“Nina came to me and asked if she could write about Formula 1. I agreed!” ~ Andrzej Martynkin

We live in times when, thanks to the Internet, we can search for information about almost anyone in the world. One day, I found an old book titled “Formula 1: Legend and Reality” published in Warsaw in 1984 by Sport i Turystyka publishing house. I decided to learn more about the author. There was only one problem – Nina Lengyel did not exist according to the Internet search engines.

Nina Lengyel & Jacques Laffite (source: Lengyel N.: Formuła 1. Legenda I Rzeczywistość. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Sport i Turystyka, 1984)

Following the thread…

Starting my search for information about the author of books and articles on Formula 1, I sought help from Rafał Jemielita. He recognized Nina’s books because they ignited his passion for motorsports, but he had never wondered who the author was. Later, I got in touch with editor Andrzej Borowczyk. It was the first time I spoke with someone who knew Nina personally and even had coffee with her. This gave me the certainty that she truly existed! Over the next few weeks, I corresponded with people associated with Formula 1 from around the world, gathering fragmentary information about her and piecing it together. Finally, in a small café in Warsaw’s Żoliborz district, I met with editor Andrzej Martynkin – a long-time automotive journalist, rally driver, and three-time participant in the Camel Trophy. However, most importantly for this story, Martynkin was a close friend of Nina’s and told me about her journey with Formula 1.

Nina Lengyel & John Watson (source: Lengyel N.: Formuła 1. Legenda I Rzeczywistość. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Sport i Turystyka, 1984)

Freelancer

In the mid-70s, Nina Lengyel came to the editorial office of “Sztandar Młodych” with a proposal to write about Formula 1. She was directed to Andrzej Martynkin, who served as the deputy head of the sports department. In a brief conversation, she explained that she was the wife of Janos Lengyel – a well known and respected journalist working for a Brazilian media corporation. This opened doors for her into the world of racing and guaranteed first-hand materials. For the editorial team of the youth newspaper, she was a valuable collaborator as it allowed them to publish reports from an unknown and inaccessible world for media in The Polish People’s Republic. When she was accepted as a freelancer, she requested that all her payment be given to her mother – Katarzyna Maksimow. It was then that Martynkin realized he had heard a similar-sounding name before.

Nina Lengyel & Nelson Piquet (source: Lengyel N.: Formuła 1. Legenda I Rzeczywistość. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Sport i Turystyka, 1984)

The First Coffee

A few months after that meeting, when the journalist from “Sztandar Młodych” was invited by Nina for coffee, and he got out of a taxi at Długa Street 18/20 in Warsaw, he remembered he had been in that place before. About twenty years earlier, he had attended a party that took place in the same apartment where he arrived for a social meeting. When it was clarified that Nina Lengyel was actually Nina Maksimow, old school friends sat down to reminisce. It turned out that Nina had studied meteorology and had worked in Africa for some time. From there, as she said, she brought back a souvenir – a visible mark on her leg. Doctors had a hard time diagnosing it and even more trouble treating it. The mark accompanied her for the rest of her life.

prof. Aleksander Maksimow (source: Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe)

Family

Nina was born on January 11, 1936, in Warsaw. Her father was Prof. Aleksander Maksimow – an agricultural engineer, lecturer, and head of the Department of Peat Science at the Faculty of Water Management at Warsaw University of Life Sciences. He was highly esteemed for his contributions to the university and was renowned as an outstanding specialist in soil chemistry. He was considered noble-hearted, generous, and always willing to help. Little is known about Nina’s mother, Katarzyna Maksimow. It is likely that she married Aleksander in 1925. She was a French language teacher, which is how Nina learned to speak both English and French. After the Warsaw Uprising, Aleksander, along with his wife and daughter, was deported by the Germans to a concentration camp in Gross-Rosen, and from there, separated from his family, he was sent to the Mauthausen camp. He returned to Warsaw at the end of May 1945 and immediately resumed his work at the university. In 1948, the apartment at Długa Street 18/20 was transferred by notarial deed by Katarzyna to the School Dormitory No. 1 named after Wiktor Kordowicz in Warsaw.

Nina & Janos Lengyel (source: Fred Sabino)

Hungary

Nina’s husband, Janos Lengyel, was born in Hungary in 1919. He came to Brazil in the 1940s with only a little money in his pocket for a new suit. He initially worked at Correio da Manhã and later became the European correspondent for the Brazilian media giant O Globo. His great love was Formula 1, and he had been involved in it since 1950. He contributed to popularizing the sport in Brazil and actively supported efforts to bring F1 to Hungary. He spoke six languages fluently, which allowed him to conduct numerous excellent interviews throughout his career, including with Franz Beckenbauer, Yuri Gagarin, and The Beatles. He was modest but, as his colleagues recall, represented the highest level of journalistic craft, becoming a role model for many aspiring journalists who wanted to follow in his professional footsteps. On August 10, 1986, Janos’ greatest dream came true – the first Formula 1 race behind The Iron Curtain, the Hungarian Grand Prix at the Hungaroring. On Wednesday before the race, Janos felt unwell but dismissed it as a bad day. Two days later, he suffered a serious heart attack and was taken to a hospital in Budapest.

