Who was Pierre de Crawhez? (Upd. inventor of circuit racing?)

Thomas Billicsich may be right about Pierre de Crawhez being the 'inmventor' of circuit racing (for cars) but the first circuits were still between towns, often a roughly triangular route. The world's first purpose built (ie off-road) circuit was Brooklands, Surrey, England which opened in 1907. I don't know when the idea was born or planning began, but work started in 1906.

We were present, in the 1904 Berliet, at the unveiling of a statue to him in Bastogne on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the 'Circuit des Ardeennes' in 2002

Baron Pierre de Crawhez was an important figure in Belgian motor sport in the pre-WW1 era. However he was not president of the AC de Belgique (at least no before WW1), but president of the sports commission between 1899 and 1910.
He was a regular competitor in the major races around 1900, often not finishing, but winning Bruxelles-SPA in 1898, becoming 5th in the 1903 Paris-Madrid race and indeed winning the 2nd Circuit des Ardennes in 1903.
His last car race seems to have been the Gordon Bennett race of 1904 on Pipe, in which he did not finish.
He apparently made regularly tours in the deserts of Algeria e.g. in 1901 (with a Panhard & Levassor), in 1905-1906 (with a Fiat, of which photos were shown in an earlier post on PreWarCar! Memory can be short sometimes ...) and in 1909 (with a fully equipped Pipe, as you see on these photographs).
There also was a Jean-Marie de Crawhez, who seems to have been his brother. He also was a regular participant in the early auto races and joined his brother Pierre in the desert tours.

Comment by Editor Rutger Booy: We should use own our search box a bit more often: http://www.prewarcar.com/index.php?view=search&searchword=crawhez&searchphrase=all&ordering=newest&areas[0]=prewar_magazine&option=com_searchextended

As far as i know Baron de Crawhez was the inventor of Circuit racing after the grear races from town to town got more and more dangerous
http://www.circuit-ardennes.be/en/historique.
Regards
Thomas

More pictures of the Baron and his aircraft
http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/pioneer-aviation/56488-breguett-pre-1914-challenge-452-a.html
stuart

Baron Pierre de Crawhez, certainly a Motoring man, and, as president of the Belgian Automobile Club, originated and carried out the Ardennes Races in 1902, and won the Ardennes' Race in 1903.
http://newspapers.nl.sg/Digitised/Article/straitstimes19020901-1.2.24.aspx

More about this Race's inauguration :
http://themotorsportarchive.com/2010/08/18/speed-before-spa-the-circuit-de-bastogne/

1903 Getty image of him winning :
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/baron-pierre-de-crawhez-winning-the-ardennes-circuit-news-photo/3278096

Could he however have decided that an African adventure was just his thing, since :
An entry in the book THE AUTOMOTOR JOURNAL. : First Half 1904
http://archive.org/stream/TheAutomotorJournalFirstHalf1904/automotorjournal1904a_djvu.txt

is as follows :
"Considerable importance will attach to the auto-
mobile meeting in Algeria for the Coupe Sneyden over a
flying kilometre, which will be held on February 14th,
postponed from January 24th. Already entries have
been received from Baron de Crawhez, with a 70-h.p.
Panhard ; Werner, with a Mercedes; Jenatzy, J. de
Crawhez, &c. ....................................

In the Coupe Sneyden, which was run in Algeria on
Sunday last, Baron J. de Crawhez secured the cup, in
the time of 32 sees, for the kilometre, with a 70-h.p.
Panhard. The kilometre race for tourist vehicles was
secured by De Bellemare on a 14-h.p. Renault in
57* sees,

Also a flyer, his Triplane, on show at the Eighth Annual Belgian Motor Show, held in Brussels from the 16th through to the 26th of January 1909
http://members.shaw.ca/flyingaces/br.pre1914/
Stuart