Achille Varzi



The mist rose from the wet track as the famous 44 year old racing driver, immaculate both in his dress and his driving, sped along the Bremgarten track in his 158 Alfa Romeo during practice for the forthcoming 1948 Swiss and European Grand Prix. It was July 1st and the summer sun was rapidly drying the sodden track. The Alfa was virtually invincible at the time, in fact it was in the middle of a five year unbeaten run. Achille Varzi was close to emulating his form of the late twenties and early thirties, when he was Tazio Nuvolari’s greatest rival. He was regarded as a courageous but very safe driver, who had never had a serious accident. Suddenly however, near the Jordenrampe curve, the car skidded in the wet at 110mph, spun several times and then, after almost coming to a stop, flipped over and crushed its driver. It was a terrible tragedy that Varzi’s first real mistake should cost him his life.

Born in 1904, Achille Varzi was the son of a wealthy cotton manufacturer and came from Galliate, near Milan. He first came to public notice as a motor cyclist (as did his brother Angelo) riding the most expensive and best machines, Garellis then Sunbeams.



He and Nuvolari were motor-cycle racing stars at the same time, but seldom came up against each other on the track. In 1928 Nuvolari and Varzi entered into a motor racing partnership with a stable of Type 35 Bugattis. Varzi took Guido Bignami as mechanic, an association which was to last throughout Varzi’s racing career (Bignami subsequently became Fangio’s mechanic). After only a few races, Varzi felt that his style was being cramped by Nuvolari, so he took advantage of the family finances to buy himself a P2 Alfa Romeo, and set up on his own late in 1928. During 1929 he won so many victories that Nuvolari was stung into buying a P2 so that he could compete on equal terms. This led to Varzi switching to Maserati, and in 1930 he earned the title of ‘Champion of Italy’ mainly driving for this up-and-coming marque.



The 1930 Targa Florio was a significant race in Varzi’s career. The previous five Targas had been won by French Bugatti cars – this was intolerable to the racing-mad Italians, and so a great deal of expectation and hope lay on the shoulders of Varzi in his 2-litre Grand Prix Alfa Romeo. Achille started 12 minutes behind Louis Chiron, but in the first 20 miles gained a minute on the French champion. The race became a duel between the two men. The extremely rough surface caused the spare wheel on Varzi’s car to come adrift and to fall to the road after having rubbed a small hole in the petrol tank. The last two laps had to be run without a spare, Varzi knowing that Chiron was gaining little by little and that a single puncture would destroy all his chances. Chiron was handicapped by a very sick mechanic and two damaged wheels, the latter of which he managed to replace, but not the former! The damaged wheels, the jack and tools were abandoned on the roadside and, tumbling aboard, Chiron raced away in a wild frenzy.



Meanwhile, as Varzi left the pits after changing tyres at the beginning of the last lap, he knew that he had no spare wheel (the attachment had broken), his fuel tank was leaking, and he might run out before he got round. Popping through the carburetor indicated that the supply was getting low. Grabbing a can of petrol from one of the many stations the firm had established round the circuit, the mechanic endeavored to pour its contents into the tank while running. Much of the fuel spilled over the tail, some of it dropped on the hot exhaust pipe and wicked flames began to play around the car. They reached Varzi’s neck, but he refused to stop. Crouching forward, and edging himself sideways in the seat, he gave his mechanic all possible room to fight the flames with the seat cushion.

The fire was extinguished, but the incident had caused the loss of nearly a minute. Now Varzi worked up to fever pitch. He roared through Campfelice and entered the five-mile straightway by the sea-shore – the only portion on which top gear could be used and where his GP racing model gave him an advantage. The rev counter crept past the danger line, but this was no time for caution. Achille Varzi knew from the wild roar which went up from the grandstands that he was the victor. He had won by 1 min.48.4 secs. A red car had won and Italy was wildly triumphant.

In 1931 he switched again to a Type 51 Bugatti and had three victories, most notably the French Grand Prix (sharing with Louis Chiron). 1932 was a relatively poor year, but it was back to form for 1933, when he won the Monaco Grand Prix after a truly epic duel with Nuvolari.

In the race, Varzi took the lead from pole position, and from the second row Nuvolari was fourth behind Borzacchini and Lehoux at the end of the first lap. By the end of the third lap Tazio was second, immediately behind Achille, and the two of them got down to a desperately close struggle which was to continue until the last lap. The lead changed hands every second or third lap, and at half distance Varzi led again, the shorter wheelbase of his Bugatti giving him some slight advantage through the corners, Nuvolari’s compensation being in slightly better acceleration. As the 98th lap ended, the cars were neck and neck, with Achille just edging ahead as they started their 99th lap. On the climb to the Casino for the last time, Varzi held on to third gear, stretching his engine to the limit and risking all to take the lead. Nuvolari held him but briefly, for a piston failed as he over-revved and hot oil sprayed onto the hot exhaust. So as Varzi, alone for the first time in the race, took the flag, a yellow shirted figure jumped from his smoking car as it lost momentum down from the tunnel and started to push. Worried about a fire breaking out, a mechanic helped and Nuvolari was disqualified. The duel for the lead in the 1933 Monaco Grand Prix had lasted for 97 of 100 laps and thus is unique in Grand Epreuve history. Nuvolari led for 66 laps, Varzi led for 34 laps.



It was back to Alfa Romeo for 1934, and Varzi won 9 races with his P3 as well as the Mille Miglia in a Monza Alfa. Varzi was declared Italian Champion for the second time. Nuvolari rejoined Scuderia Ferrari (who raced the Alfas) in 1935 so Varzi went to Auto Union. His extremely quick reaction time and delicate touch enabled Varzi to get the best from the rear-engined Auto Union extraordinarily quickly and in his first season he won at Tunis and Pescara, despite the car being dogged with minor development troubles through most of the year. In 1936, he won at Tripoli, with a record lap of nearly 142mph, but during the season his health started to fail. He had a torrid affair with another driver’s wife, and became addicted to morphine. He was out of racing for much of 1937 and nothing much more was heard of him until after the war when he made a surprise and welcome comeback to his old form with two successful seasons in the Alfa 158. He had two successful forays to South America and became very popular with the Argentineans. He planned to live in their country on retirement, and in the Argentine formed the Scuderia Achille Varzi which set Juan Manuel Fangio on the road to fame.

Varzi’s coffin stood for three days and nights on the chassis of a racing car in the church at Galliate, and his friends stood vigil over it. Some fifteen thousand people attended his funeral. Part of the farewell address at his grave went: "Perhaps you were destined to die, Achille, because in your driving there was something of that genius which is one of Nature’s greatest mysteries, and Nature strives to destroy those who come too close to her. Beethoven was struck with deafness when he seemed about to transcend man’s powers of musical expression. Galileo was blinded when he tried to probe infinity and its laws. Leonardo da Vinci’s hands were crippled when he was about to come nearer to perfection than any man before him. And you too, Achille, were destroyed when you sought to cross the known frontiers of man-made speed.

Now you are preparing for another race, the last great race. A race without danger, without care or sorrow……."

Victories

1929 Monza
1930 Targa Florio
1930 Coppa Acerbo
1930 Monza
1930 Spain
1931 Tunis
1932 Tunis
1933 Monaco
1933 Avusrennen
1933 Tripoli
1934 Mille Miglia
1934 Targa Florio
1934 Tripoli
1935 Coppa Acerbo
1935 Tunis
1936 Tripoli

Vittorio Jano was born on April 22, 1891 in San Giorgio Canavese, the son of the Technical Director at one of Turin's two arsenals. At 18, after completing instruction at the Instituto Professionale Operaio in Turin he took a job as a draughtsman for the Rapid motor works. In 1911 he became an employee of Fiat and worked under the brilliant designer Carlo Cavalli. Fiat at the time was one of the world leaders in automobile technology. In 1921 he became head of a design team within Fiat and worked on the historic 2 liter 805 race car. During this time he befriended Luigi Bazzi who would later move to Alfa Romeo in Milan.



Nicola Romeo owned the Italian franchise of the American Ingersoll company, makers of earth-working equipment, pneumatic drills and air compressors. Because of WW I the importation of equipment became a major problem and Ingersoll decided to give Romeo the license to design and manufacture their products in Italy. Romeo took control of the Alfa factory in Milan and produced the equipment there. After the war there was a need for automobiles in Italy and Romeo turned to producing automobiles full-time as Alfa-Romeos. Motor sport was seen as a proper avenue for the promotion of this "new" company and the former Darracq engineer, Giuseppe Morosi, was tasked to design a new race car. The P1 Alfa was a disappointment and Luigi Bazi, Alfa-Romeo's test driver suggested that they hire the young Fiat designer Vittorio Jano. Fiat had a reputation for producing talented designers so Romeo signed Jano in 1923. Jano first car, the P2, was based on knowledge he had gained at Fiat and at the first race Antonio Ascari drove the new car to victory. Later the P2 would win at the Grand Prix of Europe at Lyons, this time with Campari driving. The P2 had the first Grand Prix engine to produce more than 4 bhp per square inch of piston area.



With the withdrawal of Fiat, Alfa-Romeo became the leading Italian racing car manufacturer. Jano also designed production touring cars for the Milanese firm. But it was in racing that his talents could reach their full expression. The Alfa-Romeo's began to dominate racing, too the point where some of the more nationalistic spectators would begin to heckle the Italian team. One incident has become a part of racing lore. During the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa in 1925 the local favorite Delage team had retired all of their cars and the race became an Alfa-Romeo parade led by Ascari and Campari. The fans began to make their displeasure known and Jano in response ordered his cars to pit. While they were being refueled the cars were cleaned and buffed. During this pitstop he had a table placed in full view whereupon he imperiously ate lunch, deaf to the howls of the spectators. The cars rejoined the race and won with ease.

During this time he began to collaborate with Stefano Somazzi in the scientific development of racing fuels. Somazzi worked for Shell Italiana in Genoa. Their collaboration bore fruit when in 1925 they came up with a fuel/alcohol mixture that allowed the engine to run cooler and cured pre-ignition problems. Somazzi would go on to develop the famous Shell Dynamin in 1932.



Like fellow engineer Ferdinand Porsche, Jano was also involved in designing aircraft engines as well as truck and busses. In 1932 Jano produced the P3 Monoposto which at the hands of Tazio Nuvolari won the Italian Grand Prix its first time out.

The P3 Monoposto was the first genuine single-seat racing car. It was powered by an eight-cylinder engine built around two four-cylinder blocks, each fed by its own Roots supercharger. One of the engines major strengths was its low-speed torque. Power to the rear wheels was transmitted through twin driveshafts that allowed for the drivers seat to be placed lower in the chassis. The original leaf spring suspension was replaced in 1935 by an independent Dubonnet front suspension. The complete car weighed in at only 1,625 lbs. and were it not for its cast-iron block engine, it would have weighed considerably less.

Winning its first race out of the box, the P3 went on to win 5 more major races in 1932. With the two best drivers of the day, Nuvolari and Caracciola racing them 1932 was a successful year. Some said that with a Jano designed car and their two great drivers they should not expect anything less. The P3's most famous victory came very late in its career when Tazio Nuvolari beat the combined German might of Mercedes and Auto Union. That race, the German Grand Prix at the Nurburgring, in front of dozens of Nazi officials is considered one of Nuvolari's greatest victories of all time.

In 1937 after the death of Vicenzo Lancia, Jano was induced to join Lancia as chief development engineer. While there he produced the revolutionary D50 race car which incorporated its engine as a stressed member, and the equally revolutionary Aurelia Grand Turismo sports car. This car was powered by the first successful production V6 and included in-board rear brakes. In 1955 Lancia withdrew from racing and the cars and equipment was transferred to Ferrari. Jano, who had known Enzo Ferrari from his earliest Alfa Romeo days joined Ferrari full-time and was instrumental in establishing a firm foundation for Ferrari's future racing efforts. Illness was to end his life at the age of 75 not through its own efforts but by the hand of Jano who committed suicide rather than face the prospect of failing powers.