Janos Lengyel (right), Wagner Gonzalez (middle), Ayrton Senna (left), 1984 r. (source: Wagnera Gonzaleza via Fred Sabino)

Memories

Tamas Rahanoyi, with whom I had the opportunity to correspond, was responsible for organizing the first Hungarian Grand Prix in 1986. He remembered the Lengyels as wonderful people. He also recalled the dramatic scenes when Janos insisted on being sent immediately to Switzerland due to the poor state of healthcare in Hungary. Eventually, he was transported to Geneva by plane-ambulance. A few weeks later, on September 21, 1986, Janos had a second heart attack, which he did not survive. In recognition of his merits, the press room at the Hungaroring bears his name.

Hungarian Grand Prix ’86; Hungaroring press room (source: Fortepan HU / Tamás Urbán)

Switzerland

As Andrzej Martynkin recalls, Nina and Janos seemed like a happy couple and were very hospitable. After the meeting in Warsaw, Nina invited her school friend to Switzerland, where she lived permanently with her husband. The journalists had a spacious apartment in Geneva on Liotard Street. During their first visit to Switzerland, all three of them went together to the Italian Grand Prix at the Monza. Thanks to the Lengyels’ connections, Martynkin could move freely around the track and paddocks. Moreover, it was through Nina that he met Emerson Fittipaldi and his mother, whom he remembered as a very polite woman. He met the Brazilian driver and his family in a large camper he used to travel to races. It is worth mentioning that the first Polish person in F1 was Emerson’s mother – Józefina Wojciechowska – Fittipaldi. Nina conducted an interview with her titled “Who Has Seen a Mother Not Worried About Her Son?” The interview was published in the MOTOR weekly magazine in issue 51/52 of 1984. There were many occasions for revisits. Nina and Janos often visited Poland. After Karol Wojtyła was elected pope, Janos immediately flew to Warsaw to prepare materials for his publisher. He was shown around the city by my interlocutor – Andrzej Martynkin.

MOTOR nr 51/52 z 1984r. (source: private archives)

1986

Nina’s last book “Finally Alain Prost” was published in 1986. As Agnes Carlier told me, after Janos’ death, Nina was very lonely and stopped attending races, confirming at the same time that she was the only Polish journalist in Formula 1 at that time. Jeff Hutchinson also told me about her sudden disappearance, adding that Nina was a very quiet and secretive person. Meanwhile, Andrzej Martynkin remembered another significant episode. For some time, in the late 1980s, he had regular contact with Nina, and they had frequent telephone conversations. The journalist often said that she feared for her life, couldn’t sleep, felt followed and persecuted. It was evident that something disturbing was happening to her. Then, the contact suddenly ceased. Nina passed away on June 6, 2004, in Vernier, in the canton of Geneva. We know this from the “Feuille d’Avis Officielle” (the Geneva equivalent of the Public Information Bulletin) dated September 8, 2006. The announcement, which aimed to find potential heirs, referred to Article 466 and Article 555(2) of the Swiss Civil Code. It was announced that, according to the law, if heirs did not come forward within the designated period, Nina Lengyel’s estate, as a childless person, would be transferred to medical facilities and public hospices.

Nina Lengyel & Carlos Reutemann (source: Lengyel N.: Formuła 1. Legenda I Rzeczywistość. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Sport i Turystyka, 1984)

Nina Lengyel left behind a substantial journalistic legacy. She regularly published articles in “Sztandar Młodych,” “Motor,” and “Przegląd Sportowy.” She authored three books on the queen of motorsport, Formula 1: “Legend and Reality,” “The Year of McLaren,” and “Finally Alain Prost.” She wrote in a light, feminine style, putting the focus on the individual and the machine only in the second place. Her articles were a glimpse into a completely different world – a better, more colorful world with vast possibilities – for an average reader in the times of The Polish People’s Republic of Poland. So, it is not surprising that her materials became the foundation for the education of subsequent generations of Polish automotive journalists. For me, Nina Lengyel remained an enigma that I tried to decipher, and although I managed to unravel many threads, she still remains a mysterious Pole in the Formula 1 paddock.

Nina Lengyel & Rene Arnoux (source: Lengyel N.: Formuła 1. Legenda I Rzeczywistość. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Sport i Turystyka, 1984)