Barbara Johansson

Barbara Johansson was a Swedish race and rally driver most active in the 1960s. She usually drove small cars and is most associated with the Mini. She was nicknamed "Bra-Bra" by the Swedish press, with "bra" translating here as "good".

Barbara was born in the USA to Swedish parents, although she lived her entire adult life in Sweden. She had always been interested in cars and enjoyed driving fast in her parent's Ford V8 when going to and from the stables where she kept her horses. After her marriage, she began her motorsport career in speedboats, sharing a vessel with her husband. Her husband worked for a Peugeot dealership and it was at the suggestion of his boss that she tried out motor racing. She won her first event, driving a Peugeot 203.

She was highly successful in the Swedish Touring Car Championship and won a Group 2 race outright, at Knutstorp in 1964. Her car was a Mini Cooper run by the works BMC team. She was also second at Falkenberg and fourth at Skarpnack, and would have been Group 2 champion without a couple of non-finishes. According to a story, DKW driver Sigurd Isaakson said that if she beat him in a race, he would withdraw from the championship. She did defeat him in 1964, albeit in a different class, and he did go home.

Her first STCC appearance was in 1960, at Karlskoga, where she drove a Peugeot 403 and finished tenth, eight laps down. Sharing the same car with Jan Englund and Carl-Erik Linn, she was 21st in the end-of-season enduro at Skarpnack. 

In 1961, she appeared in the same race, driving a Renault Dauphine this time. Her co-drivers were Gunnar Friberg and Lars-Erik Tisell and they were 17th overall. This was as part of a Renault dealer team who were trying to gain attention by employing a female driver.

She then disappears from the STCC entry lists until 1964. She did two rounds of the championship in 1965, finishing one, at Karlskoga, in fifth place. Again, she was driving a Mini.

The 1966 STCC featured Barbara and her Mini racing in its mid-season events. She was tenth at Skarpnack, eighth at Karlskoga and twelfth at Falmarksbanen. After this, BMC began to scale back its motorsport activities and could no longer support her.

After touring cars, she also raced single-seaters. Photos exist of her competing in Formula Vee in 1967, although results are not readily available. Her car was a German-designed Dolling. By this time, she had separated from her husband and was combining her competition career with bringing up two children, helped by a nanny. She went back to racing boats, continuing to compete on and off until the early '70s.

Alongside her racing career, she competed in rallies. When BMC Sweden's representative Bosse Elmhorn saw her competing in local ice races and rallies, it was their rally team she was originally signed up for. Her team-mate was Harry Kallstrom, In a reflection of her track activitiy, she had already entered the Swedish Midnight Sun Rally in 1960, in a Peugeot 403, and the same event in 1961, in a works-supported Renault Gordini. She was also on the entry list for the Malarallyt.

In 1963, she was part of the BMC set-up. She was assigned a Mini Cooper for the Midnight Sun Rally, but then switched to an MG 1100 for three more Swedish events. At the end of the year, she did her first overseas rally, the RAC Rally in the UK, driving the Mini with Sheila Taylor. Sadly, the suspension failed when they were in fifth place.

A regular partnership with Margot Bradhe formed for 1964. Apparently, Margot was a calming influence on Barbara's aggressive driving style; she did not believe in lifting off the throttle. They drove the Mini Cooper almost exclusively and entered the Monte Carlo Rally for the first time, although they do not seem to have finished. Barbara's best finish was a 24th place in the Midnight Sun event, There were 138 finishers that year and many more starters. Later in the year, she won the Ladies' prize in the Jamt Rally.

Her last year as a rally driver was in 1965. BMC were already scaling back by then and she was back in a Renault 8 Gordini. She and Inga-Lill Edenring entered the Midnight Sun Rally, but do not appear to have finished.

She died in 2013, aged 80.

(For reference, Tommy Lyngborn's 2014 article provided a lot of the additional information here.)

Image copyright Upplands Museum, Sweden.

Women Drivers in Touring Cars: Sweden

Sandra Oscarsson

Jessica Bäckman now has her own post.

Lillebil Ankarcrona - raced in the late 1960s early 1970s. Her usual car was a Mini Cooper and she drove for the same Botkyrka team as Barbara Johansson had. She entered the Ring Knutstorp Cup in 1967, finishing 14th in her class. Later, in 1970, she made up an all-female team for the Mantorp 24 Hours with Birgitta Uppling and Barbro Lundberger. They did not finish after their Mini broke an axle. In 1973, she was due to race an Alfa Romeo at Anderstorp in a GT race, but she does not seem to have started. She was better-known as an actress and a high-profile friend of Frida from ABBA.

Caroline Bender - former karter who graduated to cars quite early, at the age of 17. She competed for two seasons in the Junior Touring Car Championship in 2007 and 2008, driving a Citroen C2 both times. In 2007, she was unplaced in the championship. In 2008, she was also unplaced, after a part-season with rather a lot of non-finishes. Her best finish was 21st, at Knutstorp. She does not appear to have raced since then. She was racing alongside her brother, Alexander Bender.