Enzo Ferrari



was born in 1898 in Modena Italy. His father, Alfredo, ran a local metal-fabricating business. When he was 10 his father took Ferrari and his brother Alfredo Jr. to an automobile race in Bologna. There he saw Vincenzo Lancia battle Felice Nazarro in the 1908 Circuit di Bologna. After attending a number of other races he decided that he too wanted to become a racing car driver. Ferrari's formal education was relatively sketchy, something that he would regret in his later years. In 1916 tragedy, which would haunt Ferrari his entire life, struck his family to its core with the death of his father and brother in the same year.

He spent World War I shoeing mules but the world-wide flu of 1918 brought upon his discharge and almost ended his life. Looking for work he applied for a job at Fiat only to be turned down. Eventually he was able to get a job at CMN, a small carmaker involved with converting war surplus. His duties included test driving which he did in between delivering chassis to the coach builder. About this time he took up racing and in 1919 he finished ninth at the Targa Florio. Through his friend Ugo Sivocci he got a job with Alfa Romeo who entered some modified production cars in the 1920 Targa Florio. Ferrari driving one of these cars managed to finish second. While at Alfa Romeo he came under the patronage of Giorgio Rimini who was Nicola Romeo's aide.

In 1923 he was racing and winning at the Circuit of Sivocci at Ravenna when he met the father of the legendary Italian W.W.I ace Francesco Baracca. The senior Baracca was enamored with the courage and audacity of the young Ferrari and presented the young driver with his son’s squadron badge, which was the famous Prancing Horse on a yellow shield. In 1924 he scored his greatest victory, winning the Coppa Acerbo.

... Among the different competitions whom, in that time, I participated in, I remember with particular satisfaction my victory at Pescara in 1924, with an Alfa Romeo R.L.

With this car I had won at Ravenna the Racetrack of Savio and at Rovigo the Racetrack of Polesine, but in the Acerbo Cup I initialed my fame as a pilot. In fact I was able to beat the Mercedes, which was just returning from the success of the Targa Florio. In the team of the Alfa there was also Campari with the famous P2, but, unfortunately, he was forced to retire. My mechanic was Eugenio Siena, a Campari's cousin, full of an agonistic spirit which was over his relationship duties, who died in Tripoli in the Grand Prix of 1938 when he was graduating as an international pilot. As agreed, since the first lap I should have looked for the shape of Campari's P2 in the driving mirror, if I had lead the way, to give him way with dispatch. I had a very speedy start and at each lap I repeated my search in the mirror, but in vain: I couldn't see the P2.

Worried about his absence - Campari's car was faster than mine- and the chase of Bonmartini and Giulio Masetti's Mercedes, I looked at Siena with a first sign to slow down. But Siena gave a cry where there was not even a shadow of worry about the delay of his cousin: So I insisted on the first position, and I won. Campari explained me that he had hidden the car in a by-street, after having retired for a damage to the change-gear, so that the antagonists would not have realized too soon his surrender...



After some more success he was promoted to full factory driver. His racing career up till that time mostly consisted of local races in second hand cars but now he was expected to compete driving the latest cars at the years most prestigious race the French Grand Prix. What happened next is not quite clear but it seems that Ferrari suffered a crisis of confidence and was not able to take part in the the biggest race of his career. A lesser man may have been permanently scared by this but Ferrari was able to resume his position at Alfa Romeo becoming Rimini's "Mr. Fixit". He did not race again until 1927 but his racing career was pretty much over before it really began. Recognizing one's limits in this most dangerous of sports should not be minimized. He continued to compete in minor events and in this he was quite successful. Ferrari by this time was married and owned a Alfa distributorship in Modena. In 1929 Ferrari started his own firm, Scuderia Ferrari. He was sponsored in this enterprise by the Ferrara-based Caniano brothers, Augusto and Alfredo, heirs to a textile fortune. Alfa Romeo had temporarily withdrawn from racing in 1925 and the Scuderia’s main task was to assist his wealthy Alfa Romeo customers with their racing efforts by providing delivery, mechanical support and any other services that they would require. With Alfa Romeo he exchanged a guarantee of technical assistance with stock in his company. Ferrari then made similar deals with Bosch, Pirelli and Shell. To supplement his "stable" of amateur drivers he induced Giuseppe Campari to join his team. He followed this with an even greater coup by signing Tazio Nuvolari. In his first year the Scuderia Ferrari could boast 50 full and part-time drivers! The team competed in 22 events and scored 8 victories and several good placings. Scuderia Ferrari caused a sensation. It was the largest team ever put together by one individual. None of the drivers were paid a salary but received a percentage of the prize money won. Any extra technical or administrative assistance a driver required was gladly given for a price. The basic plan called for the driver to get to the race and his car would be delivered to the track and any entrance fees or duties were handled by the Scuderia. It is not surprising that Ferrari would look fondly back upon this period. It is also not out of the question that if anyone could survive as an independent in the current Formula One world then the younger Ferrari would be that man.

Alfa Romeo would continue to support the Scuderia either as a client or as the official racing department of the factory. But soon everything would change as Alfa Rome announced another withdrawal; from racing starting with the 1933 season due to financial problems. At first this seemed to be just the opening that Ferrari needed but then it was realized that their own supply of new racing cars would soon dry up. Luckily for the Scuderia, Pirelli interceded and convinced Alfa to supply Ferrari with six P3's and the services of engineer Luigi Bazzi and test driver Attilio Marinoni. The Scuderia would now be in effect Alfa Romeo's racing department. In 1932 his first son also named Alfredo after his father, and known as Dino was born, and Ferrari took this opportunity to retire from driving. A more professional turn was also taken by the team. This upset Alfredo Caniato and he was bought out by Count Carlo Felice Trossi who was a part-time driver as well as a full-time millionaire. All looked set for Ferrari to make his true mark on the racing scene. What he did not count on was a German tidal wave in the form of Auto Union and Mercedes. In 1935 Ferrari signed the French driver Rene Dreyfus who most recently drove for Bugatti. He was struck by the difference between his old team and Ferrari.

"The difference between being a member of the Bugatti team and Scuderia Ferrari was virtually night and day," recalled Dreyfus. I lived with Meo Constantini, the Bugatti team manager, I visited with Ferrari. "With Ferrari, I learned the business of racing, for there was no doubt he was a businessman. Enzo Ferrari was a pleasant person and friendly, but not openly affectionate. There was, for example, none of the sense of belonging to the family that I had with the Maserati brothers, nor the sense of spirited fun and intimacy that I had with Meo Constantini. Enzo Ferrari loved racing, of that there was no question. Still, it was more than an enthusiast’s love, but one tempered by the practical realization that this was a good way to build a nice, profitable empire. I knew he was going to be a big man one day, even then when the cars he raced carried somebody else’s name. I felt sure that eventually they would carry his.



Through the years the Scuderia Ferrari would employ such great drivers as Giuseppe Campari, Louis Chiron, Achille Varzi and the greatest of them all Tazio Nuvolari. Except for Nuvolari's great victory in the 1935 German Grand Prix, victories in any of the major races were few and far between. During these years his team faced the German might of Auto Union and Mercedes. On one occasion Ferrari had the opportunity to passenger the great Nuvolari. At the trials on the "Three Provinces" Circuit, when he asked his companion (Ferrari was also driving there with a more powerful car than the Mantuan's) to take him with him. It should be added that Nuvolari did not know that circuit. "At the first bend," Ferrari writes, "I had the clear sensation that Tazio had taken it badly and that we would end up in the ditch; I felt myself stiffen as I waited for the crunch. Instead, we found ourselves on the next straight with the car in a perfect position. I looked at him," Ferrari goes on. "His rugged face was calm, just as it always was, and certainly not the face of someone who had just escaped a hair-raising spin. I had the same sensation at the second bend. By the fourth or fifth bend I began to understand; in the meantime, I had noticed that through the entire bend Tazio did not lift his foot from the accelerator, and that, in fact, it was flat on the floor. As bend followed bend, I discovered his secret. Nuvolari entered the bend somewhat earlier than my driver's instinct would have told me to. But he went into the bend in an unusual way: with one movement he aimed the nose of the car at the inside edge, just where the curve itself started. His foot was flat down, and he had obviously changed down to the right gear before going through this fearsome rigmarole. In this way he put the car into a four-wheel drift, making the most of the thrust of the centrifugal force and keeping it on the road with the traction of the driving wheels. Throughout the bend the car shaved the inside edge, and when the bend turned into the straight the car was in the normal position for accelerating down it, with no need for any corrections." Ferrari honestly admits that he soon became used to this exercise, because he saw Nuvolari do it countless times. "But each time I seemed to be climbing into a roller coaster and finding myself coming through the downhill run with that sort of dazed feeling that we all know."

In 1937 Ferrari suggested to Alfa that they build 1.5-liter voiturette class cars but what he got was Alfa Romeo's decision to bring the racing effort back in-house. After being the man in charge at the Scuderia he found himself, the new Direttore Sportivo, working under Alfa's engineering director, Wilfredo Ricart. This was a situation he could not stomach and soon decided to quit. As part of his severance agreement he could not compete against his former bosses for four years. Ferrari started a new company called Auto-Avio Costruzioni S.p.A. which produced machine parts for various clients. For the 1940 Mille Miglia, Ferrari entered two small sportscars to be driven by Alberto Ascari and Lothario Rangoni. They were labeled AAC 815s but were actually the first Ferrari race cars.

The Ferrari of the Scuderia years was very much the hands on team manager quite unlike the Ferrari of later years when he did not attend any of the race and was given information over the telephone and in reports from his employees. Ferrari continued to be successful after he stopped attending the races but it is not hard to imagine that in this were the seeds of Ferrari’s future decline.

After the war Ferrari set out to create his own Grand Prix car and in 1947 a 1.5-liter Tipo125 entered the Grand Prix of Monaco. The car was designed by his old collaborator Gioacchino Colombo. Ferrari’s first Grand Prix victory came in 1951 at the British Grand Prix in the hands of Argentine Froilan Gonzalez. The team had a chance for a World Championship evaporate at the Spanish Grand Prix. Before the most important race in the young team’s history Ferrari decided to experiment with new Pirelli tires. The result was thrown treads, which allowed Fangio to win the race and his first title.

Production sports cars were also an important endeavor for Ferrari but in marked difference with other car manufacturers, racing was not used to sell more cars, rather cars were sold so that the team could go racing! Many of the cars that were sold were last year’s models to private entrants. Ferrari was not a sentimental person when it came to his cars and those that were not sold were turned to scrap or scavenged for parts. Ferraris would become common feature at all major sports car events including Le Mans, the Targa Florio and the Mille Miglia. It was at the Mille Miglia that Ferrari would claim some of its greatest victories. In 1948 Nuvolari already in bad health was scheduled to drive a Cisitalia but the car was not ready in time. Ferrari gave him a car intended for Count Igor Troubetzkoy, an open Ferrari 166C. Nuvolari realizing that his body was failing him drove as if the devil himself was in pursuit. By the time the field reached Ravenna, Nuvolari was already in the lead. Despite losing his fender and later the engine bonnet nothing could stop the "Flying Mantuan". By the time he reached Florence he was more than have an hour ahead of Ferrari’s normal lead driver. The seat had come lose from his car to be replaced by a sack of oranges and still he drove on driving faster and faster. Some in the crowd began to fear that the "Great Little Man", knowing that time was running out was determined to die behind the wheel. Ferrari at one of the last control stops saw the state of his driver and with tears in his eyes begged his friend to stop. For even though they had at various times been at each other’s throats each understood the other. Nuvolari was the last driver that could look Ferrari in the eye as an equal. Finally at Reggio Emilia what no competitor could ever accomplish, Nuvolari was beaten by a broken spring. Exhausted he had to be carried from his car.



