by Unknown
On Friday afternoon, however, there was noquestion about the times, as Jenks wrote in Motor Sport: ‘The Old Man was right on form and inspite of the wet track was hurling the car throughthe bends in beautiful slides, while the young man(Collins) was making everyone sit up and take notice by doing exactly the same and at just the samespeed. These two were easily the fastest and recorded 9’ 51.2” and 9’ 51.5” respectively, with Castellotti third with 9’ 54.4”.’ Next up was StirlingMoss on the new 250F Maserati, but he could notget under 10 minutes, recording 10’ 03.4”.Peter Collins made the best start and wasfirst into the South Curve, followed by Moss andFangio, but as they roared past the pits to start thesecond lap it was Fangio who led from Collins andMoss, with a good lead over the next trio of JeanBehra and Roy Salvadori (Maseratis) and de Portago (Ferrari).And that was it, really. Fangio led from startto finish and stamped his authority on the race ina way that he had been unable to do in 1954. Initially, Collins stayed with him. Driving brilliantly,the young Englishman was never more than 2-3seconds behind Fangio and on the second lap theyboth broke Lang’s outright record officially with 9mins 51.0 secs.As Denis Jenknson remarked, ‘There was nodoubt now that the Lancia-Ferraris were in a similar position to Mercedes-Benz in last year’s GrandPrix races, and once more it was Fangio who wasin control with a young British driver sitting on histail learning all about Grand Prix racing. Last yearit had been Moss, this year Collins, and Fangio isold enough to be father of both of them.’The Old Man and the two youngsters nowbegan a determined attack on the lap record. Onlap seven first Collins recorded 9’ 47.6”, then Mossknocked a second off that, only for Pete to replywith 9’ 45.5” on lap eight. Moss came back with 9’45.3”, but at the end of that lap Collins came into thepits, groggy from fumes as a result of a split fueltank.
Now Fangio got into the act again, recording 9’ 44.9” on lap 10. At half-distance (11 laps) he led Moss by some 20 seconds, with Behra, de Portagoand Castellotti a long way behind. On lap 14 Fangio made everyone else look positively tardy witha sensational new lap record of 9’ 41.6”, almost 10seconds better than his pole position time.Peter Collins recovered and, chasing valuable Championship points, took over de Portago’sLancia-Ferrari, but in his efforts to make up lostground he overdid it between the Karussell andSchwalbenschwanz and slid off the road. Therewas now just one Lancia-Ferrari left in the raceand that was in the hands of the new King of the Nurburgring, Juan Fangio, who romped home towin the German GP for the second time, 46 seconds ahead of Moss in the 250F.Fangio went on to finish second in the lastGrande Epreuve of 1956, the Italian GP at Monza,securing his fourth World Championship. Thiswas in no small way thanks to Peter Collins who, seeing Fangio standing forlornly at the pits afterhis Lancia-Ferrari had retired, immediately gaveup his car, despite having an outside chance ofwinning the title himself.Nonetheless, Fangio had not enjoyed hisyear at Ferrari and for 1957 he signed with Maserati, while Collins stayed with Ferrari, where hewas joined by Mike Hawthorn, a partnership thatwould prove fruitless for the Scuderia, but whichwould provoke the final, majestic flowering ofFangio’s awesome skills.
Fittingly, this would happen at the Nurburgring in the German GP, butfirst Juan Manuel had a frustrating race in the 1000Kms, in which he was paired with Stirling Moss.Stirling had joined Vanwall for Formula 1, butremained with Maserati for sportscar racing andhe and Fangio were now paired in the 450S, a 400bhp, 4.5-litre monster that was not ideally suitedto the Nurburgring. Despite this, Fangio recordedfastest time in practice with his own car and second fastest with the similar one of Harry Schell/Hans Herrmann, which the organisers unfairlyput in second place in the line-up for the Le Mansstart.The 450S was backed up by a 300S in thehands of Jo Bonnier/Giorgio Scarlatti and theteam’s principal opposition came in the form oftwo Ferraris, a 4.1-litre for Peter Collins/OlivierGendebien and a 3.8-litre car for Mike Hawthorn/Maurice Trintignant. There was also a new threat from the DBR1 Aston Martins of Tony Brooks/Noel Cunningham-Reid and Roy Salvadori/LesLeston, Brooks having stunned everyone in practice by lapping in 9 mins 48.2 sees against Fangio’sbest of 9’ 43.5”. But Fangio’s best did him no goodat all for Moss, taking the first stint, stalled andlost much time before the engine would fire.Meanwhile, Tony Brooks was off and running, leading the race easily in the opening lapswith the Aston Martin. Although giving awaysome 160 bhp to the big Maseratis, the Aston had aspaceframe chassis that clung to the Nurburgringlike ivy to a wall and it took Moss eight laps towrench the lead away from Brooks. In the processhe set a new sportscar record with 9 mins 49.9 sees,but at the end of lap 10 it was Brooks who camepast the grandstands in the lead and there was nosign of Moss.
The Maserati had shed a rear wheelat Schwalbenschwanz.Team Manager Nello Ugolini immediatelynominated Moss and Fangio to drive the second450S and when Harry Schell brought the car in alap later it was Fangio who rejoined the race. Twolaps later he was back, for an oil cooler had comeadrift. After 17 minutes Moss took the car backinto the race, only to pull in and retire next timeround. The 3-litre car of Bonnier/ Scarlatti was indeep trouble, so in desperation Ugolini called inthe works-entered but privately-owned 300S ofFrancisco Godia/Horace Gould and Moss set offin that.Fangio took it over for the final laps and bydint of some very fast motoring finished in fourthplace, behind the winning Aston Martin of Brooksand Cunningham-Reid and the Ferraris of Collins/Gendebien and Hawthorn/Trintignant.
The Fates had conspired to rain on Fangio’s parade onthis occasion, but a month later he would have hisfinal day in the sun, one that will be rememberedfor all time.‘Practicing on two warm, dry days in succession, showed that we were to see epic motor racing in the 19th German Grand Prix,’ wrote Rodney Walkerley in The Motor. ‘Driving the “Monza”low-chassis Maserati, Fangio went round at therecord pace of 9 mins 25.6 secs (a Nurburg lap at90 mph!) which was no less than 26 seconds fasterthan his own 1956 lap record(Ferrari) - nearly two seconds faster per mileof tormented, twisting mountain roads.’Maserati entered three 250Fs for Fangio, JeanBehra and Harry Schell to do battle with the V8Ferraris of Mike Hawthorn, Peter Collins and Luigi Musso. These cars were the latest developmentof the Lancia-Ferrari with which Fangio had won the 1956 race, now without the fairings betweenthe wheels and with coil spring front suspension,being used for the first time.Mike Hawthorn was closest to Fangio inpractice, getting round in 9’28.4”. Next was Behra,2.1 secs slower and completing the front row wasCollins, with 9’ 34.7”. Unlike the previous year,when Collins had run Fangio very close indeed,he was off the pace here and it was Hawthorn whostepped into his shoes.
Making their first visit to the Nurburgring,the Vanwalls were no match for the Italian cars,being fifth (Tony Brooks), seventh (Stirling Moss)and ninth (Stuart Lewis-Evans) on the grid. Theywould play no part in the race.Knowing that his cars would have to make astop for new rear tyres, Maserati Team ManagerNello Ugolini decided to start them with their fueltanks half-full. Ferrari elected to run non¬stop, buteven with full tanks, Hawthorn and Collins ledthe race from Fangio for the first two laps. On thesecond, Mike broke The Old Man’s 1956 lap recordwith 9 mins 37.9 secs, only for Fangio to follow himwith 9’ 34.6”. As they passed the pits Fangio waslining up Collins and overtook him on the exit tothe South Turn.‘On the twisting downhill run through theforest he came up with Hawthorn,’ wrote RodneyWalker ley. ‘For seconds the two men raced elbowto elbow, and then Fangio drew past and led. ThenCollins passed his team-mate into second place.’Fangio now began Part One of the Drive ofhis Life in an effort to gain enough time on the twoFerraris to allow for his pit stop. He set new records on lap three - 9’ 33.4”; lap five -9’ 33.0”; lap six- 9’ 32.5”; lap eight - 9’ 30.0” and lap ten -9’ 29.5”.At the end of lap 12 he stopped for fuel andrear tyres, leaping out of the car for a drink whilethe mechanics did their work. His lead had been 28seconds over the pursuing Ferraris, but the stop tookan interminable 56 seconds and, for good measure,on that same lap Collins went round in 9’ 28.9”.But now Fangio’s pit stop lulled Collins andHawthorn into thinking that
he was in trouble. Asthey fled past the pits a couple of lengths apart theywere very much aware that the spectators in thestands were on their feet and waving frantically,‘Which meant just one thing,’ wrote Mike in Challenge Me The Race, ‘Fangio must have stopped.’In the heat of the moment they failed to seethe Maserati stationary at its pit and when, nexttime round, they were told they were 45 secondsahead of Fangio and then 48 seconds, they relaxedand eased up.
