70s, flashing into Formula 1 before disappearing just as fast.
One of them was the Scarab team, an American effort that entered Formula 1 in the 60s but lasted only a short time. The question is, why was their stay in the sport so brief?
Scarab F1 project remains one of the most fascinating ‘What if’ stories in racing history.
A story built on American optimism, vast personal wealth, and the belief that sheer craftsmanship and ambition could overcome Europe’s fast-evolving racing landscape.
Scarab F1 effort lasted only a single season.
SCARAB F1 TEAM
Team’s vision
At the center of the Scarab story was Lance reventlow, a young, and extraordinarily wealthy American whose life moved at the pace of a race engine full throttle.
Racing was his true obsession, and in 1957, Reventlow founded Reventlow Automobiles Inc. with a bold vision: to build an all-American machine capable of challenging and defeating European giants like Ferrari and Maserati.
At the time when most American racing success came from oval tracks, Reventlow wanted to build something more refined.
His dream was not simply to win races, it was to prove that the United States could match the engineering brilliance of Europe.
Scarab in American Sports Car Racing
Before entering F1, the team had already built a near-mythical reputation in the American sports car scene.
Their shimmering aluminum-bodied machines, powered by thunderous Chevrolet V8 engines, were the envy of paddocks across the country.
Designed by talents like Phil Remington, the cars were reliable, fast and breathtaking to behold.
In 1958, Scarab captured the USRRC Championship and earned victories against experienced international rivals.
The dominance of these V8-powered beasts gave Reventlow the confidence to aim even higher.
If SCARAB could conquer America, why not the world?
Scarab F1 1960 – enter at the Worst Possible Moment
The problem was not ambition. The problem was timing.
By the time Scarab shifted its focus to F1 in 1960, the sport was undergoing one of its most dramatic periods of change.
The rear-engined revolution, led by Cooper and later Lotus, had already changed everything in F1.
Cars with engines behind were much faster, lighter and easier to handle.
Front-engined F1 car, which had dominated the decade before, were suddenly relics.
Yet the American team pressed ahead with a front-engined design, it was beautifully built, polished like fine jewely, but technically outdated the moment it arrived!
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The Engine That Never Had a Chance
To make matters worse, Scharab developed an all-new engine for the project, four cylinder unit with a desmodromic valve system.
It was a marvel on paper, but F1 is not decided to engineering sketches.
The engine was rushed, poorly tested. At high RPMs, the valve system often self destructed.
Oil starvation was common, entire weekends were lost to mechanical chaos.
Even when everything seemed right, the engine lacked the power needed to compete with the best Europe had to offer.
And car itself carried more weight than its rivals, making handling and braking another uphill battle.
No time to prepare
The team also faced a challenge that no amount of money could instantly fix; experience!
F1 circuits in Europe, from the tight streets of Monaco to the flowing curves of Spa, demanded intimate knowledge and constant testing.
Reventlow and Chuck Daigh had raced extensively in US, but the unique rhythm of F1’s calendar was unfamiliar territory.
The team arrived in Europe with no real testing program, little understanding of the circuits and a car that was already behind the times.
The cars were photographed endessly but results never came!
A Quiet End to a Bold Dream
Scarab appeared in just five races in the 1960.
The only finish came at the final race, the United States GP at Riverside, F1 raced for the first time in this track.
Chuck Daigh limped home with tenth place, far behind the leaders – five laps behind the winner, Stirling Moss driving for Lotus.
However, by the end of the year, the team had financial problems, Reventlow had already spent much of his fortune on the project.
Without sponsors, prize money, Scarab’s F1 journey ended as quickly as it had begun.
Reventlow closed his company in 1962.
The workshop, however, continued to make history when it was leased by his former driver, Carroll Shelby.
Shelby would create the legendary Cobra, an icon built on the floor where Scarab’s dreams were born.
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Why Scarab Failed in F1
The reasons are clearer than they were in 1960.
The team’s biggest downfall was committing to a front-engined design at the moment F1 had already moved on.
Even with perfect reliability, Scarab would have struggled to match the nimble Coopers and Lotuses rewriting the sport’s identity.
The rushed engine program compounded the problem, the desmodromic system was experimental and lacked the development time needed to survive a race distance.
Combined with limited European experience and almost no track testing, Scarab was fighting a battle it could not win.
What more about the team
Despite its failures, the Scarab F1 project is remembered with great affection.
Collectors and historians speak of Scarab not as a disappointment, but as a brave and beautiful attempt to challenge the best in the world.
It was a team born from passion rather than corporate strategy, from a young man’s dream rather than a multinational budget.
Scarab proved that even when a project falls short on track, it can still leave behind a legacy that inspires generations of fans and engineers.
In many ways, the Scarab F1 team symbolizes the romantic side of racing: big dreams, daring risk, and the belief that with enough talent and determination, anything is possible, even if the results say otherwise.