During the 1952-53 seasons there was a shortage of Formula 1 cars so the World Championship would be staged for Formula 2 cars. The Ferrari Tipo 500 would dominate the championships both years. In the hands of double World Champion Alberto Ascari Ferrari would win 9 races. For 1954 Ascari left Ferrari and joined Lancia where he would drive one of the the Jano-designed D50s. Lancia's hopes for a title were dashed first when the car was late in arriving and fatally when Ascari died testing a Ferrari sportscar. Lancia was forced to withdraw and Fiat their parent company turned over all of Lancia's cars over to Ferrari also including their designer Vittorio Jano! Ferrari's next challenge came from the new British teams. Guy Vandervell supplied Ferrari with the special ThinWall bearings that were used in all of their engines. Vandervell had been a part of the BRM group but quit in disgust. After purchasing and racing a pair of Ferrari's he built his own cars that eventually beat the Italian cars. It was only by outlasting the Vanwalls, as the cars were named was Ferrari able to climb back on top. But this was only the beginning of the British invasion. These manufacturers did not produce their own engines but concentrated on chassis design and aerodynamics, areas of traditional weakness for Ferrari. During this period Ferrari began to produce his famous Gran Turismo car in conjunction with Battista "Pinin" Farina. Victories at Le Mans and other long distance races made Ferrari famous the world over. The demands of producing winning sportscars and Grand Prix cars was proving to much for the relatively small company. In the sixties John Surtees the 1964 World Champion in a Ferrari would complain that Ferrari’s involvement in sports car racing was hindering its Formula One efforts. Surtees explains "At Ferrari in those days you started with a handicap. Until Le Mans was over you couldn't really do the work you wanted to do - and needed to do - in Formula One.



In 1969 Ferrari faced severe financial strains. Their cars were still much sought after but they were unable to produce enough to meet the demand and maintain their racing program. To their rescue came Fiat and the Agnelli family. Ferrari was still in charge but a new paymaster was on board. It was with the background of Fiat's manufacturing and aerospace empire that Ferrari was criticized for not dominating their smaller British rivals. Another genius, Colin Chapman was at his peak.

In 1975 Ferrari attained something of a renaissance at the hands of Niki Lauda winning two World Championships and three Constructor titles in three years. It was three years after Renault had inaugurated the new Turbo Era when Ferrari joined the bandwagon. Their current Flat-12 engine had reached the end of its development to be replaced by a 1.5-liter turbo V6. As with most Ferraris the engine turned out to be the car's strong point while the chassis was based on an antiquated multi-tube spaceframe. The brilliant driving of Gilles Villeneuve gave the new Ferrari several victories in 1981 but it was evident that the chassis needed to be upgraded before the car could seriously challenge for the title. At mid-season the team was joined by Dr Harvey Postlewaite whose job it was to build an improved chassis for the following season. Postlewaite wanted to build a carbon-fibre composite chassis but had to settle on a monocoque with a Nomex honeycomb skin because of Ferrari’s lack of experience with the new material. Still with a half decent chassis much was expected of the team in 1982. It all ended in tragedy with the death of its star driver, Villeneuve and the maiming of his estranged teammate, Didier Pironi, in different accidents. With the earlier retirement of its last World Champion, Jody Scheckter, Ferrari was now bereft of any frontline drivers and years would go by before it could count a top driver as one of its own.



Enzo Ferrari would not live to see that day; he died at the age of 90 in 1988. Ferrari continued to drift even though the brilliance of a Prost or Mansell would bring some victories. In 1993 Jean Todt was brought in to end the drift. Todt had been in charge of Peugeot 's Le Mans winning team and he hired Niki Lauda as a technical advisor. In 1996 they added two-time World Champion Michael Schumacher to the equation and 1997 Ross Brawn and Rory Byrne from Benneton were added to finish the remade team. The season long battle came down to the last race which ended in controversy. 1998 would be the year for the return of Ferrari, now it was only left to Williams and the resurgent McLaren to cooperate!

Unfortunately while Williams did their best to regress, McLaren with their partner Mercedes produced a car that even Michael Schumacher couldn't stop on its way to a championship for Mika Hakkinen. Yet Ferrari was back and if team stability is maintained a championship will come their way whether at the hands of their hired German driver or another.

Gilles Villeneuve was born in Quebec on 18 January, 1950. He rose up through snowmobile racing and Formula Atlantic. In fact he credits some of his success to his snowmobiling days: "Every winter, you would reckon on three or four big spills - and I'm talking about being thrown on to the ice at 100 mph. Those things used to slide a lot, which taught me a great deal about control. And the visibility was terrible! Unless you were leading, you could see nothing, with all the snow blowing about. Good for the reactions - and it stopped me having any worries about racing in the rain." In 1976 he dominated the Formula Atlantic championship with an Ecurie Canada team so impoverished that he was forced into the role of spectator at the Mosport race because the team couldn't afford to field an entry. This impressive performance against daunting odds earned him a great deal of notice and a spot with McLaren.

His first F1 race (also the debut event for the turbo Renault) was at Silverstone in 1977 partnering James Hunt and Jochen Mass. Toward the end of the '77 season Villeneuve had established a reputation as a promising talent, Teddy Mayer, due partly to Marlboro sponsorship considerations, declined to keep Gilles with McLaren, apparently leaving the promising young driver high and dry for 1978.



But in August of 1977 Maranello called. Enzo Ferrari said that when he first met the diminutive Canadian, he was immediately reminded of the great Nuvolari. Ferrari's obvious interest in Villeneuve prompted Niki Lauda to jump ship at Canada in October, and Gilles began his short but storied Ferrari career in a less than auspicious fashion. In the Mosport race he left the course on someone else's oil. The next race, at Fuji, saw him off again, but this time at the cost of some spectators' lives. He would later remark that: "If someone said to me that you can have three wishes, my first would have been to get into racing, my second to be in Formula 1, my third to drive for Ferrari..."



The first of Villeneuve's six F1 wins came the next year, fittingly enough at Canada. All told he won six Grands Prix. In 1979 he finished second in the championship to teammate Jody Scheckter, the luster of whose reputation is today considerably duller than that of Gilles. The quality of the cars that Gilles had at his disposal was uneven, and much of his racing was against the last of the world-conquering Lotuses, the ground effects 79. But for these reasons he probably would have won several more races. It can be argued that his method was not as conserving of his machinery is it might have been, and that this contributed to his relatively low win total.

Gilles Villeneuve's all-or-nothing approach was well known. An example: at Watkins Glen one year, qualifying on the first day on a soaked track, he left his competitors scratching their heads after turning a lap eleven seconds faster than anyone else. The author of this piece clearly remembers the first photo he ever saw of Villeneuve. Actually, it was a picture of the bottom his Ferrari as it flew off of some track somewhere.

Gilles' signature race was not a first, but a second. At the 1979 French Grand Prix at Dijon, Renault and Jean-Pierre Jabouille posted the first win for a modern turbo car. Rene Arnoux, running well, looked to make it a Renault one-two. Villeneuve, however, asserted a definite au contraire in a sliding, wheel-banging, tire-boiling duel with Arnoux that no witness to it is likely to forget. Villeneuve's insane insistence that his slower Ferrari could beat Arnoux's faster Renault was rewarded, and he finished just ahead of the Frenchman. It is probably safe to say that this was the most exciting race for second place in the history of motor racing.



Like certain other great drivers, including Clark and Senna, Villeneuve was a curious mixture of seemingly disparate personality types. Lauda wrote of him, "He was the craziest devil I ever came across in Formula 1...The fact that, for all this, he was a sensitive and lovable character rather than an out-and-out hell-raiser made him such a unique human being". Flying, snowmobiling or driving, he was a risk-taker of classic proportions. Yet his fellow drivers said that on the track he was scrupulously fair and did not put anyone's safety other than his own in jeopardy. This combination of traits made him exceptionally popular not only with fans but with teammates and opponents as well. He still remains even today a fan favorite in Canada, Italy and in the rest of the F1 world.

Gilles' bon ami did disappear on one notable occasion, which may have contributed to his tragic and untimely end. On the final lap at Imola in 1982 Pironi snuck past his unsuspecting teammate, who had slowed feeling that the race was in hand, to snatch the win. Villeneuve was uncharacteristically furious. Still feeling the sting and out to prove something two weeks later at Zolder, while on his way to the pits during Saturday qualifying, he came up behind the much slower March of Mass. Gilles' in laps were often like other driver's hot ones, and Mass pulled over to give him a free track, in the process obstructing the pit entrance. The resulting collision sent the Ferrari off in cartwheeling disintegration. Villeneuve was resuscitated at the scene, but his injuries were mortal. He died in a local hospital that evening.

If his death was not greeted with great shock and surprise (everyone knew his style), that was more than offset by the profound sadness it produced. Even Arnoux, his adversary in the Dijon epic, confessed that he cried the day Gilles died and the day after.

In June, 1997 Canada issued a stamp in honor of its favorite racing son. Villeneuve fils may now have more wins than Villeneuve pere, but he has a ways to go to match his father's legend.

Colin Chapman

Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman was born on 9 May, 1928 in a suburb of London. He grew up living at the Railway Hotel, Hornsey, which his father managed. One of the first significant events of Chapman's life occurred in March of 1944 when he met his future wife, Hazel Williams, at a dance. Even prior to their marriage ten years later she was to be instrumental in helping Chapman make a name for himself in racing and car building, among other things putting up the initial 25 pounds sterling to get Lotus Engineering Co., Ltd., started in 1952.



Chapman seems to have been taken by fast machinery from an early age. He learned to fly at university, and, after earning a degree in civil engineering in 1948, he was for a short time a flying officer with the RAF. Aviation was to remain a lifelong passion. When he got into car building he soon began to compete. He became determined to achieve great things as a driver. His approach to covering the financial requirements was to build a car for himself, demonstrate its qualities on the course, and then sell his innovations and services, and later copies (not always exact) of the cars themselves, to other enthusiasts in post-war England. The very first one-off he built was a modification of a 1930 Austin Seven saloon, and it was only as an afterthought that he decided to enter it in trials races. He had never even been to a motor race before. From there he was off on a tenacious hunt for loopholes in regulations that would give him an edge. Many of these were of the very small variety, and allowed him to exercise and hone his novel engineering approach to the maximum.

Early on he held a position with The British Aluminium Company and relied on long hours, volunteer help and barter arrangements (in consideration for assistance he gave to BRM with their F1 suspension design he received a converted Ford Zephyr) to keep his car building operation afloat. It was tough going even after Lotus cars became well known as winners. Chapman branched out from trials machines to sports cars achieving success at that level as well. At the end of 1954 he was able to quit his day job and devote himself entirely to Lotus Engineering and Team Lotus, the newly-formed competition arm of the business. He was also able to take on paid employees, among whom were names such as Mike Costin, Keith Duckworth and Graham Hill. Lotus Engineering built both road and competition sports cars for customers, and eventually Formula 2 and, in 1958, Formula 1 cars as well. Although single-seaters originally gave Lotus fits due to their having to adapt their fragile chassis to very high power to weight ratios, Team Lotus continued its on-track success in sports cars as Chapman continued to develop his engineering magic.

Lotus cars, though intentionally built sparingly, were not gimcracks. Chapman, above all, wanted his cars to win. Their notorious frailty was no accident. Chapman was unswerving in his devotion to minimalist design philosophy. Each part had to do as many jobs as it was possible to squeeze out of it. Although this trade-off was not always adequate, when it did pay off it was dynamite.

Chapman's motivation for this approach was apparently not parsimony, but something more deeply-seated in his personality. It is tempting to relate it to his tendency to treat superficially many of the people he had dealings with, but more likely it was just a manifestation of his extraordinary talents. What Chapman left out in material substance he replaced with cleverness. It was as if automobiles were to him ephemeral things, spirits of his own creation, or rather spirits formed by the act of their creation. Their physical existence seemed to have little importance. Only their performance was meaningful. It took great urging from friends and family before, late in life, he would make even belated efforts to preserve examples of some of his historically significant machines.