‘Victory seemed to be ours,’ continued Mike,‘and as we roared along the straight I motionedto Peter to come alongside and pointed behind uswith thumb down to indicate that Fangio seemedto be in trouble. He nodded, put his thumb up, thenpointed to me with one finger and back to himselfwith two. He wanted me to win and was preparedto come second himself...’ Peter and Mike had made a huge mistake andit would cost them the race, for Fangio was not introuble, simply getting used to his new tyres. Andhe was not a happy bunny, having rejoined therace almost 50 seconds behind the Ferraris afterhis prolonged pit stop. ‘I felt quite disappointed,’he wrote, ‘as I was losing a race that could win methe Championship.’A disappointed Fangio meant trouble for thetwo youngsters ahead of him and he now beganPart Two of The Drive of his Life on the Nurburgring. ‘I had learnt from experience that if youleft the car in a higher gear for some of the fastercurves, as long as you went in at the correct angle,you came out with the engine revving at a fasterrate on the straight, which made a difference interms of time. It wasn’t very comfortable, feelingthe lack of grip as the car went round, but after all,I had to win. I began to take nearly all the bends ina higher gear than I would normally have used.’The result was electrifying and gave Hawthorn and Collins ‘the fright of our lives. Fangiohad cut our lead by 12 seconds in one lap!’ Andthat was just the beginning. On lap 17 The OldMan recorded 9 mins 25.8 secs, reducing that to9’ 25.3” next time round and then 9’ 23.4” on lap19. ‘The Ferrari pit staff were in a ferment,’ recorded Rodney Walkerley in The Motor, ‘but the two Englishmen could go no faster... Lap 20 and uproar in the grandstand, hysteria in the Ferrari pit;they gesticulated and tore the air, they fell on theirknees to their drivers, and in the Maserati pit Ugolini smiled at his watch. Fangio was on their tail- three seconds behind with a lap at 91.84 mph.’As with his career, so with the lap record,for Fangio had saved the best till last, recordingan unbelievable 9 mins 17.4 secs. On the approachto the North Turn he caught the Ferraris, slippinginside Collins as they went into the huge concretebowl of the left-hander. But Fangio’s passing speedcarried him wide, and Peter dived through the gapinto second place again. Fangio replied almost immediately by passing the Ferrari with two wheelson the grass, throwing up dirt and stones, one ofwhich shattered a lens in Peter’s goggles. Fangionow went after Hawthorn. ‘I was driving right onthe limit,’ wrote Mike, ‘as we rushed through the endless tree-lined curves to the Hocheichen andon to the Quiddelbacher Hohe, but just as I was going into a slow left-hand corner Fangio pulled thesame trick, cut sharply inside me and forced meonto the grass and almost into the ditch.’
Fangio then put Masten Gregory’s Maserati between himself and Hawthorn and Mike was unable to challenge him again, but he was only 3.6 seconds in arrears as Juan Manuel took the chequered flag, to the thunderous cheers of the delirious spectators, who had been given a graphic description of that last, tumultuous lap by the on-course commentators. Despite his lengthy pitstop, his average speed for the race was 88.79 mph, faster than his previous lap record. The resurfacing of much of the circuit betweentimes will have had something to do with that, but most of it was just due to The Old Man’s phenomenal skill and daring.
That victory proved to be the last of his remarkable career, and secured his fifth World Championship. Looking back on the race in 1984, he wrote in My Racing Life, ‘The Nurburgring was always my favourite track, from the first day I drove on it, in an Alfetta in 1951. I fell totally in love with it, and I believe that on that day I finally managed to master it. It was as if I had screwed all its secrets out of it and got to know it once and for all... I had always been a man with faith in my own abilities and in the machines that were prepared for me to drive. Till that race, I had demanded nothing more of myself or of the cars. But that day I made such demands on myself that I couldn’t sleep for two days afterwards... For two days I experienced delayed-action apprehension at what I had done, a feeling that had never come over me after any other race, a feeling that still returns to me to this day when I think about that time. I had never driven as I drove then, but I also knew that I’d never be able to go so fast again, ever!’
STIRLING MOSS
1951 – 1961
‘Feb 19. Left for Germany. The roads to Nurburg are really awful with potholes, etc, due to war. Shocking weather, snow, hail, rain. Arrived at Adenau with no fuel, no money. Bought petrol at black market rates when changed a cheque, then came to the Ring! Wow! At first I thought I would never learn it, then gradually it came clearer, and now I have a fair idea of it.’ That extract from Stirling’s diary for 1951 records his very first look at the circuit on which he would score several of his greatest victories. He made the trip in a Jaguar XK120 (borrowed from the works) with his friend, Ian Burgess, in order to take a look at Spa and the Nurburgring, before moving down to Italy and checking out the Mille Miglia route. His next visit was in July, in a somewhat less exciting motor car, a Morris Minor. The 22 yearold was due to race an HWM in the 20-lap German Grand Prix and a Kieft in the 6-lap 500 cc event. However, an administrative mix-up meant that the HWM team did not get any entries and was withdrawn. Stirling did two laps in the Minor to refresh his memory of the circuit and in evening practice with the Kieft the next day he gave notice that he was a future Ringmeister with a truly sensational lap, winning pole position with a time of 11 mins 31.8 secs. ‘Old record was 12 mins 8 secs.’ he noted in his diary, ‘Very bumpy course, car bottomed twice, and fuel tank split.’ His time was not only 40 secs faster than the next 500cc car, it was faster than no fewer than five 4.5-litre Talbots entered in the Grand Prix! There were 49 half-litre cars on the grid (which comprised 11 rows) and the noise was deafening. It seemed to affect the starter, because he fell off his rostrum, causing some confusion and Stirling and Eric Brandon (Cooper) jumped the start. Both stopped and waited for the rest of the field, which dropped them back a few places, but at the end of the first lap Moss was 22 secs ahead of Brandon, with the Cooper of Alan Brown third. After two laps Stirling’s lead was 38 seconds and he was running away with the race, but during the next tour a steering arm broke and the Kieft slid to a halt at Hatzenbach, its front wheels at very different angles to the perpendicular. Nonetheless, he completed his one flying lap in 11 mins 42.5 secs, which proved to be the fastest of the race. ‘Had a nasty moment when it was seen that Moss was overdue.’ wrote Rodney Walkerley, in The Motor. ‘He had been ill in the tummy all night and felt (and looked) like death before the race, so I gave him a couple of anti-seasickness tablets to freeze his interior. It then occurred to me that perhaps he was allergic to such things and went off the road in a paroxysm of red-hot corkscrews. However, it was merely a broken steering arm, which cost him some £300 in starting money.’ Stirling next appeared at the Ring for the 1952 Eifel Meeting, where he entered both the F2 and F3 race in borrowed cars. No works HWM was available as two of the team’s four cars had lost a rear wheel during the Swiss GP the previous weekend and his Kieft had been written off in a multi-car shunt in Brussels the weekend before that. Not to be denied, Moss borrowed a 1951 HWM for the F2 race and his friend Derek Annable lent him his Kieft for the 500 cc event. Which turned out to be even shorter than his 1951 debut, for hardly had he completed the first lap well in the lead than a wheel fell off the Kieft at the South Turn, and that was that. To rub salt in the wound, Eric Brandon (Cooper-Norton) reduced Stirling’s 500 cc lap record to 11 mins 34.5 secs. Moss did better in the F2 event, making fastest lap in practice and leading the race for the opening two laps, but the Ferrari of Rudi Fischer had the legs of the HWM on the three-
