Early Life & Racing Career
Leopold was born on Schloss Umkirch near Freiburg im Breisgau in Baden-Württemberg. He is the eldest son of Prince Konstantin of Bavaria and his first wife Princess Maria Adelgunde of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen.
Since his parents separated soon after he was born, Leopold was raised by his grandparents Prince Friedrich von Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen and Princess Margarete Carola of Saxony. He grew up on Schloss Umkirch together with his uncle Prince Ferfried who is only two months his senior. It was there the Prince developed his love for cars and racing. He started his career with rallying and in 1969 moved to touring car racing winning the North American Championships with Porsche in 1972. In 1984 he also took part in the legendary sports car endurance race 24 Hours of Le Mans together with Walter Brun and Bob Akin, finishing fourth. In 1986, Leopold became a factory driver for the Munich based car manufacturer BMW and although he retired from competitive racing in 1998, he remains involved with the BMW racing team as an adviser.
Prince Leopold didn't just compete in Europe and America during his racing life. He competed in Australia also with a drive the 1984 James Hardie 1000 driving a Group A BMW 635CSi for Frank Gardner's factory backed team partnering former Formula One world champion Denny Hulme. In Australian touring car racing Group A was only a minor class 1984 before taking over as top class in 1985. After a troubled week which included the Prince crashing the BMW at the top of the mountain due to a lost front wheel, the pair finished the race in 15th place and 2nd in class, 4 laps behind the class winning TWR Rover and 15 laps behind the race winning Holden Commodore.
Read more about this topic: Prince Leopold Of Bavaria (b. 1943)
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