Although his early cars were based on the space frame chassis (done up, as usual, better than the original), the chassis development that he is most famous for was the full monocoque that made its debut in the Lotus 25. The 25 was the first of Chapman's F1 world-beaters and carried Jim Clark to his 1963 championship. It was to be followed in due course by, among others, the 49, the 72 and the 79. The 49, a winner its first time out, popularized the engine as a stressed chassis member, and was Chapman's masterpiece and the epitome of his insistence on extreme economy of design; the 72 sported novel features such as a wedge shape, torsion bar springing and inboard brakes; and the 79 was the pinnacle of ground effects, an ingenious madness of which Chapman was, again, a major innovator. He did not, of course, conceive all of these cars by himself. Others including Duckworth and Maurice Phillippe made indispensable contributions. Chapman, in the best engineering tradition, was quick to borrow ideas from other sources including the aerospace industry. But his finger prints were all over the design and engineering of every Lotus while he was alive. As a matter of fact, news of Chapman's untimely death was brought to Team Lotus while they were breaking in the 92 with its active suspension, the master's last great technical revolution.

Colin Chapman's story remains half told until Jim Clark is brought into it. Several Lotus drivers won races only because they were in a Chapman car. But many Lotuses won races only because Clark was driving them. Chapman and Clark were an odd couple to say the least - Chapman the brilliant and charming engineer cum salesman; Clark the reserved, thoughtful farmer from the Scottish Border country, and the driver that Chapman at one time had wished to be. That they were close nonetheless was due almost certainly to the fact that each recognized the talents of the other in his particular sphere of motor racing, an enterprise they both loved. Both were known for parting with a pound reluctantly, although Chapman was significantly more sophisticated in money matters than was Clark, perhaps, as it turned out, too sophisticated for his own good (he even managed eventually to get Clark to pay his expenses from his Indianapolis expeditions out of his retainers). Chapman showed no prescience in signing up Clark since by that time the Scotsman's abilities were becoming general knowledge. He got Clark and hung on to him because he built winning cars. The fruitful relationship between the two, probably approached only by that between Tyrrell and Stewart, was as much a result of each adapting to the other's natural shortcomings as anything else. Clark was too down-to-earth to be shined up by Chapman's hard sell, and Chapman was too savvy to be over awed by the driving ability of which Clark was justifiably, and obviously, proud. Chapman was genuinely devastated by Clark's death in 1968 in a Lotus 48 F2 car.

Chapman was always considered a hardware person and not a people person. Yet some of the greatest names in racing won for him, including Clark, Hill, Rindt, Peterson, Andrett and Fittipaldi. Stirling Moss, racing for privateer Rob Walker, gave a Lotus car its first F1 victory. After Chapman's death, but while vestiges of his influence still remained with the team, Senna chalked up victories in Lotuses. Great drivers are seldom found consorting with mediocre cars. The caliber of men who chose to drive Lotuses probably comprises the best witness to the high quality of racing machines that Chapman produced.



Chapman achieved his greatest fame in the U.S. by forcing the rear-engined concept on the technologically stagnant Indianapolis 500. Dan Gurney was the one who, after seeing the Lotus 25, persuaded Chapman that Indy would be worth a look. That look revealed, to Chapman's glee, an obscene amount of money that, considering the competition, looked ripe for picking. Gurney set up a deal between Ford and Chapman, and Clark did indeed nearly take the prize on the first try in 1963 in a controversial finish. The Lotus-Ford missed again in 1964, but by its 1965 victory the majority of the cars in the field were rear-engined. There was no great pioneering in the first Lotus Indy cars, not even the engine placement since Brabham had been there and done that. The Lotus 29's combination of many 25 features plus a solid big block Ford engine was so far ahead of the traditional roadsters that it made the whole thing akin to shooting fish in a barrel. Lotus did break new ground in 1968 with a turbine powered car. It showed such promise in that race that turbine cars were promptly banned by USAC.

Not everything that Chapman touched turned to into technological gold. The Indy turbine cars had used four-wheel drive, and Chapman decreed that in 1969 so would the conventionally-powered Indy and F1 Lotuses. Alas this did not turn out well. The power train was cumbersome, the drivers complained about the common drive shaft passing through the cockpit over the top of their legs, and the cars were slow. They never competed.

It is difficult to overstate the influence, in so many different ways, that Chapman had on F1 as we know it today, what might be called "Big Formula 1." At the end of 1967 Esso pulled its support for motor racing. The CSI, which at the time oversaw the sporting aspects of the FIA, recognizing the need for expanded financial opportunities for an expanding F1, withdrew the restriction on advertisements on racing cars. Chapman was characteristically first in exploiting this opportunity, signing up Imperial Tobacco as the Team Lotus sponsor for 1968, in the process setting F1 on the road to a financial addiction to tobacco which has proved as difficult to shake as the real thing. English racing green gave way to Gold Leaf livery, and later to the stunning black and gold of the John Player Specials. There can be no argument about the monetary advantages that motor racing realized from tobacco sponsorship. It was inevitable that so much money floating around would attract attention, but curiously it was not Chapman but Lotus driver Jochen Rindt's former manager, Bernie Ecclestone, via his Formula One Constructors Association, who got control of it.



Chapman did have a shot at running the money part of the F1 circus. During the great FISA-FOCA war of 1979 - 1981 a conspiracy was hatched by Jean-Marie Balestre to have Chapman replace Bernie Ecclestone as head of FOCA. It came to naught, but one both delights and shudders at the thought of what F1 might be today had this coup d'etat been carried off.

One of the casualties of the 1979-1981 unrest in the F1 world was another Chapman engineering marvel. In order to reduce chassis movement the suspensions of ground effects cars were so stiff that they were physically very hard on the driver. Enter the Lotus 86 and 88 incorporating aerodynamics and body work sprung separately from the cockpit. The 86 fell victim to the concession FOCA made in its truce with Balestre that did away with ground effects skirts. The 88 was ganged-up on and eliminated by assorted constructors and race organizers watching out for their wallets. Thereafter, ground effects itself was gradually all but legislated away. These triumphs of politics over progress was disheartening to Chapman for whom F1 had always been synonymous with the highest level of technical achievement. He seemed to lose much of his interest in the sport.

Towards the end of his life Chapman, never one to shy away from a chance to make some money, became entangled in the John DeLorean scandal. The British government welcomed the DeLorean - Chapman partnership with open arms when it offered to site the factory for DeLorean's stainless steel wonder car in depressed Belfast, to the extent of putting up 54 million pounds of financing. Unfortunately several million pounds of this never made it to Northern Ireland. Rumor had it that its ultimate destinations were the pockets of DeLorean, Chapman and others. DeLorean's arrest for allegedly dealing in a controlled substance and the simultaneous collapse of the DeLorean car business left behind a nasty mess indeed. Due to his premature passing, Chapman's real part in this sad affair has never been completely explained.

Chapman tossed his cap in the air in celebration of an F1 victory for the last time at the Austrian race in 1982, which Elio De Angelis took in a squeaker from Keke Rosberg. Chapman's death from a heart attack in December of that year was shockingly sudden and a surprise to everyone who had followed his unparalleled career. Some of these were legal authorities looking into the DeLorean fiasco, but the great majority were friends and family of motor racing who knew they had lost an irreplaceable part of their sport.

Alfred Neubauer



Born in 1891 he fell in love with automobiles when at the age of seven he saw his first car, a Benz drive through his village, Neutitschein in North Moravia. Even as a small boy he would claim that "petrol already ran in his blood." After a stint as a motor pool officer during the First World War he joined Austro-Daimler as a race car driver. When Ferdinand Porsche left Austro-Daimler in a fit of pique he brought Neubauer with him to Mercedes. At Mercedes he found his home and would work there for the rest of his life. He was a company man who would stay loyal through thick and thin. It soon became apparent to Neubauer as it had been to his wife earlier that he was not destined to become a great race car driver. In fact his wife remarked that he drove like a night watchman! While working for Mercedes he heard of Rudolf Caracciola's exploits at the first Grand Prix of Germany at Avus in 1926. Caracciola driving under the most appalling conditions was not aware that he had actually won the race. Neubauer believed that a driver on the racetrack was the "world's loneliest human being." He thought that if a driver could be informed, during the race, of his position, speed, race distance and other particulars he would have a better chance of achieving his ultimate potential.



Neubauer brought his ideas to his superiors and luckily for him and Mercedes he found a willing supporter in Wilhelm Kissel. Head of the entire firm, Kissel was also a racing enthusiast and understood the benefits of a racing program in publicity and the development of road cars. Neubauer was a very large man with a voice to match. He could be a strict disciplinarian or a amiable dinner host with his impersonations of der Führer, Marilyn Monroe and others. His love of food and parties rivaled a modern day Bacchus. His loyalty to his drivers and to Mercedes though could not be questioned. He was called the big man or the fat man or simply Don Alfredo.



At his first race as team manager, Neubauer organized a Mercedes team of three cars. Neubauer assigned a crew for each car. Signal boards and flags were prepared and a sign language was created for the drivers and pit crews. Neubauer in the officeThey were similar to the signs used in American Baseball without the theatrical spitting and grabbing of one's crotch! In fact they started out rather simply: circling the right index finger in the air asked the remaining number of laps, a finger pointed forward asked how far the car in front was, pointing a thumb towards the back asked the converse. He had his mechanics practice pitstops for hours on end till they got it right. At the beginning of each race Alfred Neubauer took his place at trackside, a black and red flag in his hand. An official seeing this strange sight tried to have him removed but to no avail. There is even a photograph of Neubauer at the front of the grid holding up 4 fingers to signal four seconds to start. Amazingly all eyes are on him rather than on the starter! From that moment on a race without Don Alfredo could not have been very important.



Amazingly Neubauer had almost left Mercedes in 1932 to join Ferdinand Porsche at Auto Union when Mercedes quit racing during the depression. But he was promised that Mercedes would soon return to racing. Wilhelm Kissel could not afford to lose his once and future team manager. Alfred Neubauer would lead Mercedes' racing team through its golden period and then would come back for an encore in 1954 as if to show the world that he was still the master.



His many innovations continue on to this day. He is famous for creating the "silver arrows" by removing the paint from his white cars but this was actually a suggestion by his driver von Brauchitsch to meet the weight requirements. Mercedes was to drop out of racing shortly after this photo was taken.He created a secret racing elixir of black coffee, egg yolk, sugar, a little wine, and a few spices. He guaranteed that it would work wonders ... at least for a few laps. Neubauer had his pitcrews practice pit stops with the changing of all for tires until they were able to accomplish this with unheard of speed and precision. Not all of his ides worked though. For one race he flew in a plane to get a better view but has communication with his driver and pitcrews had failed or were nonexistent, and such was the legend of Alfred Neubauer this most singular man. Stirling Moss would say of him that "He was an amazing character, who could have anybody snapping to attention if necessary, but would also show great thought and understanding, in relaxed moments he could have us all rolling about with laughter."

Emerson Fittipaldi



Emmo" as he is known by legions of fans in America began his rise to fame in Europe. The son of well know Brazilian motor racing journalist Wilson Fittipaldi started racing motor bikes but soon moved to karts. In 1967, Fittipaldi with his older brother Wilson Jr. built their own karts and won everything in sight. Knowing that any future in motorsport led through England, Fittipaldi traveled to the distant shore in 1969 and came under the wing of legendary racing school owner Jim Russell, the first in a trio of great Brazilian drivers who were yet to come. Driving a Lotus Formula 3 car he won the Lombank F3 championship. His driving was smooth and controlled, trademarks that would continue throughout his career.



