Cesare Fiorio

Cesare Fiorio (born 26 May 1939) is a former Formula One sporting director of Scuderia Ferrari, Ligier and Minardi, and former racer, founder and team manager of Lancia HF Squadra Corse. After retiring from motorsport he worked as television commentator.

Biography Cesare Fiorio was born in Turin, Italy, the son of Sandro Fiorio, former chief of the public relations department of Lancia. He began racing with Fiat, winning the Italian GT championship in 1961, and was eliminated from his only Monte Carlo Rally as a result of an accident.

He obtained a degree in political science. Soon afterwards, in February 1963, he joined the Lancia management and established a racing team which he called HF Squadra Corse, which would become one of the most successful rally teams. Lancia was initially not keen on racing, and Fiorio wanted to change this attitude: he started preparing some Lancia Fulvia, which entered many local rallies, obtaining some victories. In 1965, the team became a semi-works operation, and began hiring talented engineers to improve the Lancia Fulvia; finally, in 1967, Ove Andersson won the Spanish Rally and Sandro Munari won the Tour de Corse. When Fiat bought Alfa Romeo in the same year, he was appointed head of Squadra Corse Alfa Romeo, the racing department of this marque. In 1989, he debuted as sporting director of Ferrari, with the hard task of making the team competitive again after some disappointing seasons in the mid-1980s. The team won the first race in Brazil with Nigel Mansell, and then again in Hungary and in Portugal with Gerhard Berger, but poor reliability prevented the team from competing with McLaren and Williams. In Ferrari employed the reigning World Champion Alain Prost, and almost won the title, losing it at the season finale in Japan when Prost and Senna had their second infamous collision. Fiorio and Ferrari terminated their working relationship weeks before the beginning of the 1991 season but Fiorio stayed until the 1991 Monaco Grand Prix. The farm produces extra virgin olive oil, "primitivo" wine, corn, vegetables, cheese, fruit and eggs from the farm's own hens. In 2017, Fiorio suffered a bad cycling crash, which left him in critical condition, and he was hospitalized. He made a full recovery.

The movie Race for Glory: Audi vs. Lancia is based on his life, with actor Riccardo Scamarcio as Fiorio.