13/09/2011
FEATURE BY MIKE LAWRENCE
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Some years ago I was staying with Les Leston whom I mentioned in a recent piece about a TV documentary 'Grand Prix: The Killer Years'. Les is the guy who did the most to promote fire resistant motor racing clothing in Europe.
He has led a remarkable life. As a teenager, he played drums in the Ambrose Octet, a headline act which featured Anne Shelton as the singer and George Shearing on the piano. After wartime service in the RAF, he did not return to Show Biz.
In 1954, he became the British F3 Champion and drove occasionally in F1 events for BRM, Connaught and Cooper. Then he turned his hand to saloon car racing and was very quick in a Riley 1.5. Then it was on to GT racing with a Frank Costin-modified Lotus Elite which bore the fake registration number DAD 10. He also commentated on motor racing on radio and compered at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in London.
I was going through his files when I came across the featured photograph and my reaction was so clearly emotional that Les gave it to me. The quality is not great. it is an amateur snap, but the subject matter was remarkable since it shows Stirling Moss and Tazio Nuvolari together at the 1950 International Trophy at Silverstone.
In separate books on Grand Prix Greats. Alan Henry nominated Moss as the greatest ever, while Mark Hughes nominated Tazio Nuvolari. In his autobiography, 'My Terrible Joys', Enzo Ferrari nominated Nuvolari and Moss as the two greatest drivers.
Stirling was then aged 20 and you can imagine the excitement of the youngster at meeting the man who, at the time, many considered to be the greatest ever. Nuvolari had a mystique which no modern driver has. At every Grand Prix. the leading contenders are interviewed for television. News and gossip about them are in the daily press and on dozens of websites. Most have their own websites and fans know what music and food they like, what is their favourite movie and so on.
Back in the day, there was none of that. Nuvolari was known through magazine reports and the odd newsreel clip. He had hardly ever raced in the United Kingdom, though when he did he usually won. When Stirling met him in 1950, Nuvolari was one of only two drivers to have won the Tourist Trophy twice and, of course, he had won the 1938 Donington Grand Prix.
His exploits were known, but not the man himself, so he was a legend in a way no modern driver can be.
Nuvolari, then 57, was at Silverstone to drive a works Jaguar XK120 in the One Hour Production Car Race. I guess that Jaguar's boss, William Lyons, wanted to experience the personal thrill of seeing Nuvolari race a Jaguar, it was the act of a fan. Nuvolari had the use of an XK 120 (reg. HKV 500) which was painted red in his honour.
By this time, he had a serious lung condition caused from years of inhaling fumes and he regularly coughed blood. He drove the Jaguar for only about a dozen laps before realising that he was unfit to go further. It was the last time he attempted to drive a competition car and he was dead within three years.
There is an irony in that someone had once asked him how he dared to risk his life by motor racing. Tazio asked the enquirer how he wished to die and received the reply, 'In my bed.' Nuvolari said, 'Yet you still go to sleep at night.' Nuvolari died in bed.
Stirling was then just a promising youngster proud to be seen in the company of a legend. They could not communicate, Stirling had no Italian, Tazio had no English. Whoever took the picture could not have imagined that here were the two drivers Enzo Ferrari would nominate as the two greatest ever and, incidentally, the only two men to win the Tourist Trophy, Mille Miglia and Targa Florio.
So many people today count only World Championship wins, but Nuvolari won not a single WC point, it not having been started until 1950. Until the early 1960s, wins in classic sports car races could carry more prestige than wins in the World Championship.
Though William Lyons wanted to see Nuvolari in one of his cars, he would not countenance giving Stirling a drive on the grounds that he was too young and inexperienced. One of the six recipients of works-prepared Jaguar XK120s was driver and journalist, Tommy Wisdom, who believed in Moss. Tommy cut a deal, he would enter Stirling in the Tourist Trophy and they would split the prize money.
It was a shrewd move. Three weeks after the photograph was taken, Stirling won the first of his seven victories in the Tourist Trophy, in heavy rain at Dundrod, beating all the works Jaguars.
That evening, Williams Lyons offered Stirling the chance to lead the works Jaguar team in 1951. They agreed with a handshake the contract would come later. Since the Tourist Trophy had been held on 16th September, 1950, he could not have legally signed a contract had one been presented, he did not turn 21 until the day after the race.
I once showed Stirling this picture with the comment that it showed Enzo Ferrari's dream team. He said, 'Okay, as long as the other guy is Number Two.' That is the proper response for a racing driver.
Nuvolari's appearance at Silverstone hardly merited a mention at the time and the odd subsequent mention usually places the meeting, incorrectly, at the 1950 British GP. This is not bad journalism, it is poor memory on Stirling's part.
At Motorgraphs.com you can buy a photograph of Nuvolari driving the Jaguar, which then still had pressed steel wheels since Dunlop had not got round to making suitable wire wheels.
Everyone to whom I have shown the photograph has had the same reaction that I did: 'Wow!' It seemed a shame not to share it.
Mike Lawrence
mike.lawrence@pitpass.com
To check out previous features from Mike, click here