In 1970 he graduated to Formula 2, again driving a Lotus. In May of that year he was invited to a Formula 1 test drive by Colin Chapman. Duly impressed Chapman signed the young Brazilian to become the third team member after Jochen Rindt and John miles. Fittipaldi made his debut at Brands Hatch driving an an old Lotus 49 in which he scored an 8th place. His second race in Germany saw him score his first points for fourth place. Later after the tragic death of team leader Jochen Rindt, he won the United States Grand Prix clinching the World Championship for his stricken teammate. This young well-mannered driver seemly appeared out of nowhere to rescue the devastated team.



Fittipaldi's 1971 season was interrupted by a road accident on hi way home. His injuries while not life-threatening contributed to his lack of form that year but the following season saw him rise to the top, becoming the youngest World Champion in history. In 1973 he started the season as World Champion destined for another title. He seemed to have the measure of his competitors all save one, his teammate. Colin Chapman hoping to duplicate the superteam of Clark and Hill added the Swede Ronnie Peterson. At first Fittipaldi seemed to take this challenge in stride when he won both the Argentine and Brazilian Grands Prix. But the strain of developing the car, only to be out-qualified by Peterson, soon told on the usually calm Brazilian. In France he made an uncharacteristic error in trying to pass South African Jody Scheckter, causing a collision that ended the race for both cars. Fittipaldi would finish the title chase in second that year and soon left for McLaren.

More than the threat of his fast teammate Fittipaldi might have surmised that Lotus was entering one of their down periods after the racing life of their superb Lotus 72 had reached its end. Three wins and numerous points scoring finishes allowed him to claim his second World Championship in 1974. The next year was a year of turmoil which included a half-hearted Brands Hatch Race of Champions and a walkout at the Spanish Grand Prix. Disgusted with the political machinations he found in Formula 1 he turned inward. Helped by sponsorship from the Brazilian sugar combine, Copersucar he formed his own team with his elder brother Wilson Jr. but try as they might they could not reproduce the magic of a decade earlier and it was a sad sight to see the double World Champion at the blunt end of the grid. Frustrated with the lack of success Fittipaldi retired to his native Brazil heavily in debt but through his many contacts and hard work he was able to rebuild his fortune.



His career while ending in disappointment had shown a driver of great talent, whose smooth style was best described in the title of his autobiography; Flying on the Ground. All could have ended there but the racer's heart still beat in his chest and.

In 1984 he made a remarkable comeback, not in Formula 1 but in the IndyCar series. He soon became a crowd favorite with his open love of racing and his gracious attitude to his fellow drivers, one of whom, Al Unser Jr. who would become his rival, teammate and friend something not exactly the norm in Formula 1. His smooth style and experience would result in two Indianapolis 500 victories on that fearsome track. He finally retired for good after suffering neck injuries in a crash at the start of the US 500 in Michigan in 1996 and later back injuries in a small airplane crash. Today he continues his involvement in motor sport on multiple levels loved by fans on two continents.

Tazio Nuvolari a legend in his own lifetime, was known as Il Montavani Volante, the Flying Mantuan.. He epitomized courage and daring and for 30 years he amazed the racing world with his exploits on both two and four wheels. He was born November 18, 1892, in Casteldrio near Mantua. His uncle Giuseppe was a Bianchi dealer and introduced his nephew to motor sports. After serving in the Italian Army as a driver he started racing motorcycles seriously when he was 28. He raced Nortons, Saroleas, Garellis, Fongris and Indians. His riding was noticed by the powerful Bianchi team and he became a member and eventually Italian champion. At the Monza Grand Prix for motorcycles he crashed during practice. This resulted in two broken legs. After doctors put plaster casts on both legs he was told that it would be at least one month before he could walk again let alone race motorcycles. The next day he started the race having himself tied to his bike. He required his mechanics to hold him upright at the start of the race and to catch him at the end.



The legend of Tazio Nuvolari began that day when he won the race. Nuvolari began racing cars in 1924 at the age of 32 while still competing in motorcycles. In 1927 he started his own team, buying a pair of Bugatti 35Bs which he shared with his partner Achille Varzi who was also a successful motorcycle racer. This partnership would later turn into an intense rivalry. Nuvolari began to win races at the expense of Varzi who left the team. Varzi, the son of a wealthy merchant could afford better equipment and bought an Alfa P2. With this car he had the better of Nuvolari. He signed on with Alfa Romeo in 1929 and was a teammate of his rival Varzi once again. The Mille Miglia of 1930 would go down in history when Nuvolari caught an unsuspecting Varzi while driving in the night sans headlights. Three kilometers from the finish he suddenly pulled along side, smiling at his startled teammate he flicked on his headlights and powered on to victory.



For the Targa Floria of 1932 he requested of Enzo Ferrari a mechanic who weighed as little or less than he. Nuvolari took the young and inexperienced mechanic that Ferrari had given him and told him that he would warn him when they approached a particularly difficult corner so as not to unduly frighten the young man. As they approached a corner, Nuvolari would shout for the mechanic to take cover under the dashboard. After the race and another victory for Nuvolari, Ferrari asked the mechanic how he had made out. "Nuvolari started shouting at the first bend and finished at the last one," the boy answered. "I was down at the bottom of the car all the time." In 1933 he scored many victories but became estranged from the team manager Enzo Ferrari and left for Maserati. 1933 also saw him travel to Northern Ireland for the Tourist Trophy Race and a drive in a supercharged MG K3 Magnette. After totally dominating the race someone asked him if he liked the MG's brakes. Nuvolari replied he couldn't really tell, he hadn't used them that much. In 1935 he was induced to return to Alfa Romeo and scored one of his greatest victories at the Nurburgring. Driving an obsolete Alfa against the might of the German nation. He drove at the ragged edge and sometimes over it. His relentless pursuit caused the lead Mercedes to retire with a blown tire and he cruised to victory in front of a large gathering of Nazi party officials. In 1936 he had a serious accident during practice for the Tripoli GP but escaped from the hospital and took a taxi to the race where he finished seventh in a spare car. After the death of Bernd Rosemeyer in 1938, Auto Union was desperate for a driver who could master their mid-engine racecar. At the insistence of Dr. Ferdinand Porsche they turned to an Italian, Nuvolari who would go on to win the British Grand Prix at Donington.



Only World War II could stop Nuvolari but after the fighting stopped he returned to racing at the age of 53. In a minor race he had the steering wheel come off his car yet managed to return to the pits holding the wheel in one hand and the steering column with the other. He continued to win but age and sickness from acute asthma, the result of years of inhaling exhaust fumes would finally take their toll. His last Mille Miglia, in 1948, was a defining moment in his illustrious career. It was said that he wanted to die in the sport that he loved so much but in this wish he was denied. On August 11th, 1953, 9 months after suffering a paralyzing stroke he was dead. As was his wish he was buried in his uniform - the yellow jersey and blue trousers.



More than 50,000 people attended his funeral. Enzo Ferrari arriving in Mantua stopped at a plumber's shop to ask for directions. Seeing the Modena license plates and unaware of the identity of the driver, the workman murmured, "Thank you for coming. A man like that won't be born again."

Stirling Moss



In the United States when you hear the name Mario Andretti the first image that comes to your mind is auto racing. The same can be said for Stirling Moss on the "other side of the pond." Moss was born to racing with both parents involved in motorsports. His father Alfred Moss raced at Brooklands and when his studies took him to America he raced at Indianapolis. His mother competed in various trials and rallies. At the age of nine his father bought him an old Austin Seven in which the young Moss would drive around the fields surrounding their home. The family was also involved in horses and competitive riding which saw Stirling and his sister Pat entering various horse show competitions. While his sister continued to compete Stirling's heart lay more in horsepower of the mechanical variety. Despite being a natural athlete he suffered from various childhood health problems including a kidney affliction which made him medically unfit for National Service. This would later involve some controversy before his father had his medical records published. While motorsports ran through the family it was soon time to consider a proper career. Like his compatriot Tony Brooks it was once thought that he would follow his dad's footsteps and become a dentist and take over the family business. His father owned a lucrative business providing dental care to lower income patients which Stirling would call a "quick yank and out, next please" operation. But his indifferent school record made that impossible. He next tried a "crammer" school but this too failed to dislodge any innate brilliance. At age seventeen it was decided that the young Moss would go into the hotel trade. His training included serving as a waiter and later night porter - another occupation he was totally unqualified for.



Still Moss maintained his interest in cars and was soon driving on the open road, when of legal age, in a three wheeled Morgan. His next car was a MG and after seeing an advertisement for a racing car with an Aspen engine he promptly ordered one for 50 British Pounds. When his father found out, he angrily contacted the car company and had the order rescinded. Stirling was crestfallen but eventually his father relented and allowed Stirling to borrow his BMW sports car that he had recently purchased. It was in this BMW that Moss would start to compete in local speed trials. His first proper race car was a Cooper 500 which he used to compete in local hillclimbs. This car and its descendants formed the breeding grounds of future champions. Moss became aware of these cars through fellow competitors and went looking for the Cooper factory which he found in Surbiton. Factory may be to the wrong word to use as it was actually just a garage but one with a showroom that had on display one of the little jewels. Stirling contrived to drive past the showroom one day with his father as his unsuspecting passenger. Remarking on the car in the showroom he impressed upon his father how wonderful it would be to race such a car as this. His father agreed that it would be so if only Stirling would assume most of the cost. Reduced to selling most of his worldly possessions he was still short of the £600 needed but on his 18th birthday his parents made up the difference. This would be the beginning of a long association which saw him driving Coopers on and off for much of his career.



Since all of the pre-war racing venues were no longer available racing in Britain was very much a small time affair, that is to all except the competitors. Great Britain was still feeling the effects of World War II with the rationing of Petrol, yet almost every weekend played host to some form of competition as most of the race cars used methanol. This tradition of numerous events every weekend continues to this day as any visitor to this country can attest. Britain is the center of motorsports because more of it is happening at any one time than anywhere else in the world and Moss would enter as many races as he could and began to win more than his share. His obvious racing talent finally convinced his parents where his future lay if they needed any convincing as his weekend races had long become family affairs. With this support group Moss was on his way driving and racing anything that he could get his hands on. This became a trademark of his success. In 1950 Moss got his first works team drive for HWM. Created by John Heath and George Abecassis, partners in Hersham & Walton Motors the team consisted of three four-cylinder Formula 2 cars. The team leader was the free spirited Lance Macklin. Moss would learn his racing craft from HWM and lessons about life from Macklin. HVM's chief mechanic was an Polish ex-serviceman by the name of Kovaleski who adopted the English name of Alf Francis and who would later become a legend himself. At the Monza Autodrome GP he was involved in a terrific dice with the veteran Ferrari driver Villoresi who later congratulated the young Moss on his skill. His record with HWM was uneven to say the least with the cars breaking down more often then not but Moss would remember this period as a great learning experience. During this time he also raced other cars including the Jaguar C-Type in which he won the sports car race leading up to the French Grand Prix. This would be the first win for a car using disk brakes.



