Notes:
A chemical engineer and car designer, Guido Bigio was a talented racing driver. He started his career in the early years of 20th Century, driving a Ceirano 8HP, in which he finished 2nd in class at the 1902 Susa-Moncenisio hillclimb.

With Matteo Ceirano, Edoardo Pavesio and other partners, Guido Bigio was one of the founders of the Italian car manufacturer Itala. Under the guidance of Guido Bigio, who took the role of general manager of the company, Itala began to produce large engined sporty cars in Turin, Italy, in 1904. At first the Italian make produced high-prestige cars, such as the 4.6-litre Tipo 24 and the 5.6-litre 8/22HP model presented in 1905, with honeycomb radiators, gate gearchange, low-tension magneto ignition, pressed-steel chassis.

Bigio and Ceirano were keen upon promoting the marque's prowess through competition. Ceirano won, leading Bigio home in a Itala 20HP 1-2 in their class, in the Susa-Moncenisio hillclimb in 1904. Then Guido Bigio won his class, ahead of Ceirano, in the Targa Rignano also known as Padova-Bovolenta race in that same year, driving the Itala 24HP. In 1905 he earned another 2nd in class in the Susa-Moncenisio hillclimb, driving a Itala 50HP.

Among the drivers who competed with the Itala team were the French brothers Henri and Maurice Fournier; Marquis Giovanni Battista Raggio, who won the Circuit of Brescia - Coppa Florio in 1905, beating De Diétrich, Darracq and Fiat cars; and Alessandro Cagno, the winner of the first Targa Florio held at the Madonie circuit in Sicily in 1906, at the wheel of an Itala 35/40HP. In that race, Ettore Graziani was second, Victor Rigal fourth and the wealthy amateur and former Mercedes exponent Baron Pierre de Caters fifth overall, all driving sister cars, this becoming the Itala’s greatest success. Attention was focused on the marque when Itala took another impressive win in the Raid Peking-Paris in 1907, when Prince Scipione Borghese and riding-mechanic Ettore Guizzardi, with passenger the journalist Luigi Barzini, won the harrowing marathon in an Itala 35/45HP, powered by a 7.4-litre four cylinder engine.

Sales continued with ever increasing volumes and also profits for Itala in the next years. Guido Bigio assumed a new designer, Alberto Balocco, and aside from his administrative tasks, he managed the works racing team and continued to drive the works cars. Itala participated in the 1907 Kaiserpreis, held on a gigantic 117.7-kilometer (73-mile) long circuit on the roads of the Taunus, a hilly region not far from the site of the current Nürburgring in Germany, and three times in the prestigious Grand Prix de l'Automobile Club de France, by far the most important race of that era. For the first race held at Le Mans in 1906, they entered three 120HP cars, to be driven by Cagno, Baron de Caters and Maurizio Fabry, but failed to finish.

For the 1908 French Grand Prix held at Dieppe, Guido Bigio guided the factory drivers Cagno, the Itala's French concessionaire Henri Fournier and the Itala mechanic Giovanni Piacenza, who was hired to drive the 12-litre, 4-cylinder with cylinders cast in two blocks of two cylinders each, known by the affectionate nickname of “Floretta”. Piacenza’s Itala was one of the first cars to drop out from the race due to gearbox problems on second lap, Cagno finished 11th and Fournier 20th. After the French Grand Prix at Dieppe, the Itala team cars were shipped to Savannah, Georgia, for the American Grand Prize road race, to be held in November of 1908. Cagno was forced to retire after traveling in fourth place for several laps, while Fournier finished eighth, and the unfortunate Piacenza crashed his entry.

In 1913 the Itala Grand Prix cars were fitted with a new 8.3-litre four cylinder "avalve", the engine presented in 1911 for production models. The company experimented with a range of novel engines such as variable stroke, sleeve valve, and "avalve" rotary types. Guido Bigio decided to file three entries in the 1913 Grand Prix de L'Automobile Club de France, scheduled to be contested on 12 July, in the 31.620-kilometer road course South-East of Amiens, Picardie region, in northern France. Bigio intended driving one of the firm's cars in the race, his companions being Antonio Moriondo and Felice Nazzaro.

In order to test out the racers about two months before the event, Bigio went to Brooklands, England, in the early days of May 1913, in company with his mechanic Crescentino Ardizzone and second driver Moriondo, and a number of mechanics, being the Amiens course still closed to racing cars. They remained at the track just a few days and then moved to France by way of Dieppe, Seine Maritime. The Itala team made arrangements to spend a few days in that town, only 100 kilometers North-West of Amiens, wishing to take advantage of the fast 76.987-kilometer somewhat triangular road course between Dieppe, Londinières and Eu, which formed the venue of the 1912 French Grand Prix. To avoid trouble with traffic, they decided to test the racing cars in early hours of the day.

