The Great Races 4: The Race of Two Worlds - 1957/58


Earlier today (Wednesday) I saw the Mclaren Honda Andretti @MclarenIndy twitter page using the hashtag #RaceOfTwoWorlds which, got me thinking about a little known event in the late 1950s, Yes many F1 fans already know that the Indy 500 was a part of the F1 championship up until 1960 and, many F1 fans also know that the likes of Jim Clark, Graham Hill and a few others took on the challenge with varying levels of success in the 60's. But, to celebrate the opening of the oval at Monza, an event was planned as documented in the short video above, teams and drivers from the USAC (United States Auto Club) National Championship - effectivley what we know as IndyCar today, were invited to compete against team from Europe.

 The inaugural event is pretty much covered above but, for 1958 a few more European teams squads chose to race, Ecurie Ecosse bringing a pair of D Type Jaguars and a Lister for Maston Gregory, Ivor Bueb and Jack Fairman, while 3 Ferrari's of various construction were competed by such hands as Harry Schell, Phil Hill, Luigi Musso and Mike Hawthorn.

 Stirling Moss was entered in a custom built Maserati while Maurice Trintignant and Juan Manuel Fangio sampled USAC machinery on the Monza banking.

 As before the race was split into heats and, the Europeans looking to give their American counterparts a proper race this time, The Jaguars and Ferraris started strongly but, were soon caught and passed by the US squads, Stirling Moss being the highest placed of the non USAC drivers after the first heat, sitting 4th in the Maserati 1 lap down.

 With Phil Hill's Ferrari, Masten Gregory's Jaguar and three of the American entries out with various technical difficulties, 13 cars started heat 2, Luigi Musso was, for a time the top European runner until he began again to suffer with nausea bought on from the methanol fumes from the engine and was replaced by Phil Hill - his own Ferrari out of action. 

 Jim Rathman's Watson Offenhauser was unchallenged in this portion of the race as the Americans filled the top four positions, Moss taking 5th in his Maserati ahead of among others a young A J Foyt! The Musso / Hill Ferrari eventually winding up 9th ahead of the remaining Lister/Jaguar entries.

 Heat 3 saw 12 cars take the start 10 of the eleven that finished heat 2, the repaired Jaguar of Gregory and, finally having missed heats 1 & 2, Juan Manuel Fangio in a Kuzma Offenhauser. Alas the latter lasted two laps before a fuel pump failure.

 Mike Hawthorn started in the Ferrari over Musso, he had already taken the car over during heat 1 following Musso suffering from fume inhalation then as well but, suffered the same fate as the Italian, this time handing Phil Hill the car during the final bout. Moss however, while pushing on in his Maserati suffered a steering failure and crashed out of the race while in 4th place.

 Rathman again would be untroubled at the front leading all the way to finish ahead of the 1957 winner Jim Bryan in his Salih Offenhauser. Hill dragged the Ferrari to third before handing back to Hawthorn to take the flag and final podium slot for the prancing horse.

 Rathman was declared the overall victor of the second and final event from Bryan and, due to poor public turnout - although many thousand more spectators attended the 1958 event than 1957 the event was shelved.

 This short video shows brief footage of the 1958 event.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_of_Two_Worlds

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