9/10/1903 - 25/1/1954
Record updated 05-Jun-20
Eric Forrest Greene was an Argentinean driver of British origins born in Rosario in 1903. He spent his youth in England where he participated in a few races at the wheel of a Bentley. Forrest Greene continued his racing career when he returned permanently to Argentina to run his business as the Bentley and Rolls Royce agent.
Eric Forrest Greene was an Argentinean driver of British origins born in Rosario in 1903. He spent his youth in England where he participated in a few races at the wheel of a Bentley.
Forrest Greene continued his racing career when he returned permanently to Argentina to run his business as the Bentley and Rolls Royce agent.
In 1928 he won his first race in the Premio de Otoño driving a Bugatti and five weeks later, on 27 May, he won the important 500 Miles of Rafaela ahead of the Hudson of Domingo Bucci and the Mercedes-Benz of Carlos Zatuszek.
Forrest Greene continued to race, before and after World War II, at the wheel of different cars, including Maserati, Bentley and Aston Martin. Although he did not obtain other important results he remained an important motorsport personality in Argentina, being the centre of the British automobile industry and importer of Jowett cars, Aston Martin and BRM.
He was the mediator that set up Juan Manuel Fangio's test in the BRM single seater in 1952 although he was at the time a works Maserati driver. Forrest Greene and his wife Dora, also used to entertain the British drivers that went to race in Argentina.
At the end of 1953 he acquired Aston Martin DB3 chassis number 1. The following year at the 1000 Kilómetros de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires on 24 January he made his debut with the car sharing the driving with Carlos Stabile.
Sadly, on the fourteenth lap he crashed on the Avenida General Paz, the car rolled several times landing upside-down in flames. He managed to extricate himself from the wreck and ran towards the crowd with his clothes on fire but most of them ran away most of them ran away. Only two policemen bravely helped to extinguish the fire by covering the driver with their jackets. His burns were too severe and he died the following day in the Hospital Salaberry.
Many years later, the Aston Martin DB3/1 was rebuilt by his son, John "Jackie" Forrest Greene, who won the Argentinean Sport Fuerza Libre Championship in 1961 and vice-champion in 1964 and later the sporting director of the Sevel squad in the local Turismo Competición 2000 series in the ealry 1990s.
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