kilometre straight and powered past on lap three. On the next tour the fire extinguisher in the HWM went off on its own accord, spraying Stirling with foam, with the result that after four laps the Ferrari’s lead was 16.5 secs. Fischer completed the 10 laps 41 seconds ahead of Stirling, who was relieved to have finished the race. For 1953 Stirling Moss Ltd employed mechanics Alf Francis and Tony Robinson and went racing with the Cooper-Alta Special. The brainchild of John Cooper (Sports Editor of The Autocar), Moss and designer Ray Martin, this had a much-modified F2 Cooper chassis, fitted with de Dion rear suspension and inboard drum brakes, with Girling discs at the front. Alf and Tony took it and the Cooper-Norton to the Nurburgring in Stirling’s new Commer transporter for the Eifel Meeting. Charles Cooper (of Cooper Cars) hitched a ride with them. Stirling drove there with his girlfriend, Sally Weston, in a Jaguar Mk VII and after the first practice session he took his team for a few laps, as Alf Francis recalled in his book, Racing Mechanic. ‘Tony Robinson and I sat in the front with Stirling whilst Charles Cooper sat in the back with Sally Weston. The Jaguar lapped the Ring in just over twelve minutes with five people up, which I considered very good indeed. Poor Charles Cooper, visibly perturbed, did not like it at all. ‘Tony and I did not worry. We chatted and joked whilst Stirling described the line he took through different corners in the Cooper-Alta: “Here the car does this; here it does that.” ‘He explained all the corners and I marvelled how he had learned so much about the circuit in such a short time. It takes a very active and receptive brain to memorize even part of the Nurburgring but Stirling seemed to be doing exactly the right thing at every corner. ‘Poor Charles Cooper was finished. When he got out of the car he disappeared and although he was with us in the pits during the race I never saw him again after the meeting. I think he must have hitch-hiked back to England with someone else.’ Stirling scored his first win at the Ring with the Cooper-Norton. Unfortunately, no one from the British magazines was there to report his success. He also finished sixth in the Eifel GP with the CooperAlta, finding its roadholding to be pretty awful. As a result a new Cooper-Alta with preselector gearbox and drum brakes all-round was built by Alf Francis and Tony Robinson in 11 days and was ready - just - in time for the German GP. Stirling qualified 12th fastest with a time of 10 mins 48.3 secs, as opposed to pole-setter Ascari's 9' 59.8» in the Ferrari. Minutes before the start Moss found that the car was stuck in second gear. «What can we do?» he asked Alf. «Nothing,» was the helpful reply, «You'll have to start in second gear, retire as soon as you can and collect the starting money.» Francis did not expect to see the car again, so was very surprised when Stirling completed the opening lap and flashed past the pits. He finished sixth and explained to Alf that in the heat of the moment he had started the race using the pre-selector as a normal gearbox, and it worked, so he carried on. Stirling scored his second victory at the Ring in the 1954 Eifel meeting, when he drove his BeartCooper. It was a lucky win, for the race was dominated by the Cooper of Stuart Lewis-Evans, who drove away from everyone and left Moss to battle for second place with Don Parker (Cooper). After three laps Lewis-Evans was almost 30 seconds ahead of Moss and Parker's Cooper had expired. On the fifth tour Lewis-Evans' Norton engine died on him shortly before the finish and he was passed by both Moss and Theo Helfrich (Cooper). He managed to push the car over the line to finish third, but was acclaimed by the crowd as the moral victor. After years of trying for success with British cars, Stirling 'went foreign' in 1954. His manager, Ken Gregory, had earlier tried to persuade Alfed Neubauer to sign him to Mercedes-Benz for their return to Grand Prix racing in 1954, but Neubauer already had Fangio in his pocket and was keen to have German drivers in his other cars. He told Gregory he felt that Moss needed more experience before he was ready for Mercedes and suggested that he join one of the Italian teams for a year. If he did well, Neubauer would consider him for 1955. Without telling Stirling Gregory went to Modena, stood in the middle of the town and tossed a coin. Heads he would approach Ferrari; tails he would try Maserati. It was tails, but he was told that Maserati already had their drivers finalised for 1954. However, they were building a 250F which as yet had no buyer. On an impulse, Gregory told them Moss would buy it, although he had no idea how Stirling was going to find the asking price of some £5,000. Eventually, the whole Moss family chipped in and the Maserati was his. Ever the patriot, Stirling insisted that it be painted British Racing Green. Alf Francis oversaw the building of the car in Modena and Moss made his Championship debut with it in the Belgian GP at Spa, finishing third behind Juan Manuel Fangio (Maserati) and Maurice Trintignant (Ferrari). As he was committed to Jaguar for the Reims 12-Hour race he opted out of the French GP and loaned his 250F to the works, which needed two extra cars for Ascari and Villoresi, as the D50 Lancias were not ready. In return, Maserati promised Stirling a new engine if his should blow up during the British Grand Prix. Freed from the restrictions of a private owner, Moss drove the 25OF hard and fast at Silverstone. He held a superb second place for 25 laps, behind winner Jose Froilan Gonzalez and ahead of the Mercedes of Fangio and Kling and the Ferrari of Hawthorn, only for the Maserati to glide to a halt nine laps from the end. The lack of drive was due to gearbox failure. Stirling was clearly quicker than the works Maserati drivers, Roberto Mieres, Onofre Marimon and Sergio Mantovani and the factory was just as clearly very much aware of the fact. On the first day of practice for the German GP Moss made his point in no uncertain terms, setting the fastest time with 10 mins 05.1 secs. w'He lost no time coming to the point. «They have just offered me a place in the works team. The car will be repainted red; they will take full responsibility and look after it and are prepared to give me reasonable terms.» Francis knew this meant that he would be out of a job, but he was convinced that Stirling was destined for great things and generously told him to accept Maserati's offer. He also reminded Stirling that the engine in his 250F was worn out. «It is never going to finish the race.» So Moss joined Officine Maserati at the Nurburgring but, repaying Alf's generosity, only after insisting that he and Tony Robinson went with him. Overnight the 25OF was repainted red, but Alf carefully left the nose in green. Onofre Marimon, a protege of Juan Manuel Fangio, was clearly worried by the fact that the private entry of Stirling Moss had put up a faster time than he had, and spoke to Alf Francis and Stirling about it. The next day he went out at the same time as Stirling and Alf was convinced that he was trying to stay with him, despite his lack of experience. He lost ground in the first two laps, then went off the road just before the Wehrseifen bridge on the third. He was killed instantly. Naturally, this cast a pall over the whole meeting and Maserati withdrew Villoresi from the race, but released Moss from the team so he could take part as a private entry. So he finally made his debut in a proper GP car at the Nurburgring and he put the Maserati on the front row, too, alongside pole-sitter Juan Manuel Fangio in the Mercedes and Mike Hawthorn in the Ferrari. However, Alf Francis knew what he was talking about when he had said that the 250F was never going to finish the race. Stirling made a great start and was third behind Fangio's Mercedes and Gonzalez' Ferrari at the end of the first lap. On the second the Maserati's big ends failed. In the Swiss GP at Bern, he held second place behind Fangio until the Maserati's oil pressure failed and then he led the Italian GP for 23 laps until the car ran its bearings. Moss finished the season having won a few minor races with the Maserati, but it had failed to finish every Grande Epreuve but one. However, he had made his skills known to Alfred Neubauer in no uncertain fashion and when he returned to the Ring in 1955, it was as a fully-fledged member of the MercedesBenz team. He arrived having scored two victories for Mercedes already. The first was something of a non-event, the second Heat of the free-formula Buenos Aires GP, but the second was to stand as one of the greatest achievements of his illustrious career, the Mille Miglia. With Motor Sport’s Denis Jenkinson as his navigator, Stirling had completed the 1000 miles at the shattering average speed of 97.9 mph and given the Mercedes 300SLR a stunning victory first time out. Aft
er coming within an ace of winning the Monaco GP, Stirling travelled to the Nurburgring, where he, Fangio and Kling were to drive 300SLRs in the 10-lap Eifel GP. On arrival they learned the dreadful news that Alberto Ascari had been killed at Monza. The next day Moss and Kling recorded 10 mins 19.0 secs and Fangio did 10’ 16.0”. On the Saturday Stirling got down to 10’ 05.0” and frightened himself badly when he went into the Karussell too fast and slid over the side. Fangio recorded 10’ 01.0”, putting everyone in his place. Nonetheless, Team Manager Neubauer made it clear to Stirling that Fangio was to win this race. “It was the only time in my career with Mercedes that I came under team orders,” recalls Sir Stirling. “Alfred Neubauer said it would be nice if Fangio won - and I got the message!” In the race Kling got the best start, but before the end of the lap the order was Fangio, Moss, Kling and on lap seven Kling’s engine ‘spread oil all round the bloody circuit,’ according to Stirling’s diary. ‘Juan and I continued first and second, one metre apart and I got fastest lap in 10’ 10.8”.’ Having enjoyed a lesson in Ringmanship from Fangio, Stirling must have been looking forward to driving the W196 in the German GP, but that was just one of a string of races which were cancelled in the wake of the Le Mans disaster. And at the end of the season Mercedes withdrew from racing altogether, mission accomplished. For 1956 Moss rejoined Maserati and also signed to drive for Aston Martin in sportscar races where the Italian concern was not present. The Nurburgring 1000 Kms was back on the calendar as a Championship event and received works entries from Ferrari, Maserati, Aston Martin, Jaguar and Porsche. There were three 300S Maseratis for Stirling Moss/ Jean Behra; Piero Taruffi/Harry Schell and Cesare Perdisa/Robert Manzon and their main opposition would obviously come from the 3.5-litre Ferraris - 4-cylinder 860 Monzas for Juan Manuel Fangio/Eugenio Castellotti and Fon de Portago/Olivier Gendebien and VI2 290MMs for Luigi Musso/Maurice Trintignant and Phil Hill/ Ken Wharton. Lesser threats were the DB3S Aston Martins of Peter Collins/Tony Brooks and Peter Walker/Roy Salvadori; the D-type Jaguar of Mike Hawthorn/Desmond Titterington and the 1.5-litre Porsches of Taffy von Trips/Umberto Maglioli and Hans Herrmann/Richard von Frankenberg. Fangio won pole position for the Le Manstype start with a time of 10 mins 03.0 secs and Moss was fourth fastest with 10’ 10.0”, but it was Stirling in the Maserati who led across the line at the end of the first lap and he proceeded to draw steadily away from the World Champion, being 37 secs ahead after 10 laps. Taruffi (Maserati) was third, followed by Hill (Ferrari) and Hawthorn (Jaguar). Five laps later and Stirling’s lead was up to just over 2 mins 30 secs, thanks to Fangio’s pit stop to hand over to Castellotti. On lap 16 it was the Maserati’s turn for a change of drivers and after 90 seconds Jean Behra was back in the race. But not for long, and Maserati’s hopes seemed to be dashed when he came into the pits after just one lap, stepped out of the car and took off his helmet. The rear suspension on the 300S had broken away from the chassis and the car was out of the race. The rules stated that if one car retired, the drivers (plural) could be transferred to another, so Team Manager Nello Ugolini quickly brought in Harry Schell and replaced him with Behra. The feisty Frenchman loved a challenge and, now in third place, he set about getting the Maserati back in the lead. He moved up to second when Olivier Gendebien pitted to hand over the Ferrari to Portago (they having taken over the Hill /Wharton car) and began to catch Fangio in the leading Ferrari. After 28 laps the gap between the two cars was 23.5 secs; then 20.2; then 18 and after 31 laps Behra was just 10 seconds in arrears. Next time round he stopped to give the Maserati to Moss. Stirling speeded up the proceedings by using the gravity feed pipes from two of Maserati’s pits to fuel the car and was back in the race after 57 seconds. After 33 laps, he was 1 min 06 secs behind Fangio and proceeded to reel him in, in the first of his several ‘Comeback Kid’ drives at the Ring. With seven laps to go Fangio’s lead was 54 seconds; Lap 38 and it was down to 42, then 35. On lap 40 the Ferrari made a frantic stop for a few more litres of fuel and then Fangio was away again, but it was too late, for Moss had gone by into the lead. As Cyril Posthumus reported in Autosport: ‘Three laps to go and Fangio was 25.5 secs behind Moss. Two to go, and he had lost three more seconds; one lap to go and there were 30 sees between them. Moss had another race in the bag, and once again Fangio had to give him best. The last lap... Moss at the Karussell... Moss coming through the Swallowtail... Moss now in sight... and Stirling Moss took the winner’s flag in a motor race for the ninth time this season, to the clapping and cheering of the multitude. Round the back leg he drove and into “victory lane”, there to celebrate with his codrivers in victory, Schell, Taruffi and Behra.’ Although this was the first of Stirling’s five wins at the Nurburgring, it was Piero Taruffi who had done the lion’s share of the work in the winning 300S, completing 16 laps to the four of Schell and 12 each of Behra and Moss. However, it was the latter two who had ensured victory for Maserati. Moss had beaten Fangio on this occasion, but on their next meeting at the Ring, in the German GP, Juan Manuel reversed the situation, showing once again that if Stirling had the edge on him in sportscars, he had the upper hand in single-seaters. The Grand Prix was preceded by a 7-lap race for sports and sports-racing cars up to 1.5 litres. In the latter category, Porsche entered four RS cars for Hans Herrmann, Taffy von Trips, Umberto Maglioli and Richard von Frankenberg; Maserati sent two 150S models for Moss and Jean Behra and there were two works, centre-seat Cooper-Climaxes for Roy Salvadori and Jack Brabham. There were also four AWEs from East Germany and Edgar Barth put his on the front row, with Moss, von Trips and Behra. Stirling's car was unpainted and had only arrived the day before, just in time for him to practice. It was Roy Salvadori who got away first, but by the end of the lap Hans Herrmann was in the lead, ahead of Edgar Barth, von Trips and Behra. Next time round Salvadori had moved up to second place, followed closely by Moss, the two swapping places occasionally. Unfortunately, Maserati had undergeared the 150S and Stirling found that he could not stay with the Cooper on the straight, despite hitting 7,900 rpm. The Porsche of von Trips expired on the first lap; Barth retired on lap five and Stirling managed to get past Roy on the final round, setting fastest lap in the process with a time of 10 mins 13.3 secs. He finished second, behind Hans Herrmann. During practice for the Grand Prix, Stirling found that his 250F Maserati was no match for the V8 Lancia-Ferraris, three of which (in the hands of Juan Fangio, Peter Collins and Eugenio Castellotti) got round in under 10 minutes, while the best he could do was 10’ 03.4”. The outright lap record for the Nordschleife still stood to Hermann Lang, who had recorded 9 mins 52.2 sees in his Mercedes W154 during his winning drive in the 1939 Eifel GP. In the opening laps of the GP, Fangio, Collins and Moss broke this handsomely several times, Moss getting down to 9’ 45.3” on lap nine, only for Fangio to settle things once and for all on lap 14, when he recorded 9’ 41.6”. From the start Moss held third place behind Fangio and Collins, moving up to second when Collins retired on lap nine. He could do nothing about Fangio and had a pretty uneventful race, enjoying the 250F’s reliability for once, although with two laps to go he passed the pits pointing down to his gear lever, indication that all was not well with the transmission. He completed the 22 laps 46 seconds behind the World Champion and almost seven minutes ahead of his Maserati team-mate, Jean Behra. For 1957 Moss joined Vanwall for Grands Prix but stayed with Maserati for sportscar racing. Fangio left Ferrari for Maserati and when the team arrived at the Nurburgring for the 1000 Kms race he was paired with Stirling in the fearsome, 400 bhp, 450S. They already had experience of this beast, having driven it in the Buenos Aires 1000 Kms race in January, but the clutch and gearbox failed when they were well in the lead. Then, in the Mille Miglia, Moss had the brake pedal snap off after just seven miles. The omens were not good for the Nurburgring. Officine Maserati fielded two of these cars for Fangio/ Moss and Harry Schell/Hans Herrmann and a 300S for Jo Bonnier/Giorgio Scarlatti. Scuderia Ferrari entered a 4.1-litre 335S for Peter Collins/Olivier Gendebien; a 3.8-litre 315S for Mike Hawthorn/Maurice Trinti
gnant and a 3-litre prototype for Masten Gregory/Olindo Morolli. There were two new, 3-litre DBR1 Aston Martins for Tony Brooks/Noel Cunningham-Reid and Roy Salvadori/Les Leston and although the British cars were fresh from a 1-2 victory at Spa, they were not considered a serious threat to the Italian cars - until the first practice session was over, that is. Then the writing was on the wall, for in wet and misty conditions, Tony Brooks was fastest with a time of 10 mins 16.5 secs. Moss was next with 10’ 32.5” and Umberto Maglioli third, recording a remarkable 10’ 37.0” in the 1.5-litre Porsche. On the Friday it was dry and Fangio restored the order, getting the Maserati round in 9’ 43.6”, but Moss could not break 10 minutes. Brooks could, however, and set tongues a-wagging with a sensational 9’ 48.2” in the Aston. On the Saturday Moss at last hit his stride and went round in 9’ 51.6” still slower than Brooks. Moss took the first stint and his race got off to a bad start when the Maserati refused to fire for many agonising seconds. He finally got away in the middle of the pack but the sheer grunt of the 450S allowed him to power his way up to fifth place at the end of the opening lap. Which was led, with some ease, by Tony Brooks in the Aston. After five laps Brooks was 23 seconds ahead of Harry Schell in the second 450S Maserati, but Moss was on the move. He passed Collins and then Schell on lap six and at the end of lap eight swept past Brooks on the 3-km straight. In the process he demolished Fangio’s 1956 lap record of 10 mins 05.3 sees with a time of 9’ 49.9”. His lead was short-lived, for on lap 10 the Maserati broke a halfshaft at Schwalbenschwanz and the right rear wheel went bouncing into the fields. Stirling managed to bring the car to a halt without hitting anything and hitched a ride back to the pits. By the time he arrived Team Manager Nello Ugolini had replaced Harry Schell with Fangio in the second 450S, but