In 1951 he was contracted to race for Ferrari at selected events but when practice began for the first race at Bari he was told unceremoniously that the car he supposed was his had been given to Taruffi. Deeply embarrassed he vowed to exact his revenge against the red cars. In 1955 driving for Mercedes alongside Fangio, he tasted his first victory at Aintree. In 1956 he drove a Maserati and won twice more. The following year although again pursued by Ferrari he chose to drive for the British Vandervell team. This decision to drive for British teams whenever possible may have cost him future World Championships. A telling example that shows the measure of this man happened in 1958 at the Grand Prix of Portugal. During the race Mike Hawthorn spun his car but was able to continue and eventually finished second. Which when added to his fastest lap gave him 7 points to Moss' 8 for the win. Hawthorn though, was accused by the officials of breaking the rules by restarting in the opposite direction. Moss who witnessed the incident came to his rival's defense and a relieved Hawthorn was able to keep his 7 points. Moss would eventually lose the championship to his rival by one point even though he bested his fellow countryman in race wins 4 to 1. It makes one ponder what any of the current racers would do today in similar circumstances. Moss would continue to win against larger teams but the championship was always just beyond his reach. In 1962 a terrible accident at Goodwood would eventually force his retirement. To say that his career was in any way a failure is not to know of the achievements that were made in his name in such legendary races as the Targa Florio, Pescara and the Mille Miglia. At home in any type of car he partnered with journalist Denis Jenkinson to win the historic Mille Miglia in 1955, the first foreigners since Caracciola and the only Britons to ever do so. At the 24 Hours of Le Mans he was partnered with Fangio in the lead Mercedes, Neubauer rightly believing that if they were to race in separate cars they would race each other to the possible determent of finish the endurance race. While leading the race they had to withdraw with the rest of the team after tragedy struck and 78 spectators lay dead. The result of a racing accident involving one of the Mercedes.

Moss was considered by many as being the first modern professional driver who raced for the love of the sport but also was intent on earning a sizable income. Staying in top physical shape he would travel all over the world to race. He was not above haggling for more appearance money and between races he would work at his home office dealing with correspondence, managing endorsements or recording his thoughts for his latest book. He had begun writing books about the sport and would later comment that when he would race in a particular country the sales of his book there would increase. This would help to increase his fame and conversely the amount of money he could require in exchange for his appearance. He courted endorsements as no other driver of his day and was sometimes ridiculed for this when in truth he was just ahead of his time. In the end he was a racer who enjoyed driving all sorts of cars and raced only to win.



Moss still keeps track of the current Grand Prix scene and is not hesitant to voice his opinion on current circuit design and their vast run-off areas and ubiquitous chicanes. "To race a car through a turn at maximum speed, is difficult", he said, "but to race a car at maximum speed through that same turn when there is a brick wall on one side and a precipice on the other - Ah, that's an achievement."

Jackie Stewart



His early involvement with cars was in the family business, Dumbuck Garage, in Dumbarton, Scotland, where he worked as an apprentice mechanic. His family were Jaguar dealers and had built up a successful practice. Jackie's brother Jimmy was a racing driver with a growing local reputation. He drove for Ecurie Ecosse and actually competed in the British Grand Prix of 1953, or at least he did until he went off at Copse in the wet. It was only natural that Jackie would soon become involved in motor racing like his older brother. After his brother was injured in a crash at Le Mans the sport was discouraged by their parents and Jackie took up shooting. In target shooting Stewart made a name for himself and almost made it to the Olympics only just missing the team for 1960.



But he took up an offer from Barry Filer, a customer of his family business, to test in a number of his cars at Oulten Park. Jackie Stewart impressed all who were in attendance that day. Ken Tyrrell who was running the Formula Junior team for Cooper heard of this young Scotsman from a track manager and called up his brother Jimmy to see if his younger brother was interested in a tryout. Jackie came down for the test and took over a car that Bruce McLaren was testing. McLaren at that time was already an experienced Formula One driver and the new Cooper F3 was a very competitive car in its class. Soon Stewart was besting the times of McLaren causing McLaren to return to the track for some quick laps.



Again Stewart was faster and Tyrrell seeing the obvious, offered Stewart a spot on the team. This would be the beginning of a great partnership that would see them one day at the pinnacle of the sport. But this was still 1963 and Jackie Stewart still had a lot to learn. In 1964 he drove F3 for Ken Tyrrell and won his first race at Snetterton. Since Tyrrell did not compete in Formula 1 at that time he joined Graham Hill at BRM in 1965. His first contract netted him £4,000! On his debut in South Africa he scored his first Championship point. Before the end of the year he won his first race at Monza. 1966 saw him almost win the Indianapolis 500 on his first attempt only to be denied by a broken scavenge pump with eight laps to go.

All the world seemed at his feet, until Spa. A sudden downpour made the course treacherous and cars were sliding off the track at an alarming rate. Stewart unable to control his car crashed into a ditch. His team-mate Hill said: "I spun round like a top myself. When I came to a stop at the side of the road I saw Jackie's BRM in the ditch. He was in considerable pain, trapped by the side of the car, which had been pushed in. The petrol tanks had ruptured and he was covered with petrol. There was a big risk of fire and I turned off the fuel pump switches and then tried to lift him out. The steering wheel was jammed up against his leg and it was obvious that this would have to be removed before I could get him out."

Stewart: "I lay trapped in the car for twenty-five minutes, unable to be moved. Graham and Bob Bondurant got me out using the spanners from a spectator's toolkit. There were no doctors and there was nowhere to put me. They in fact put me in the back of a van. Eventually an ambulance took me to a first aid spot near the control tower and I was left on a stretcher, on the floor, surrounded by cigarette ends. I was put into an ambulance with a police escort and the police escort lost the ambulance, and the ambulance didn't know how to get to Liège. At the time they thought I had a spinal injury. As it turned out, I wasn't seriously injured, but they didn't know that."



"I realized that if this was the best we had there was something sadly wrong: things wrong with the race track, the cars, the medical side, the fire-fighting, and the emergency crews. There were also grass banks that were launch pads, things you went straight into, trees that were unprotected and so on. Young people today just wouldn't understand it. It was ridiculous."

:"If I have any legacy to leave the sport I hope it will be seen to be an an area of safety because when I arrived in Grand Prix racing so-called precautions and safety measures were diabolical." From that day on he would have a spanner taped to the BRM's steering wheel.

Together with Louis Stanley, the leader of the BRM team he launched a campaign to improve safety standards and medical facilities in the case of injury. An so he began a long uphill fight that still continues to this day. His speed was readily apparent to all those around him yet some questioned his courage because of his outspokenness in favor of greater driver safety. His driving style was marked by almost machine like consistency.



When Tyrrell moved up in class to Formula 1 Stewart joined him. In 1969 at the wheel of a Matra-Ford he won the World Championship for himself and Ken Tyrrell. In 1971 he repeated as champion racing a Tyrrell. The following year saw him missing some races because of illness brought upon by stomach ulcers. In 1973 his final year, was marked by triumph and tragedy. His third and final World Championship was marred by the death of his friend and protégé Francois Cevert. Jackie Stewart followed through with a decision that he had made at the beginning of the year and retired from racing. His 27 Grand Prix wins were not equaled for another 20 years. In 1997 Jackie Stewart returns to Formula 1 not as a driver but team owner in partnership with his son and Ford Motor Company.

Alberto Ascari



It was May 22, 1955, and the European and Monaco Grand Prix was reaching its most exciting moment. Alberto Ascari was straining every sinew in his body, and in his Lancia D50, to catch up with race-leader Stirling Moss’s Mercedes Benz W196. It was the 77th lap, and he was winning back two or three seconds per circuit. A quick calculation showed that if Moss slackened speed by as much as one second per lap Ascari could catch and pass him on the last circuit……..

1954 had been an immensely frustrating year for the world champion of ’52 and ’53. He had walked out on Ferrari at the end of 1953 and on 1 January 1954 had signed for the ambitious Lancia company, who had designed and built an innovative new Grand Prix car, the first in their history. Progress however was slow, and the car’s debut was delayed again and again. Meanwhile consternation reigned in Northern Italy when Mercedes Benz announced that revolutionary new streamlined "Silver Arrows" were to be ready to race in the French GP in July. Accordingly Alberto together with friend and mentor Luigi Villoresi were released by Lancia to drive 250F Maseratis to meet this threat to Italian supremacy. They shouldn’t have bothered. Fangio and Kling in the W196s blew all the other competitors off the track; only six out of the twenty-one starters survived. Along with many others Alberto blew his engine on lap 2 trying to keep up with the two Mercedes.

After some fairly chaotically unsuccessful races for Maserati, Ascari was generously loaned a Ferrari for the Italian GP. Alberto managed to reach the front row of the grid and by lap 6 was in the lead. The race settled down to become a duel between Ascari and Moss’s private Maserati, but on lap 49, Alberto retired with an overstrained engine. Eventually what the Italians had most feared happened, Fangio won on the German Mercedes, but only after Moss’s oil tank split.



Clearly something had to be done, and so two Lancias, maroon-red paint barely dry, were rushed out to make their debut at the final race of 1954, the Spanish GP, held on October 24 round the Pedralbes circuit. Alberto started impressively and by lap 8 had built up a big lead. On lap 9 however, a moan of dismay went up as he stopped with clutch problems. After one more slow lap, Ascari retired. Villoresi had already retired on lap 4. Although Hawthorn’s Ferrari won the race, Fangio won the World Championship of 1954, thanks to the Mercedes Benz W196, and due to the belated arrival of the Lancia D50.

Although all 3 Lancias retired in the Argentinean GP of 16 January 1955, the D50s won two minor F1 races and with the powerful team of Italians, Ascari, Gigi Villoresi, and young Eugenio Castellotti, Lancia was well placed to take on and even beat the hitherto all-conquering Germans.

And so back to Monaco…… On the 81st lap Moss swung his smoking Mercedes Benz into the pit. The pistons had packed up for the day. As Fangio had already retired with a broken transmission on lap 50, the German challenge was finished leaving the stage clear for a debut Lancia GP victory.



As Ascari drove up towards the Casino on that fateful 81st lap the loudspeakers were telling the crowds what he could not know; that Moss was out of his car and the mechanics were gazing hopelessly at the ruined engine. As he took the Casino corner and wound the Lancia round the sinuous bends by the station Alberto noticed that the spectators were waving and signaling to him. He had no way of knowing that they were trying to tell him that when he reached the pits he would be the leader. His deadly concentration on the task of taking the Lancia round the city circuit a little faster than seemed possible was broken. He sensed that something was wrong as he swung round the station bends and turned on to the Corniche road. He flashed into the tunnel and out into the brilliant sunshine to be confronted with the same gesticulations and excitement. It distracted his attention for a vital second as he covered the downhill approach to the chicane and the corner became impossible. He chose the only way out and took the Lancia clean through the barriers into the sea. Concealed among the straw bales was an iron bollard the size of a small barrel. The car missed it by about 12 inches.

Steam from the hot engine mingled with the dust and fragments of straw floating in the air. For an agonizing three seconds everyone’s breath stopped. Then the pale blue helmet appeared bobbing on the surface. Ascari was hauled into a boat before even the frogmen could reach him.

Trintignant won the race in a Ferrari. He had driven a fast but steady race and had seen the successive elimination of all the eight drivers who had been in front of him at the end of the tenth lap. Meanwhile Alberto was lying in a hospital bed suffering from nothing worse than a broken nose, and, not surprisingly, shock. It was a miraculous deliverance.

Four days later, at Monza, Ascari was on his feet again, watching the practicing for the Supercortemaggiore race. Just before going home to lunch with his wife he decided to try a few laps with the Sports Ferrari of his friend Castellotti. In shirt sleeves, ordinary trousers and Castellotti’s helmet he set off. As it emerged from a fast curve on the third lap the car unaccountably skidded, turned on its nose and somersaulted twice. Thrown out on the track, Ascari suffered multiple injuries and died a few minutes later.

Alberto Ascari was born in Milan on July 13, 1918. His father Antonio was the greatest Italian driver of his day and frequently used to take his son with him to races in which he competed. A fortnight before Alberto’s seventh birthday, Antonio Ascari was killed while leading the French Grand Prix at Montlehry. From then on it was Alberto’s passion to become a racing driver like his father. So absorbed was he with this ambition that he twice ran away from school and at the first possible moment bought himself a motor-bike. His first motor race was the 1940 Mille Miglia, the car he drove was a Ferrari. In 1940 he married a Milan girl and they had two children. The boy was named Antonio in memory of his grandfather and the girl was called Patrizia. Ascari was devoted to his family.