Nina Dahlin - raced in Sweden between 2005 and 2008. She began in the Renault Junior Cup, aged just fifteen, driving a Renault 5. She finished third in her second season in 2006, winning twice. The following year, she switched to a Clio, entering some rounds of the Junior Cup, and the Swedish Fyndbörsen Cup, where she managed another win. In 2008, she drove in the JTCC in a Peugeot 206, but only did some of the rounds, with no podium finishes. She does not appear to have raced since then, and her blog is no longer being updated. 

Angelica (Minna) Haraldsson - raced in Sweden between 2005 and 2008. She began racing a week after receiving her driving license, although she was unable to reach the pedals and struggled to drive her racing car. She raced again in 2006, although only in a few races. In 2007, she put together a deal to race in the JTCC with the GAPS team, in a Ford Fiesta. She was still very inexperienced, and although her lap times improved dramatically, she did not score points. Half way through 2008, the team folded, leaving Angelica without support or sponsorship. She sold her car in 2009. Since then, she has remained involved in motorsport through marshalling, driving course cars, and competition management.

Caroline Jansson - first raced in 2002, driving a Volvo. By 2003, she was scoring top ten finishes, and in 2004, she did the whole Volvo S60 Challenge, finishing thirteenth. After that, she appears to have returned to international watersports competition for Sweden, apart from two guest spots in the 2009 Ginetta G20 Cup. She is the daughter of Nettan Lindgren, who is her manager.

Barbro Lundberger - raced in the Swedish Touring Car Championship in the 1960s. She drove a Mini in 1965, finishing 19th at Karlskoga. In 1966, she had a more powerful Mini and moved up a class, finishing eighth in a standalone race at Skarpnack. Away from BMC machinery, she got a lot of column inches in 1965 when she and Patrick Vanson drove a Citroen DS21 from Kiruna in northern Sweden to Naples in Italy. The journey took two days. Barbro is sometimes described as being a model.

Elisabeth Nilsson - did two seasons of the Swedish touring car championship under Super Touring rules, driving a Ford Mondeo. During her first season, she was on the pace, with a best finish of second, at Karlskoga, and another fourth place at Knutstorp. Her finishing record, however, let her down, as she recorded four DNFs out of nine races. This dropped her down to eighth overall. In 1997, she came back in the same car, but with a different team. Reliability really affected her season, and she only started six of the ten races, finishing three. Her best result was fourth, at Mantorp Park, and she was twelfth overall. Previously, she won the Opel Lady Cup in 1994, and seems to have started her career through the Swedish women racing drivers’ club.

Sandra Oscarsson - raced in Sweden and Germany in the 2000s, before retiring from motorsport very young. Her first full season was in 2008, when she raced a SEAT Leon in the JTCC touring car championship in Sweden, aged 17. She did not score any points. The following year, she went to Germany to race in the DTM-supporting Castrol ADAC Volkswagen Polo Cup, after being chosen by her team. She was 22nd overall. The same year as her JTCC run, she took part in endurance racing in Sweden in the SLC championship, winning one race at Knutstorp in a diesel SEAT Ibiza. She did another big endurance race in 2009, the Dubai 24 Hours, driving a Volkswagen Golf with Per Oscarsson. In 2013, she seems to have come out of retirement briefly for the SLC, with Per and Mikaela Åhlin-Kottulinsky, but it is not clear whether she got to start a race. Despite not actively racing, she still remains involved in motor racing, as a journalist and as a karting instructor. In 2014, she made some guest appearances in the Swedish Thunder Cars championship.

Dorry Pettersson (Wunderlich) - driver and team owner from the 1960s onwards. In 1965, she raced a Volkswagen 1200 in some rounds of the Swedish Touring Car Championship and also the Swedish Sportscar Championship. Her best result that year was a seventh place in a non-championship race. Later, she raced in the Lady Racing Club's all-female Mini championship in Sweden. In between, she was the car entrant for a Mini and an Opel in the STCC, which were sometimes driven by her future husband, Klaus Wunderlich. 

Therese (Tezz) Svensson - raced in Sweden and Denmark in the 2000s. She began in the JTCC in Sweden in 2005, driving a Ford Fiesta for her family’s TS Motorsport team. She carried on in the same car and the same championship in 2006, and was thirteenth overall this time. In 2008, she joined the Techprint AB team, and improved her finishing position to twelfth, still in the Fiesta. The same year, she made two guest appearances in the Danish Clio Cup, scoring a couple of points. Therese had aimed for the Swedish Touring Car Championship, but seems not to have competed since 2008.  

Birgitta Uppling - winner of the first edition of the Swedish Mini Lady Cup in 1976, after a dominant performance. She had been racing since at least 1970, when she competed in production saloons in another Mini. The same year, she teamed up with Lillebil Ankarcrona and Barbro Lundeberger for the Mantorp 24 Hours. Their Mini Cooper broke an axle in an accident and they did not finish. She may also have taken part in some other endurance races.

(Image from http://www.teknikensvarld.se/2008/11/28/6006/fler-svenskar-till-tysk-racing/)