At 03h00 on Thursday, 22 May 1913 morning, Guido Bigio and his riding-mechanic Ardizzone started from Dieppe intending to make a round of the course at speed and then to return to town. But unfortunately, less than an hour later an accident happened during the tests. While passing through the village of Le Mesnil-Réaume, towards the small town of Eu, Bigio lost control of the car. It went off the road, hit a tree and overturned, both men being pinned underneath. Guido Bigio was killed at the scene, only 31 years of age. His mechanic Crescentino Ardizzone who suffered leg fractures, was able to get off the wreckage and came to the roadside where he was helped by a peasant. Finally he was taken to Dieppe hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries at 17h30 that same day.

The causes of the accident were never fully understood. Having it occurred soon after 04h00 in early morning, there were no eyewitnesses and of the two victims, one died almost immediately and the other could give but meagre information.

Born in Busalla, province of Genoa, Italy, Guido Bigio was a single man. He was survived by his parents Antonio and Anna, née Solari; his sister Teresa and his brother Giuseppe. He is interred at Genoa cemetery.

Crescentino Ardizzone, 25-year-old, was from Turin, Italy. An accomplished mechanic, he was an Itala employee.

After Bigio's fatal accident the Itala team hired H. R. Pope, who was the Itala agent in the UK, to replace him as the third entry in the 1913 French Grand Prix. Came race day, Pope as the other drivers of the team Nazzaro and Moriondo, had engine problems and abandoned the race. The winner was Georges Boillot in a Peugeot.

The 1913 Grand Prix de L'Automobile Club de France was overshadowed by other fatal accidents. On 19 June 1913 the Italian driver Paolo Zuccarelli lost his life while testing his racing Peugeot on public roads in Normandy, in eastern France. Also, during practice for the motorcycle supporting race at Amiens, the French rider Paul Honel crashed at the Longueau turn and contemporary press reported him to be dead. But the news was not true and he eventually recovered. The race day, spectator M. Cornette was killed by Kenelm Lee Guiness' Sunbeam.

The 1913 French Grand Prix was the final presence of Itala in one of the Grande Epreuves. The death of Guido Bigio, at the time an important engineer and manager of the company, caused the definitive end of the racing activities. After the end of World War I, other Itala cars raced in Italy as private entries. One of them was the well-known yellow colored "Itala Special" in which Emilio Materassi won the 1925 Circuito del Mugello and a number of races in the 1920s, also called "Italona" (“the big Itala”) because its weight was over two tons.


Guido Bigio’s racing palmarès (incomplete):

• Book "Le Grandi Marche sportive" by Adriano Ceci and Vittorio Venino, Editoriale Domus/Quattroruote - Milano - Istituto Geografico De Agostini - Novara, Italy 1976.
• Book "Albo della Gloria: Al Piloti Caduti in Tutto il Mondo al Loro Posto di Combattimento", by Emanuele Carli, Modena, Italy, 1972, page 10.
• Book "Mercedes And Auto Racing In The Belle Epoque, 1895-1915" by Robert Dick, McFarland & Company, 2004, ISBN-10 0786418893.
• Book "A Record Of Grand Prix And Voiturette Racing" by Paul Sheldon, Yves De La Gorce and Duncan Rabagliati . St Leonards Press, Bradford, 1988, ISBN 9780951243305 [B1].
• Book "Almanacco dello Sport - Anno I (1914)" R. Bemporad e Figlio, Florence, 1914, pages 222/223.
• Book "Settant'anni di gare automobilistiche in Italia" by Emanuele Alberto Carli, Automobile Club d'Italia-L'Editrice dell'Automobile, Italy, 1967.
• Magazine Auto d'Epoca, issue of March 2004.
• Magazine Autosprint, issue 21 May 1986, page 7.
• Magazine MotorSport, issue of May 1993.
• Newspaper La Stampa (Turin, Italy) issue of Friday, 23 May 1913, page 6, article "Guido Bigio dell'Itala, morto insieme al suo meccanico in un accidente automobilistico", retrieved by website http://www.archiviolastampa.it/ [riding mechanic's name: Giovanni Ardizzone].
• Newspaper "Poverty Bay Herald" (Gisborne, New Zealand), issue of Thursday, 26 July 1913, article "Motor Fatalities", page 10, retrieved by website http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast .
• Website AUTOSPORT → Forums → The Nostalgia Forum, thread "Speed's Ultimate Price: The Toll", page 46, posting by "Hugo Boecker", message http://forums.autosport.com/index.php?showtopic=9705&view=findpost&p=1909857, citing [B1].
• Website AUTOSPORT → Forums → The Nostalgia Forum, thread "Happy Birthday", page 13, posting by "ReWind", message http://forums.autosport.com/index.php?showtopic=64776&view=findpost&p=1769898 .
• Website Classic Car, page http://www.thoroughbred-cars.com/cars/Italy/itala.htm .
• Website The GEL Motorsport Information Page by Darren Galpin, page http://www.teamdan.com/archive/gen/1913/1913.html .