Alberto resumed racing in 1947. He bought a 4CLT Maserati from the new owners, the Orsi family. He managed to scrape together 3 million lire, and his good friend Gigi Villoresi helped with some of the other 2 million. Ascari and Villoresi raced successfully on the tracks of Northern Italy, and the Milanese crowd bestowed the nickname "Ciccio" meaning "Tubby" on Alberto. 1948 proved another successful year for the two friends in improved San Remo Maseratis. Ascari also had one race in a 158 Alfa, finishing 3rd in the French GP at Reims behind team mates Wimille and Sanesi.

Enzo Ferrari, who had been a great friend and team mate of Alberto’s father, had been taking a keen interest in Alberto’s successes, and he signed both Ascari and Villoresi in 1949. That year Ascari had five victories plus another win at Buenos Aires in the Peron GP.

In 1950 he had nine Ferrari victories and in 1951 six, despite Ferrari playing second fiddle to the aging 158/159 Alfa Romeos, but 1952 was his most successful season with 12. He missed the first race of 1952, the Swiss GP, as he was away qualifying at Indianapolis with the big 4.5 litre Ferrari, which suffered a wheel collapse in the 500, but for the other races he had a comparatively easy ride, Fangio of the rival Maserati team being out of racing for most of the season after a crash in the Monza GP in June. He won the World Championship at a canter, then repeated the feat in 1953, despite the tougher opposition from the Maseratis of Fangio and Gonzales.

Ascari was most relaxed when out in front of a race, and was unlike most drivers in that he appeared not to give of his best when further back. As Enzo Ferrari later recalled, "When leading, he could not easily be overtaken – indeed it was virtually impossible to overtake him."



He was not a relaxed driver. With his mouth set and his eyes concentrated he seemed to whip his car along and his sensitive hands constantly manipulated the steering wheel. When he was really in a hurry he took his bends in a series of dicey jerks rather than in one controlled slide. To have Ascari on your tail was a truly unnerving experience. The knowledge that he would have to find an opportunity to pass seemed to worry him.

Ascari’s death was regarded as a national loss. Telegrams of sympathy were received from the heads of three foreign states. From the front columns of the Church of San Carlo al Corso hung black drapes and a huge inscription: "On the Last Finish Line, meet, O lord, the soul of Alberto Ascari." At his funeral the Plazza del Duomo, the bustling centre of Milan, was packed with people. Normally the noisiest square in Italy it was that day so silent that the telephones could be heard ringing unanswered in the houses.

Three days after the funeral, Lancia officially suspended all racing activity, and in July they handed six Lancia D50 cars, engines, blueprints and spares over to Ferrari.

Niki Lauda



Andreas Nikolaus Lauda was born to a well-to-do Vienna family on February 22, 1949. His family's social status proved both nuisance and good fortune. Although he was later to become successful in business on his own, it was obvious early on that he was not cut to fit the conventional Lauda mold, much to his family's consternation. He did, however, find the family connections to be useful when it later became necessary for him to borrow to support his racing.
Lauda became interested in motor racing not from attendance at events or boyhood idolization of racing heroes, but rather from an innate interest in automobiles dating to a young age. When he was twelve, visiting relatives were letting him park their cars. He got hold of, in his early teens, a 1949 Volkswagen Beetle convertible in which he would ride roughshod over a relative's estate. He entered his first race, a hill climb, in a Cooper in 1968 taking second in class. Thereafter, despite his father's insistence that he stay away from racing, he competed in hill climbs and later Formula Vee. He did his stint hauling a Formula 3 car on a trailer to races around Europe. In the course of this he scared himself into a certain amount of sanity, and, in 1971, abandoned the wildness of Formula 3 to take the plunge on his own in Formula 2.



By virtue of his family's business reputation he was able to secure loans that would not otherwise have been available. He used these to buy an F2 seat at March for '71 partnering Ronnie Peterson (who was getting paid for his driving), and the next season an F1/F2 combination. When March fizzled he persuaded Louis Stanley at BRM to sell him a seat. In the course of all this he ran up debts that would have balked a small banana republic. Due dates on notes had an unfortunate tendency not to coincide with the availability of starting money from touring car races. But his abilities got him noticed. In true fairy tail fashion first Stanley began paying him, then the call from Ferrari's Luca Montezemolo came before the financial house of cards collapsed (his devil-may-care approach didn't seem to worry him at the time, although in his mature years he would say that it had been crazy). He squirmed out of his contract with Stanley, and was off on an often-rocky ride with Ferrari to two world championships.

In 1974, his first year with Prancing Horse, Lauda scored the first of his 26 F1 victories. He, as well as teammate Clay Regazzoni, with good cars under them, challenged for the championship. Lauda took it in his second year with the team in a car that was technically far superior to any of the competition. He had 5 wins and a huge margin over second place. He called 1975 "the unbelievable year."

The championship that Lauda may wind up being most remembered for was one that he did not win. It is a curious fact about top level sporting endeavor that something needs to go wrong before there is a contest - before there is real competition. Baseball with nothing but ever-flawless hitting and perfect pitching would be boring not to mention impossible. Likewise soccer with constant errorless goal keeping or shots that never miss. Things must go wrong in motor races as well. But racing involves powerful machines carrying extraordinary levels of kinetic energy. So when something does go wrong, people can get badly hurt or killed. Niki Lauda suffered severe injuries in the 1976 German Grand Prix at the old Nurburgring, in the process setting up what may have been the most dramatic championship that F1 has yet seen.



Lauda had taken a significant early lead in the points despite having cracked ribs as a result of rolling a tractor while mowing his Salzburg property. F1's reigning playboy, James Hunt, had nonetheless adopted a never-say-die attitude, and kept his McLaren barely in touch even though he had a win at the British GP taken away over an alleged technical violation. By the German Grand Prix he was more than 20 down to the Austrian. After an early stop to change from wets to slicks, just past Bergwerk, Lauda's Ferrari unexplainably swerved off to the right, impacted an embankment, bounced back across the track, was collected by Brett Lunger and caught fire. Several drivers including Lunger, Guy Edwards and a fearless Arturo Merzario managed to extract Lauda from the burning wreck. Although he was able to stand after the accident, it soon became evident that his injuries were grave. Hot, toxic gases had damaged the inside of his lungs and his blood. His helmet had come partially adrift and he had suffered severe burns to his head. He lapsed into a coma. For a period of time his life was despaired of. However, he rallied and, in a show of courage that is difficult to overstate, was back in a Ferrari cockpit at speed six weeks after the accident (he later revealed that at the time he was virtually petrified with fear).

This six weeks covered 2 races and saw Hunt draw close. The Brands Hatch win was given back to him on appeal, and he won at Zandvoort. Lauda's return to competition at Monza produced an amazing 4th place and 3 points. Hunt scored wins in both North American races, while Lauda had to settle for no points at Canada by virtue of suspension problems, and a third at Watkins Glen. This impressive run pulled Hunt to within 3 points of Lauda with only Fuji left on the calendar. The race started in a monumental downpour, and after 2 laps Lauda abandoned saying it was crazy to drive in such conditions. He was probably correct, but he was probably also still affected by his Nurburgring accident. In the event, the rain soon slacked, and Hunt finished third despite a late tire change, collecting 4 points to take the title.



Hunt by no means backed into his championship. He won 8 races to Lauda's 4 (in 1976 wins were worth 9 points; with wins now worth 10 points we may not see a championship season like 1976 again), and 6 of the last 9. When he suffered setbacks he always bounced back. When opportunity presented itself he rose, in true championship fashion, fully to the occasion. He would be have been the last to admit it (he seemed to be proud of his uninhibited life style), but he displayed the better qualities of the British competitive spirit - a consistent tenacity and persistence in the face of difficult odds. Lauda had placed himself in an awkward and stressful situation: still leading the championship while suffering the physical and mental effects of a very bad accident. He could easily have (and perhaps should have) sat out the balance of the season. But he faced up squarely to his handicaps in clinging to his lead, and displayed admirable sanity under enormous pressure at Fuji.

In 1977 Lauda cruised to his second championship despite winning only 3 races, then promptly dropped Ferrari at Canada. The parting was not amicable, although Lauda was later to recant much of his criticism of the team (and eventually serve it as a sort of minister without portfolio). He was apparently an example of that rare individual who was not over-awed by Enzo Ferrari. He claims to have regularly simply shown himself into The Drake's inner sanctum when he wanted a word with him. And he was not cowed when those words became heated as tended to be the case following Fuji.



For 1978 Lauda took up with Bernie Ecclestone and Gordon Murray at Brabham. It was not the success that might have been expected from the trio. The Alfa 12-cylinder was not up to the task. Ecclestone was busy running the money end of F1. The only real accomplishment of note during Lauda's 2 seasons with Brabham was the infamous Fan Car. Lotus was starting to make great strides with ground effects, the aim of which was to reduce the air pressure under the car thereby increasing tire grip and cornering speed. In an exercise in loophole exploitation that probably made Colin Chapman green with envy, Brabham repositioned the radiators at the rear of the car and cooled them with a big fan instead of with rammed air as was normal with side-mounted radiators. Of course, they contrived to see to it that the fan just happened to also suck air out from under the car increasing its downforce. Lauda and John Watson employed all of the sandbagging skills they could muster in an effort to hide the fact that the car was unbeatable. It won once, in 1978 at Anderstorp with Lauda at the wheel. It never won again because it never competed again, having been promptly banned as being contrary to some rule or other.

At Canada in 1979, exactly 2 years after kissing off Ferrari, Lauda suddenly decided in the middle of practice that he no longer wanted to race, and promptly retired then and there from F1. For 2 seasons he devoted himself to his airline business and to TV commentary.

Lauda returned to F1 in 1982 for, by his own admission, financial reasons. The fledgling airline that he had started (he loved flying so why not an airline; to Niki Lauda it made perfect sense) had fallen on hard times. He signed up with Ron Dennis and McLaren to partner John Watson for plenty of money (albeit, on only a 4 race contract to start with) and the promise of a competitive ride.

Lauda's comeback got tangled up in the great FISA - FOCA war. One of the more prominent skirmishes in this ugly affair occurred at the 1982 South African GP. Lauda wound up in the middle of a labor fracas before he had even turned a Goodyear in anger. The so-called Super License for F1 drivers had been introduced by FISA in an effort to keep marginal talents out of the cockpit. Owner members of FOCA (with the apparent connivance of FISA), however, had taken advantage of the licensing process to try and bind drivers to their teams. Most drivers, including Lauda with his shrewd eye for all matters fiscal, saw through this ruse and refused to sign. At South Africa they were threatened by FISA with being banned from the race for lack of licenses. Lauda and Didier Pironi, head of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, organized a resistance movement, and got most of the drivers to lock themselves together in a hotel meeting room over night while Pironi negotiated with FISA major-domo Jean-Marie Balestre. Balestre made concessions prior to the weekend having to be completely written off, and Lauda went on to place 4th in his first race back.



And it didn't take long for him to reacquaint himself with winning. At Long Beach he won in only his third race since returning. He also won at Brands Hatch that season. '83 was a no win year while the TAG Turbo was shaken down, but '84 ended with Lauda back at the top of F1. Although he won the '84 championship by a mere 1/2 pt., he seemed to have the measure of his usually faster rival and new teammate, Alain Prost, for most of the season. As quick as Prost was and as good a politician as he was, he met his match in the imposing personalities of Lauda and later Ayrton Senna. Lauda was seldom faster than the best of his rivals. He disliked risks that he considered unnecessary. He was not noted for redoubling his efforts when things weren't going well. He was not one for making selfless sacrifices for the good of the team (though he would do so for the good of Lauda). He did often have good cars, but he also often had talented teammates who had the same cars - Regazzoni, Reutemann and Prost. One might wonder how it was that he was so successful. Lauda had the sort of self-confidence usually reserved for megalomaniacs, minus the psychosis. All three of his championships probably came about as much because he willed them into existence as for any other reason.

