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During his twenties Henri Julien began working at a garage in Gonfaron, a small village 25 miles northeast of Toulon, France. During this time he started constructing his own single seater racing cars for competition in local races.
After a few years on hiatus, the creation of the new single-seater Formule France (later changed to Formula Renault) in 1968 spurred Julien back into racing car construction. He established Automobiles Gonfaronnaise Sportives and signed his former apprentice Christian Vanderpleyn to help built a new car, the JH4. AGS continued with designs for both Formule
Renault and Formula 3 cars, but success was slow in coming.
For 1978 Julien decided to enter Formula 2, yet again success was not quickly achieved. 1982
saw the signing of future F1 drivers
Philippe Streiff and
Pascal Fabre,
and in 1985 he moved the team into the new Formula 3000 series with Streiff
driving AGS then decided in 1986 it would enter Formula 1 racing.
The AGS-Motori Moderni JH21C made its first appearance at the Italian Grand Prix with
Ivan Capelli driving. The car was based on an old Renault Sport monocoque which Julien had purchased and renamed JH22 with backing from clothing firm Charro. The team hired Fabre to drive, though at the end of the year Fabre was replaced by Roberto Moreno who scored AGS's first World Championship point with sixth place in Adelaide.
In 1988 Streiff returned to AGS with some good showings in the JH23, though the team was struggling for sponsorship money. In August, the team was torn apart with the departure of technical director Vanderpleyn to
Coloni with his assistant Michel Costa and team manager Frederic Dhainhaut.
In March 1989 Streiff was paralyzed in a testing accident at
Rio de Janeiro and Julien decided to sell the team to French businessman Cyril de Rouvre. De Rouvre
arranged sponsorship from Faure and
Gabriele Tarquini was hired to replace Streiff.
The team's challenger, JH24, was uncompetitive and they slipped into the realms
of pre-qualifying. In the autumn the team was restructured with Costa
returning as chief designer. Hugues de Chaunac was appointed team director
and Claude Rouelle becomes head of R&D. The team landed backing from Ted
Lapidus, and Dalmas and Tarquini were re-signed. The team moved into a
purpose-built factory at the Circuit du Luc but things soon started to go wrong
with De Chaunac leaving after a couple of months. Costa departed as well but the
JH25 was developed and managed to qualify for some races in 1990, the best
result being Dalmas's ninth place in Spain.
Over the winter it became clear that the team was in very bad
shape. There was talk of a merger with Larrousse, but talks broke down and
the team was left to be purchased by Italians Patrizio Cantu and Gabriele
Raffanelli. The team was horribly uncompetitive and folded at the end of
the season. Out of F1, AGS formed a driving school for people wanting to
experience a drive in a Formula 1 car, which they still run today.
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