after 16 laps Fangio was in for repairs, the fuel tank having come adrift. Two laps later Moss took it back into the race, now in 17th position. One lap was enough to tell him that the car was undriveable and so he retired. As the Bonnier/Scarlatti 3-litre was in trouble with a broken shock absorber, Ugolini called in the 300S of private entrant Francesco Godia and Moss leapt into that, rejoining the race in 10th spot. By lap 35 he had moved up to fifth, losing that position momentarily when he stopped for fuel. Fangio then took over, regained fifth position and that was where the Maserati finished, one lap behind the victorious Aston Martin of Tony Brooks and Noel Cunningham-Reid. Moss and Fangio had both driven three cars and only had fifth place to show for it - not a good day at the office. Things did not improve for Stirling in the Grand Prix. Fresh from his brilliant victory in the British GP, Moss (and his teammates) quickly discovered that while the Vanwall’s suspension was fine and dandy for the flat fields of Aintree it was hopeless in the Eifel mountains. Tony Vandervell entered three of his cars for Moss, Tony Brooks and Stuart Lewis-Evans, but all were way off the pace in practice. Brooks and Moss were only fifth and seventh fastest, with Lewis-Evans tenth and Brooks was no fewer than 10.5 sees slower than Fangio’s pole position time with the 250F Maserati. ‘Observing around the second half of the circuit,’ wrote Denis Jenkinson in Motor Sport, ‘one saw that the Vanwalls were reluctant to stay in the Karussell “ditch”, either driving too far in or sliding out... The bouncing and spinning of the Vanwall rear wheels could be heard from afar, while all along the course the steering wheel kick and front wheel patter were very noticeable.’ The race was a disaster for the Vanwall equipe, as Lewis-Evans crashed due to a seized gearbox, Moss came home in fifth spot, almost five minutes behind the winner, Juan Manuel Fangio and Brooks finished ninth. The team’s only consolation was that the spectators had barely noticed their poor performance, as one and all were entranced by Fangio’s heroic victory over the Ferraris of Mike Hawthorn and Peter Collins. Despite 14 appearances at the Ring, Stirling had yet to establish himself as a Ringmeister, but he was to put that right in no uncertain fashion with superb consecutive victories in the next four years. Strapped for cash, Maserati had been forced to withdraw from racing at the end of 1957 and so Stirling joined Aston Martin for the coming season, staying with Vanwall for Grands Prix. He had enjoyed being a part of David Brown’s team, so ably run by John Wyer, in 1956 and, in common with everyone else, he had been mightily impressed with the way Tony Brooks and the DBR1 had demolished the much more powerful opposition in the 1957 1000 Kms. Astons took three DBR1s to the Ring for the 1958 event, confident of repeating their stunning success of the year before now that they had strengthened their team by the addition of Moss. Also in their favour, supposedly, was the fact that there was now a 3-litre capacity limit to the Sportscar World Championship and they had been racing 3-litre cars since the start of the decade. However, Enzo Ferrari had produced his new Testa Rossa, which had already swept all before it in the Buenos Aires 1000 Kms, the Sebring 12 Hours and the Targa Florio. Nonetheless, with Moss and Brooks on board, Astons were in a very strong position at the Ring. Stirling was paired with the up-and-coming Jack Brabham, Tony Brooks with Stuart Lewis-Evans and Roy Salvadori with Carroll Shelby. Ferrari had a very powerful line-up, too, comprising Mike Hawthorn/Peter Collins; Taffy von Trips/Olivier Gendebien and Luigi Musso/ Phil Hill. Then there were the very fast 1.5-litre Porsches of Jean Behra/Edgar Barth; Paul Frere/ Harry Schell and Richard von Frankenberg/Carel de Beaufort. During the first practice session Moss found that his DBR1 was over-geared and that its 3.36 final drive would only produce 5,900 rpm. He was second fastest with 9 mins 45.6 secs, behind the Ferrari of Hawthorn and Collins, who did 9’ 45.3” and 9’ 46.2” respectively. Stirling complained to Reg Parnell, who had now taken over from John Wyer as Astons’ Team Manager. ‘I told him that the car was much too overgeared and asked if I could have a 3.62 ratio put in for the next day, assuring him that I would back off on the straight and down the Fuchsrohre.’ said Moss in Racing With The David Brown Aston Martins. ‘Reg agreed, but next morning I realised that he had only dropped to a 3.5, so I came in and said, “I’m sorry Reg, but I’m afraid we’re going to have to change the engine.” ‘”Why,” he said, “what’s wrong?” ‘”I know you dropped the ratio to 3.62,” I said, keeping a very straight face, “but as I’m only getting 6,300 rpm when I should be getting 6,500, obviously the engine’s off-tune.” Reg was very surprised that I’d found him out and he had to admit it. He changed the axle again for the race.’ And to great effect, for Stirling made his usual superb Le Mans-type start and completed the opening lap almost 12 seconds ahead of the Ferrari of Mike Hawthorn. He held the lap record of 9 mins 49.9 sees (set with the 4.5-litre Maserati) and broke it on his first flying lap with 9’ 47.0”, reducing it on lap three to 9’ 43.0”. In fact he broke the old record every lap for his first ten laps. His demand for the lower ratio paid handsome dividends, as he explains: “More than anywhere else that I can think of, the Ring was where you wanted to be very low-geared, because you were only flat-out about three times - once on the straight; once through Flugplatz (where you only just touched maximum) and then after Fuchsrohre. If you’re low-geared you get to the maximum revs early, so you’re going to have to back off. Let’s say you peak 300 yards before the end of the straight, it means you’re rolling back off the throttle for 300 yards and at the Ring, more than anywhere else, instead of being 300 rpm too high-geared, you’re bang on. The lower the ratio the faster you get to the maximum speed of that ratio and you then lift off, so although your maximum speed is lower, you have better acceleration.” The regulations stated that a driver could only do a maximum of three hours at the wheel at any one time, with no maximum time during the race. Astons’ plan was for Moss to make the most of this, as Jack Brabham had very little experience of the Ring and none of the DBR1. Due to the high rate of tyre wear, it was decided that Stirling would do the opening 10 laps, then Jack would keep the seat warm for three, after which the tyres would be changed. Moss would do the next 11 laps, Brabham the next five and Moss the final 15. The plan worked like clockwork. Brabham took over from Moss after 10 laps, but was naturally no match for Mike Hawthorn in the Testa Rossa, who soon caug
ht him and took the lead. After 12 laps he was 70 secs ahead and next time round Jack stopped on schedule, all four wheels were changed and Moss shot back into the race. Hawthorn then suffered a blow-out and lost time getting back to the pits. While the Ferrari was being refuelled and re-shod, Moss regained the lead and pulled further and further away from Peter Collins, who had taken over the Ferrari. By half-distance, Stirling led Peter by 2 mins 15.0 sees. Brabham held the position for his final five laps and then the rear tyres on the Aston were changed and Moss took over for the last spell. By lap 33 his lead had grown to 4 minutes and he eased up to win by 3 mins 44.0 secs from the Ferraris of Hawthorn/Collins, von Trips/ Gendebien and Musso/Hill. 'It is said that the finest drivers are outstanding on the most difficult circuits;' wrote Peter Gamier in The Autocar, ‘if this is so then Stirling Moss, with a superb demonstration at the wheel of an Aston Martin DBR1-300 in the 1000-km race at the Nurburgring last Sunday, is now the supreme champion. He drove for 36 of the 44 laps, a total distance of 510 miles - six hours of motoring on what is acknowledged to be the world’s most punishing circuit for both car and driver. In doing so he also broke the lap record by 6.9 sees and raised the race average from last year’s event (also won by Aston Martin) by 1.87 mph.’ With that remarkable drive Stirling finally established himself as a Ringmeister, but at some cost, as he revealed in Racing With The David Brown Aston Martins: ‘It took me longer to get over that race than any other I can remember. Afterwards I had some food in the bath and felt completely dead-beat and quite ill - my pulse-rate was up from its normal 70-75 to 130. Next morning, after only a few hours sleep at the Sporthotel, I was up at eight and feeling really bad! I was always extremely fit, but I really over-drove that day, doing 36 of the 44 laps. I’d driven terribly hard for much too long and it took me a week to get over it -even more than I’d needed after the Mille Miglia.’ He had no such problems in the Grand Prix three months later, for his race lasted just three laps. Vanwall arrived at the Ring after a spate of engine failures, so there were only two cars, for Moss and Brooks. They were up against the three Dino Ferraris of Mike Hawthorn, Peter Collins and Wolfgang von Trips and it was Mike who set the ball rolling in the first practice session with a time of 9 mins 27.3 sees. Next day Stirling reduced this to 9’ 19.9” and Mike could only do 9’ 21.9”, but on the Saturday Hawthorn recorded a shattering 9’ 14.0”, beating Fangio’s lap record by 3.4 seconds. And Brooks was only one second slower, so the two Vanwalls and the two Ferraris shared the front row of the starting grid. Stirling made a superb getaway and completed his standing lap in 9 mins 26.6 secs, to lead Hawthorn by 6 secs. Next time round and he stopped the clocks at 9’ 16.6” - a new record - only to demolish that on lap three with 9’ 09.2”. He now had a lead of 18 seconds over Hawthorn, who was in close company with Mon Ami Mate, Peter Collins. 'The car was still full of fuel and I really reckoned at that time that I could get down to under nine minutes when the fuel load had been lightened.' wrote Stirling a couple of years later in A Turn At The Wheel. ‘This would have been quite something; the Ring has never been lapped in under nine minutes. I still think it could have been done. Everything was right, I was only taking the car to a little over 7,000 rpm. I was feeling in terrific form; the car was going splendidly and was handling particularly well. ‘Then suddenly the engine stopped. It was just as if you had turned the ignition key off. What had actually happened was that a tiny screw inside the magneto had come adrift, dropped down and shorted it out.’ And also out was Stirling, who had come to a halt just before Schwalbenschwanz and had to watch the two Ferraris go by (with Collins now in the lead) some 20 seconds ahead of Tony Brooks, who would win the Grand Prix after a masterly drive. But the race was marred by the death of Peter Collins, whom Stirling had known since they began racing as teenagers. ‘His death was a blow to us all,’ he wrote in A Turn At The Wheel, ‘a loss that was not assisted by the furore that followed it. Always on these occasions one is asked: “Will you give up racing?” ‘At the risk of appearing hard-hearted and unfeeling, I will say that I think this is a fatuous question. If a friend or an acquaintance dies of congestion of the lungs, you don’t stop breathing in sympathy. If an airliner crashes killing everyone on board nobody asks the airline if it will stop flying passenger aircraft. If we had all stopped motor racing after Peter’s death it still would not have brought him back... His death was a shock to us all, but I cannot, in honesty, say that the thought of giving up motor racing because of it crossed my mind.’ Although his Aston Martins had now won the 1000 Kms twice, David Brown decided not to go for the hat-trick in 1959. Instead, he moved into Grand Prix racing and restricted his sports cars to the one race he had been trying to win for 10 years - Le Mans. However, Stirling Moss was well aware that the DBR1 could have been made for the Nurburgring, so he thought he had better have one for the race. “The DBR1 was one of the most driveable cars that one could get,” he recalls. “If you knew what you were doing you could position the car on the throttle, it was a very, very user-friendly machine. It wasn’t as quick as the Ferrari in a straight line by any means, but it would allow you to get your foot on the throttle earlier and go through the corners faster because it was so agile. That’s what made it such a stunning car. «You could gain time at the Flugplatz (which was very fast) and then down Fuchsrohre, because you could hold it so much closer to the limit than something that wasn't as user-friendly. Then there was the descent to Adenau, with several corners that weren't quite flat where you had to roll off the throttle in 2nd or 3rd. All the way down there the Aston was very, very good and I would say very much better than the Ferraris. “In 1955 I set fastest lap in the Eifel race with the Mercedes 300SLR at 10 mins 10.8 secs. My new lap record with the Aston in 1959 was 9’ 32.0” more than 40 seconds quicker, which is astonishing. Of course, I wasn’t racing Fangio in 1955, just following him closely, whereas in 1959 I was in a real race and trying to make up for lost time. But 40 seconds is an amazing difference and shows just how good the Aston was.” So good, indeed, that Stirling called John Wyer and offered powerful team for ‘59. Tony Brooks left Astons for Ferrari, where he joined Phil Hill and Olivier Gendebien. They were supplemented by Dan Gurney, Cliff Allison and Jean Behra, all of whom were keen to score Ferrari’s first victory in the 1000 Kms since 1953. In practice Stirling began with the 3.62 rear axle he had used the previous year, but found he was only getting between 5,800 and 5,900 rpm. «I still felt the axle was too high,» he recalled in Racing With The David Brown Aston Martins, “and we put in a 3.74 ratio which gave me 6,000 rpm. I then did 9 mins 43.1 secs (just .01 secs outside my lap record) and Jack did 10’ 16.7”. The next day Behra and Brooks in Ferraris did 9’ 37.0” and 9’ 39.0” respectively and Dan Gurney did 9’ 41.0”, so we needed to go a bit quicker, and I felt sure we could.” And how! At the end of the opening lap Stirling was 15 seconds ahead of the next man, Dan Gurney, in the Testa Rossa. With five laps completed his lead was 47 seconds which meant, as Denis Jenkinson noted in Motor Sport, ‘that he had appeared over the horizon, gone past the pits, round the Sudkehre, back up behind the pits and round the Nordkehre while Gurney was still coming up the Tiergarten rise leading to the pits plateau.’ “I drove very hard indeed for 17 laps before handing over to Jack,” says Stirling, “having broken my old lap record on 16 of them! I left it at 9’ 32.0” - eleven seconds faster than the previous year.” Jack Fairman took the Aston back into the race after a stop of just 67 seconds but, as he did so, it began to rain. The Ferraris of Gendebien, Allison and Behra now went after him, scenting blood. They began to reduce his considerable lead lap by lap, only to have the race gifted to them or so it seemed - when, on his sixth lap, Fairman slid off the road and into the ditch on the approach to Brunnchen. He tried levering the car out of the ditch with a fence-post and when that failed, he used his considerable strength to heave it back onto all four wheels and then drove to the pits. Where Stirling was impatiently waiting to take over, but the minutes went by, as did the Ferraris of Gendebien and Behra,
Olivier making a spinning motion with one hand. Stirling accepted defeat. ‘He’d been gone so long I was convinced that he’d really stuffed it and was out of the race, so I had packed up my helmet, gloves and goggles and was just about to take off my overalls when they yelled that he was coming in. I pulled everything on again, yanked Jack out of the car almost before it had stopped rolling and was off. ‘I thoroughly enjoyed myself from then on. Here was a great chance for me to have a go at the sort of motor racing I enjoyed the most - one Aston Martin against the full Ferrari team. I did ten laps and gave the car back to Jack with a two-minute lead.’ Well, yes, but Stirling’s modesty fails to convey anything of the majesty of his phenomenal drive, which Denis Jenkinson described in awestruck tones: ‘The track was drying out fast and Moss lost no time in catching the Porsche (of Maglioli) and set out after the two Ferraris, which were now over a minute ahead, the third Ferrari having stopped to refuel, change all four wheels and let Gurney take over. The way Moss closed on the Ferraris was quite fantastic and gave the impression that the Aston Martin was a far superior car, whereas in fact it was the sheer brilliance of the Moss ability that was doing it.’ After 33 laps Stirling handed over to Fairman with a lead of 2 mins 43 sees, but Phil Hill in the leading Testa Rossa demolished this and overtook the Aston as Fairman stopped to let Moss take over for the final ten laps. He was not to be denied. ‘Moss was wildly encouraged by the crowd, and each one of his spectacular comebacks in the race was an extraordinary sight,’ wrote Bernard Cahier, in Road & Track. ‘The people were on their feet shouting and yelling and on the entire circuit you could see handkerchiefs and scarves waving as he went by. Although he was busy driving, he still found time to wave back at the crowds, delighting them even more.’ Stirling passed Phil at Flugplatz and went away from the Ferrari to take the chequered flag 41 seconds ahead of it. As I wrote in Sportscar Heaven: ‘Juan Fangio’s epic drive in the 1957 German Grand Prix has rightly passed into legend, but was it really more remarkable than Stirling’s in this 1,000 Kms race? I think not. Consider the facts: ‘After a lengthy pit stop which cost him his lead, Fangio in his 250F Maserati made up almost a minute in 11 laps to catch and pass the Ferraris of Mike Hawthorn and Peter Collins and during the 22-lap race he broke his 1956 lap record ten times. ‘That was a fabulous peformance to be sure, but get this: in the 1959 1000 Kms race Moss drove for 36 of the 44 laps and had to regain his lead not once, but twice. In the process he broke his 1958 sportscar record on no fewer than 16 occasions and put 5 minutes and 40.0 seconds - approaching eight and a half miles - between himself and the leading Ferrari in the opening 17 laps, which almost defies belief. Surely Stirling’s performance that day surpassed even that of Fangio in the pantheon of Great Drives, and I cannot think of anyone who has even approached either since.’ There was no German GP at the Nurburgring in 1959 because the AvD, in its wisdom, moved the race to AVUS, and in 1960 it was reduced to an F2 event, which was run on the Sudschleife. This did not, however, prevent Stirling Moss from adding another couple of victories to his name. Having completed the hat-trick for Aston Martin and the DBR1 in the 1000 Kms, he did the same for himself by winning again in 1960. However, Astons had ceased racing sportscars altogether and it was extremely unlikely that even Stirling could pull yet another victory out of the hat with what was now a four-year-old car, so this time he raced a Maserati, the fascinating Tipo 61 Birdcage, so called because its chassis was an absolute maze of small-diameter tubes. No bird could have survived in it and the Nurburgring commentator named it ‘spaghetti-auto’, which was much more appropriate. Two of these cars had been bought by the American, Lucky Casner, who had persuaded Goodyear to finance his Camoradi racing team and Maserati to prepare the cars for him. Stirling drove one at Sebring with Dan Gurney and they were well in the lead with about four hours to go when the final drive packed up. Then Umberto Maglioli and Nino Vaccarella were leading the Targa Florio when a punctured fuel tank brought the Maser to a halt. Two cars were prepared for the Nurburgring, as Peter Gamier noted in The Autocar: ‘Camoradi USA entered a couple of 2.8-litre Birdcage Maseratis, which must be the finest living illustrations of how far the racing-sports car has deviated from its production, for-use-on-the-road counterpart. The cars had just come from Modena where they had been completely overhauled after the Targa. Bertocchi looked after them and they were as near a works team as makes no difference. These were driven by Moss and Gurney and Masten Gregory and Gino Munaron.’ They were up against a bevy of Ferraris, including two V12 Testa Rossas for Phil Hill/Taffy von Trips and Cliff Allison/Willy Mairesse and RS60 Porsches in the hands of Jo Bonnier/Olivier Gendebien, Graham Hill/Edgar Barth and Hans Herrmann/Maurice Trintignant. Things did not get off to a good start for Stirling and Dan. The weather was awful, which is how Stirling described the Maserati in his diary after the first practice, adding that it was ‘overgeared with 6,100 rpm max - should be 6,6.’ On the Friday he managed to record 9 mins 50.1 secs, which was nine seconds faster than Phil Hill in the Ferrari, but Jo Bonnier then took his 1.7-litre Porsche round in 9’ 43.6”, which won him pole position for the Le Mans start. ‘Saturday was wet,’ wrote Stirling. ‘Car ready at 12. Dan did two laps and an oil pipe broke, so no practice for me. Suspension has been lowered and Dan says car feels better. We have to use Goodyear tyres at the front, Pirelli at the back.’ At 9am on the Sunday Moss made his usual superb start and completed the first lap 15 seconds ahead of Jim Clark in the Border Reivers DBR1 Aston and Masten Gregory in the other Maserati. In a steady drizzle Stirling did his first flying lap in 10 mins 29.3 secs. The conditions were such that he did not get under 10 minutes until lap nine, when he recorded 9’ 53.8”, reducing that to 9’ 49.5” one lap later. As ever, he was relishing the Nurburgring and the difficult conditions. He completed his 13th lap in 9’ 46.0” and next time round pulled into the pits with a lead of 2 mins 23 sees over the Bonnier/ Gendebien Porsche. After 66 seconds, Dan Gurney joined the race, the Maserati still in the lead. Five laps later Moss must have thought his chances of a hat-trick at the Ring were over, for Gurney brought the Birdcage into the pits, the cockpit awash with oil. A quick look under the bonnet revealed that, just as in practice, an oil pipe had broken. The mechanics worked feverishly to replace it and Dan rejoined the race 4 mins 37 sees behind the new leader, the Ferrari of von Trips. A thick fog now enveloped the Eifel, something not seen since Bernd Rosemeyer’s astonishing drive in 1936. Gurney rose to the occasion magnificently and carved his way through the mists, as did Jo Bonnier in the Porsche behind him. They caught von Trips and passed him on lap 28, Dan handing the Maserati back to Stirling two laps later. The order was now Bonnier, 60 seconds ahead of von Trips, who was 12 seconds ahead of Moss. On the next lap the von Trips Ferrari expired and, with the fog clearing, Moss closed inexorably on the leading Porsche. When Bonnier stopped to hand over to Gendebien after 36 laps Stirling swept by into the lead and proceeded to extend it rapidly, from 55 sees to 67 to 105 and then 122 secs. He set a new fastest lap in the process with 9' 37.0» and took the chequered flag for the third successive year almost three minutes ahead of Gendebien in the Porsche. It had been yet another great drive by the newest King of the Nurburgring and this time he was superbly backed up by Dan Gurney, whose luck at the circuit never matched his affinity for it. «Dan was one of the best drivers around in those days,» says Stirling, «and he was quite brilliant in that race. The Camoradi Maser was badly prepared, but it suited the wet conditions well. It had excellent brakes and a lot of torque, so it was quite an easy car to drive there, but I wouldn’t say it was better than the Aston.” Stirling very nearly pulled off an unprecedented fourth successive victory in the 1961 1000 Kms. He and Graham Hill had been invited to drive for Porsche in the Targa Florio and came within a gnat’s whisker of winning that, being forced out when in the lead with just over four miles to go. They teamed up again for the Ring, driving one of three 1.7-litre RS61s, the others being in the hands of Jo Bonnier/Dan Gurney and Hans Herrmann/ Edgar Barth. They were up against t
he Ferraris of Phil Hill/Taffy von Trips and Olivier Gendebien/ Richie Ginther and the Camoradi Maserati Tipo 61 of Lucky Casner/Masten Gregory. Despite bright blue skies on race morning, Porsche reckoned rain was in the offing and elected to start of Dunlop’s D12 rain tyres, a gamble that nearly came off. Moss made his usual great start and although initially headed by Jim Clark in the Essex Racing Team Aston Martin, he completed the opening lap six seconds ahead of the works Ferraris of Phil Hill and Richie Ginther, the Aston of Clark and the NART Ferrari of Ricardo Rodriguez. Phil Hill now began his sensational assault on Stirling’s lap record of 9 mins 32.0 secs (See Ringmeister 8 - Phil Hill), set with the DBR1 in 1959, taking the lead on lap two with a time of 9’ 31.9”, which put him 17 seconds ahead of Moss, who could not begin to cope with the Ferrari on his rain tyres. Richie Ginther then followed Hill past the Porsche and the order stayed the same until Richie stopped to hand over to Gendebien, when Stirling moved up one. He then pitted on lap 12 and Graham Hill went back into the race, still on rain tyres and in fifth position. On lap 16 it began to snow - fog last year, snow this - which played into the hands of Moss and Hill. Graham moved up to fourth place and was making time on the leaders in the very slippery conditions. On lap 19 he gave the car back to Stirling, who immediately began to close up on the Maserati of Gregory/Casner, passing it on lap 20 and then, when Gendebien spun due to his Ferrari icing up, Moss took second place and went after the Hill/von Trips car. Both the Ferraris made emergency pit stops in rapid succession, and although Phil Hill remained some 90 seconds ahead of the Porsche the Ferrari was sounding like a cement mixer and it seemed that Moss must take the lead. But Stirling never completed the 22nd lap, as the Porsche’s engine blew at Flugplatz. He made his way back to the pits to find his team in some disarray, as the Herrmann/Barth car was out and that of Bonnier/Gurney had lost more than three laps due to engine problems. However, there was a fourth car still running, an experimental Carrera fitted with a 1.6-litre engine and Porsche disc brakes. Driven by Herbert Linge and Sepp Greger, it was lying second in the 2-litre sportscar class, behind the Lotus XV of Doug Graham and Chris Martin. Moss and Hill were now nominated to take over this car and on lap 25 Stirling took the wheel. Enjoying the comfort of a closed car for the first time at the Ring, he set off after the Lotus. On lap 31 he caught up with the Elite of Peter Lumsden, who was not expecting to be overtaken by a very normal-looking Porsche and failed to make way for it. Moss visited the ditch while taking avoiding action, put a dent in the tail but continued. Two laps later he caught the Lotus XV and took the lead in the class, then handed over to Graham Hill on lap 36. Graham completed the final eight laps and the Porsche finished in eighth place overall, winning its class. And Moss, whose outright lap record had been reduced to an astounding 9 mins 15.8 sees by Phil Hill, had some satisfaction in making fastest lap in the Porsche’s class with 9’ 42.1”. Happily the Germans came to their senses in 1961 and the Grand Prix returned to the Nordschleife. Unfortunately, the FIA had lost its senses back in 1958 and decreed that from 1961 the maximum capacity for Grand Prix cars