An important part of his successful mental approach to competition apparently was for him to be as unsparingly honest and straight with himself as he was with others. In the late '70s a PR visit between the then World Champion driver and Muhammad Ali was arranged. Lauda came away from it scratching his head, not because of the hype the boxer surrounded himself with (which Lauda understood to sometimes be part of a super star's marketing) but because Ali appeared to believe it. This was not a delusion under which Lauda would ever fall.

Another part was sheer smarts. Lauda, though a poor student as a youngster, is obviously possessed of superior intelligence in a branch of sport where that is saying a great deal indeed. This served him well off the track as well as on. He and collaborators have produced 4 very informative books on racing and his career (which, by the way, thoroughly dispel the notion that he was nothing but a cold-hearted machine). He mastered English quickly (and, per force, Italian while he was with Ferrari), and thus had a language other than German in which to deliver the patented Lauda interviews. These were dispensed with a combination of succinctness, authority and deadly aim that rivaled the Almighty handing down the Ten Commandments on Sinai.



A good example occurred after he had retired from racing for the second time. One of his Lauda Air 767s suffered an uncommanded thrust reverser deployment after departing Bangkok and plunged into the jungle snuffing out a couple of hundred or so lives. Lauda rushed from Austria to the crash site buried deep in the Thai rain forest. The story has it that, plowing around through aircraft pieces, bodies and undergrowth, he single-handedly discovered the mechanical evidence pointing to the faulty reversers. Whether this is actually true or not, he was certainly instrumental in turning up information useful in determining the cause of the accident. He went straight to England where he could test the theory in a 767 simulator, then immediately held a press conference at which, with typical Lauda clarity and economy of words, he stated (not "suggested" or "inferred") that he knew the cause of the crash, and that it was not Lauda Air's fault, but rather a problem with the Boeing aircraft type. The official investigation culminating a year or so later arrived at the same conclusion. This ruthless straightforwardness had served him well in innumerable interviews during his racing career. While Hakkinen shows that he brooks no stupid questions by hemming and hawing, looking at the floor and replaying answers over and over, Lauda showed the same thing by simply providing a (emphasis here) few quick, clever, perfect words.

Lauda did not hang around long after taking his third championship. His second and final departure from F1, at Adelaide in 1985, was typical of his whole approach to racing and to life - quick, with no frills and no glance over the shoulder. One moment he was flying his McLaren down the long straight. The next his front brakes had failed him and he was skittering into the runoff area and up against the wall. The next after that he was out of his car disappearing behind the barrier without a look back and with the next flight out on his mind.

Many of Lauda's actions may appear to have been somewhat precipitous, but he likely is not so much impulsive as pathologically decisive. His extreme dislike of wishy-washiness probably explains such things as his abrupt abandonment of Ferrari in '77, his equally abrupt retirement from Brabham and F1 in '79, and his thumbing his nose at monopolistic Austrian Airlines by founding his own airline. He is unsympathetic to lack of punctuality. By his own admission those around him, including his family, often had to arrange their lives to suit his needs. He was vigilant and not the least bit sentimental when it came to making money from racing, to the point of insisting on handsome payment for autograph sessions. These and other personal traits chafed some egos along the way. In his Ferrari days Lauda, the very antithesis of the Italian persona, never captured the love of the tifosi the way that Gilles Villeneuve, or even Mansell did. Yet he became a bona fide legend in his own time. Certainly part of this was due to his Nurburgring accident. But primarily it was a result of the unique impact that his personality and skills had on the sport. There may have been a few better than him, but there have never been any like him.

Jean-Pierre Wimille



Was born in Paris, in 1908. His father was motoring correspondent for the Petit Parisien newspaper. He made his Grand Prix debut in 1930, at the French Grand Prix in Pau but mechanical trouble forced him to retire. His appetite now wetted he resolved to continue racing. Except for 2 victories in 1932, Oran and Lorraine, and the GP of Algeria in 1934 he was handicapped by the growing lack of a competitive Bugatti Grand Prix car. With the domination of the German teams in the latter half of the pre-war decade he concentrated on sports cars where he had more success. Winning the French Grand Prix of 1936 which was limited to sports cars and then the 24 Hours of LeMans twice in 1937 and 39. Wimille still longed to race a competitive car in a real Grand Prix. That opportunity almost came when he was reputedly offered a drive for Mercedes but decided to turn it down for political reasons. During this time Wimille's driving was marked with definite wildness quite different from his post-war smoothness.



When war came he joined the French Resistance, at one point just escaping capture by the Gestapo by jumping from a window and hiding in a nearby stream. After the war a more mature Wimille re-started his career as soon as possible. That opportunity came at a series of races held at the Bois de Boulogne, Paris on 9 September 1945. One of the races, the Coupe des Prisonniers saw a late entrant in the form of Jean-Pierre Wimille and a unique 4.7-litre Bugatti sprint car. Arriving too late for practice he was forced to start from the rear of the grid. Unfortunately for the others it wasn't far enough back as he soon charged through the field to take the victory, racing had returned to Europe. His driving, once hot headed and prone to accident was now recognized as second to none. He became a hero to countless up and coming drivers including no less than Fangio himself.



Desperate to make up for the lost years he entered every event possible, practicing for a minor event in South America he was either blinded by the sun or swerved to avoid spectators which in either case caused him to crash fatally, depriving the world of its first true World Champion when the title was instituted in 1950.

Jack Brabham



Jack Brabham was a second generation Aussie who's grandfather came from the Cockney area of East London. His father who owned a grocery store just outside of Sydney was a keen motorist who taught Brabham how to drive a car at the age of 12. At 15 Brabham left school and got a job in a local garage while spending his evenings studying engineering at Kogarah Tech.

In 1946 after two years duty in the Air Force Brabham opened a small repair business. He soon made the acquaintance of an ex-patriot American by the name of Johnny Schonberg who raced midget cars. Brabham prepared a new car for the American but after his wife induced him to quit racing it was left to Brabham to try his hand. After some sketchy instructions he made his debut at Paramatta Park Speedway. In his first season he won the New South Wales Championship. During this time he would form a partnership with Ron Tauranac that would continue into Formula One and Europe.



In 1955 he made his way to Europe and had his Grand prix debut at Aintree. After an abortive stint driving a private Maserati 250F he joined the Cooper team. 1959 saw the Cooper with a proper 2 1/2 liter Coventry Climax engine with which Brabham won the World Championship. In 1960 he repeated this feat with a new lowline model, which included a streak of five straight victories. Finding his influence proscribed at Cooper he decided to strike out on his own in partnership with Ron Tauranac and Motor Racing Developments. The new 1 1/2 liter engine limit in Formula One found the British teams scrambling for motive power. While the small engined cars seemed tailor made for Jimmy Clark and Lotus, Brabham's aggressive style seemed unsuited and he would not win a race during the 1500 cc era. It was left to American Dan Gurney to take the team's maiden victory at Rouen. For 1966 a new 3 liter formula came into existence. Brabham found an engine in his own backyard with the Australian Repco Company. The Repco-Brabham would provide Brabham a car with which he won the French, British, Dutch and German Grands Prix and that years World Championship. The next year would follow with another championship for the team, this time the title went to his teammate Denis Hulme. 1968 belonged to Lotus and Ford-Cosworth despite the tragic death of Jimmy Clark. For 1969 Brabham also had a Ford-Cosworth engine deal but a broken ankle during a test crash ruined his title chances.



In 1970 he had hoped to retire but finding all the top drivers unavailable he decided to continue driving for one more year. Rather than going through the motions he won the season opener at the South African Grand Prix and led the always difficult Monaco Grand Prix until the final corner of the last lap while under pressure of the onrushing Jochen Rindt. The Mexican Grand Prix would be his last race but even at 44 the fires still burned bright.

After retiring from driving he sold his interest in the team to his partner Ron Tauranac and returned to his native Australia. Later in his life Brabham would regret making such a clean break in Formula One. Besides maintaining his garage business he still makes appearances at the various vintage races that seem to be springing up everywhere.

Rudolf Caracciolla



born in the town of Remagen, Germany in 1901 the son of parents who originally came from Italy. He won his first race at the age of 22. He worked as a salesman at newly formed Daimler-Benz and was allowed to race on weekends if the race was within driving distance of the Dresden agency. After convincing the general manager at Daimler to lend him a factory racecar he was required to enter the Grand Prix of Germany at Avus under his own name. This 25-year-old weekend racer started the most important race of his young career and promptly stalled his car. His mechanic Otto Salzar was forced to jump out and push start the lonely Mercedes. At last the car sputtered to life. Starting from dead last in a 44-car field was not what the young Caracciola had in mind. Shortly it began to rain and cars were flying off the track. One crashed into a timekeeper's stand and killed the course worker.



The 500,000 spectators were to get the shock of their afternoon when it was announced that a new driver, one completely unknown to them had gone into the lead. But this lead was short lived as the Mercedes began to suffer from serious misfire. Caracciola pulled into the pits and in those days the driver had to do any repairs required on the car so Caracciola pulled each of the eight spark plugs out one by one. It was not until the last plug did he discover the culprit. By then it seamed that all was lost and he was urged to quit. Caracciola would hear none of this and chose to continue spurred on by a sense of duty to the factory. By the 13th lap the rain had stopped but Caracciola had no sense of his position but still he soldiered on. After driving flat-out for nearly three hours and 243 miles he crossed the finished line totally exhausted. Only then did he learn that he had won the first Grand Prix of Germany.



Caracciola would gain fame throughout Germany racing the legendary white SSK for Mercedes. He was renowned for his wet weather prowess. In 1929 he scored one of his greatest victories at the Tourist Trophy in Northern Ireland. Racing against the cream of Great Britain, including Bentley ace Tim Birkin, he came from a five lap handicap to win the thirty lap race in a rain storm. His victory in the 1931 Mille Miglia was not equaled by another non-Italian for 24 years until Stirling Moss won it in 1955. The starting positions were still selected by drawing lots in the 1935 Spanish Grand Prix. Caracciola would have to start from the last row. His style had always been to get to the front as quickly as possible but this time things would be a little more difficult. The flag fell and Caracciola roared off down to the first corner. Mistaking the pedal arrangement in his Grand Prix car with his touring car, he stepped on the accelerator instead of the brake. The leaders seeing this maniac charge from way behind could only give way and in spite of almost crashing out on the first corner did he garner the lead!



The year 1935 had been a special year as he returned to racing after suffering serious injuries to his body and his heart. His beloved wife, Charly, had died in an avalanche. Still hobbled by injuries his come back victory at the Grand Prix of Tripoli had a legendary quality to it. That year he became European Champion. In 1936 he won the Grand Prix de Monaco but the year belonged to Bernd Rosemeyer and Auto Union. Mercedes came back in 1937 and Caracciola was again European Champion. In 1938 he won the Coppa Acerbo at Pescara and won his third title. Rudolf Caracciola's career was plagued by painful leg injuries and later ill health yet he continued to win many honors.

His battles with Bernd Rosemeyer and Auto Union ended in the World Land Speed Record for Caracciola and the tragic death of Rosemeyer. During World War II he lived in exile at his home in Lugano, Switzerland. After the war, his love of racing unabated, he continued to race through worsening health brought on by bone disease. He died at the age of 58 in 1959. According to the legendary Mercedes team manager Alfred Neubauer, with who he had a long and close relationship, " ... of all the great drivers I have known - Nuvolari, Rosemeyer, Lang, Moss or Fangio - Caracciola was the greatest of them all."

Jimmy Clark



born in Kilmany, in the county of Fife to a Scottish farming family, roots that would stay with him the rest of his life. He was the only son in a family of four daughters.



His early racing exploits were initially met by family disapproval. He raced in rallies and other local races under the guidance of his friend Ian Scott-Watson. Later he joined a team run by Jock McBain known as the Border Reivers. In one of these races he drove a Lotus Elite against none other than Colin Chapman.