should be 1.5 litres. Predictably, this was met with howls of protest but the FIA stuck to its guns. As a result, Grand Prix racing was diminished in both size and stature, with exciting, 280 bhp racing cars being replaced by 180 bhp roller skates. John Cooper had followed in the 1930s footsteps of Professor Ferdinand Porsche and placed the engine behind the driver, and once Colin Chapman applied his genius to the mid-engined layout of his Lotuses the little ‘uns were soon lapping faster than the big ‘uns, but much of the drama and excitement had been drained from the sport. While the British teams had been complaining about the new Formula, Enzo Ferrari quietly got on with the job of turning his 1960 F2 car into an F1 machine, and the result was the iconic, Carlo Chiti-designed, 156 sharknose. A couple of nonChampionship races early in the season showed that Ferrari had got the jump on the Brits and that Lotus, Cooper and BRM were short on bhp and pace, compared with the red cars. However, in those far-off days it was still possible for an exceptional driver to make up for the deficiences in his car. Enter Stirling Moss and the Colin Chapman-designed Lotus 18. Stirling was now driving for Rob Walker, who had purchased a Lotus in 1960, but when he tried to buy the latest Lotus 21 for 1961, the deal was vetoed by Esso, which backed Lotus, as Walker was backed by BP. To make matters worse, the new Coventry-Climax V8 was not ready, so Moss and everyone else had to make do with the old four-cylinder F2 engine, which produced a puny 150 bhp, as opposed to the 190 of Chiti's new V6 Ferrari unit. For the opening Grande Epreuve at Monaco, Ferrari produced three cars for Phil Hill, Taffy von Trips and Richie Ginther, the latter’s fitted with the slightly more powerful 120-degree V6, as opposed to the 65-degree units in the other two. Rob Walker entered Stirling in the box-like Lotus 18 and, driving what was undoubtedly - till then - the race of his life, Moss kept the Ferraris at bay for the entire 100 laps, every one of which was faster than his pole position time. It is only fair to say that the extra power of the Ferraris was negated somewhat by the superior road-holding of the Lotus, but it is equally fair to say that no other driver in the world could have beaten the Ferraris in that car. Predictably, the red cars won the next four GPs and then the teams went to the Nurburgring. By this time Rob Walker’s Lotus had been up-dated with the rounded bodywork of the works cars and improvements to the rear suspension, but, even so, the Ferraris were favourites to win. More so by the time practice was over, for Phil Hill had stunned everyone, not least himself, with a banzai lap in 8 mins 55.2 secs, the first ever at the Ring in less than nine minutes and it is worth remembering that Moss was convinced that he could have broken nine minutes with the 2.5 litre Vanwall in 1958. Next fastest was Jack Brabham in the Cooper, now fitted with the first Coventry-Climax V8. He managed a splendid 9’ 01.4”, but the engine was brand new and troublesome, so he was an unlikely contender. Stirling was third fastest with 9’ 01.7” and completing the front row was Jo Bonnier in the Porsche with 9’ 04.8”. During practice Stirling was most impressed with Dunlop’s D12, high-hysteresis tyre on a damp track, although in the dry they soon shed bits of tread. Innes Ireland had won the recent Solitude race for Lotus using these tyres and was convinced that with rain forecast for the Grand Prix, using the D12s was a risk worth taking. Stirling agreed, although Dunlop’s Vic Barlow was adamant that they should not be used and refused to accept any responsibility if they were. Nonetheless, on race morning Stirling decided to fit them, even resorting to blackening out the green spot on the sidewall that denoted the D12s. Ferrari knew the rain tyres would never last on their cars, so they fitted regular R5s. Guest of Honour Juan Manuel Fangio dropped the flag to get the race under way and it was Jack Brabham who led initially, only to slide off the road, due to having rain tyres on the front of his Cooper and dry ones on the rear. Moss led the opening lap by two seconds from Phil Hill, the Porsches of Hans Herrmann and Dan Gurney and the BRM of Graham Hill. After four laps Stirling was 14.9 seconds ahead of Phil Hill, who was nine seconds in front of von Trips. Moss completed his fifth lap in 9 mins 13.5 secs, as the circuit was drying out and von Trips began to close on Hill, passing his team-mate on lap eight and setting a new lap record of 9’ 4.3” in the process. Stirling replied with 9’ 2.8”, only for Taffy to record 9’ 1.6”, reducing Stirling’s lead to 9.4 seconds, with Hill just 1.5 seconds further back. The Ferrari drivers were fighting each other for the World Championship, so there was no question of either one giving way in his pursuit of Moss. Hill and von Trips drove to such effect on lap 10 that both got round in under nine minutes, Taffy recording an astonishing 8 mins 59.9 sees and Phil being even faster with 8’ 57.8” - staggering stuff! As Moss crossed the line after the 11th lap the gap between him and von Trips was just 6.9 seconds, and if Taffy could continue his charge he just might pip Stirling to the chequered flag. However, as Philip Turner wrote in The Motor: ‘Slowly Moss’ lead rose to 7.5 secs to 10.7 secs. This increase under difficult conditions was by no manner of means simply a tribute to the rain tyres, it
was also the product of the superb skill shown by Moss time and again this season in just such conditions, and what better setting for the exercise of that skill than the Ring, a heroic circuit on the grand scale on which only the heroic excel. ‘Then on the 14th lap it began to rain again, a drizzle at first then with ever-increasing vigour and Moss led by 15 seconds, while Phil Hill closed right up on von Trips and passed him, only to be repassed on the next and last lap. So with spray flying from its wheels in the teeming rain, the Lotus came across the line as Moss won the 1961 German Grand Prix. Behind him, to the roar of cheers, came von Trips followed by Phil Hill and Jimmy Clark, the drivers making straight for their pits, there to leap into shelter from the pitiless deluge.’ The following week Turner wrote, ‘What an astounding European GP that was. The Ring to me fully justifies its Wagnerian associations, for there men walk with the gods and high drama is hand in hand with high tragedy. Men came away murmuring that no matter who wins the world championship of drivers, they had seen the champion driver of the world win a very great race.’ Quite. Sadly, that was to be the last Championship win of Stirling’s fabulous career, for at Goodwood on Easter Monday, 1962, he crashed inexplicably and raced no more. For many people that German Grand Prix remains his greatest race, but Sir Stirling himself is not so sure, as his drive at Monaco was something else, too. He is not even sure that it was his greatest victory at the Ring. “I suppose the most important drive at the Ring was the 1961 GP, when I beat the Ferraris, although my two wins in the Aston were actually of more significance to me in a way. I always enjoyed having a go from the back of the field and when Jack Fairman dropped the Aston in a ditch in 1959 I was able to do just that, knowing that if I broke it Astons were not going to be upset. But the year before, with Jack Brabham, I really gave it everything I had and it left me totally knackered - for whatever reason, I used all I’d got.” Unlike Tony Brooks, Stirling did not get a Nurburgring ring for winning the Grand Prix, or any of his sportscar victories. However, after finishing second behind Fangio’s Mercedes 300SLR in the 1955 Eifel race, he was given three cups, a suitcase and a rug! Then after the 1961 1000 Kms he was presented with a gold cup to mark his hattrick of wins in 1958, ‘59 and ‘60. At that time he really was the King of the Nurburgring, emulating Alberto Ascari and Juan Fangio in winning a major race there every year for four years, something no other driver would achieve, although John Surtees would win four races in three years and Vic Elford an unprecedented four in two. Remarkably, although Moss started six 1000 Kms and six German GPs he only once won pole position, with the Vanwall in 1958. And he never set fastest lap in the Grand Prix, but set four outright lap records in the 1000 Kms and one class lap record. “The Ring was my favourite of the longer circuits at 14.2 miles and equal with it, really, at 44.7 miles was the Targa Florio,” he says. “Monaco was the best of the short road circuits and then there was Spa. Bloody Hell, that was a dodgy place! It was an enormous challenge, but I never really looked forward to it and when it was over I felt great! “I had no such fears about the Ring, which was much slower, of course. There were places where you were going bloody fast, but Spa was more daunting and tremendously exhilarating. You could really get your teeth into the Ring, which had a fantastic flow to it and if you could get the bit between your teeth it was amazingly rewarding. Then, coming into the straight you had about a minute when you could relax and check your instruments. And then you’d think, ‘Christ here we go again!’ It was the most rewarding circuit of all.”