1961 Le Mans

1961 — The realities of the 1960 Grand Prix season touched sports car racing in '60. The new formula for '61 summoned even bigger changes. Ferrari was ready for both the new Grand Prix Formula and Le Mans.

Maserati had the new mid-engine Tipo 63, this time entrusting two of the bulbous roadsters to Briggs Cunningham and another one to Scuderia Serenissima. Briggs brought a 2.0-liter Tipo 60 Birdcage for himself and pal Jim Kimberly.

Ferrari had finally joined the rear-engine GP revolution and sent a new 246 Sports prototype along with the usual compliment of Testa Rossas – all with new bodywork and the first spoilers seen at the Sarthe – to the April tests. Wolfgang von Trips hustled the 246 V6 Dino around three seconds faster than Phil Hill’s test time on a traditional 3.0-liter Testa Rossa. The new mid-engine V6 won the Targa Florio a few weeks after the Le Mans tests, and its April performance in France was a revelation.

A single Cooper Monaco from Ecurie Ecosse was further evidence of the effect of the rear-engined F1 Coopers. In just two seasons, Cooper had changed the grammar of F1 and sports car racing radically and to an extent that was totally disproportional to the team’s modest gas station-based facilities in Surbiton.

Stirling Moss was fit again after his dreadful accident at Spa. He had slapped the potent new F1 Ferraris with a brilliant win in the Monaco Grand Prix. Three weeks later, he was Ferrari-mounted for the first time at Le Mans. His weapon of choice was not a prototype but a 250 SWB GT coupe (painted in Rob Walker’s Scottish colors) shared with Graham Hill and entered by Luigi Chinetti’s North American Racing Team. The whole deal had a distinctly political air about it. But that was all forgotten on Saturday afternoon.

As four o’clock approached, Moss left his little painted circle and sauntered across the track to the blue SWB, retrieved something and returned to his place in circle #18. But this time, Jim Clark won the sprint and got his elderly Aston moving first. Augie Pabst needed two minutes to coax the No. 7 Tipo 63 Maserati to life.

Ferrari’s ace test driver, Californian Richie Ginther in the 246 Sports, picked off the Aston at Tertre Rouge, and that was the last time anything but a Ferrari would lead the ’61 24 Hours. The Phil Hill/Olivier Gendebien 250 TR didn’t wait around either, and Walt Hansgen got Cunningham’s V12 Tipo 63 Maser up to third on the busy first lap. The Rodriguez brothers were fourth in NART’s Testa Rossa, then Clark’s Border Reivers Aston and in fifth overall was the amazing Moss/Hill Short Wheelbase Berlinetta running at prototype pace.

The first pit stops near 5:30 broke up the front of the order that was under the control of the Mexican teenagers – Pedro and Ricardo Rodriguez. The lads were first to pit. Ginther’s 246 V6 was giving splendid fuel economy and carried on in the lead while the big front engine TRs were serviced. Moss gave the No. 18 SWB to Graham Hill leaving the course to Clark who had seen quite enough of the blue Ferrari coupe. Pabst had forced the No. 7 Cunningham Maserati up with teammate Hansgen

Saturday morning had been chilly, gray and blustery. When it finally came, the rain took the form of wind driven drizzle. The Ferraris played a game of musical chairs at the front with Pedro leading, and Moss’s amazing 250GT SWB fourth overall.

Bruce Halford’s Ecurie Ecosse Cooper Monaco got caught by the weather and clobbered the bank outside the virage under the Dunlop Bridge. The wreck was a big one: Halford ended up prone and inert in the racing line. When word finally reached the pits that his injuries were far from life threatening, the relief was practically tactile. Then Hansgen buried the No. 6 V12 Maserati prototype face first in the sand at Tertre Rouge and was digging out.

The rain finally stopped before midnight, and there was a perceptible change in the atmosphere. Every time the leaders stopped for fuel the Trips/Ginther 246 went to the top of the order. The amazing Moss/Hill NART SWB retired in the ninth hour. A water hose had leaked, and ultimately a head gasket failed. It was yet another disappointment for Moss who, with Hill, had kept the Willy Mairesse/Mike Parkes Testa Rossa at bay all evening.

The night went fast. Hill and Gendebien harried the Rodriguez brothers into the dawn and beyond. By 6:00 a.m., the leading Ferraris were seldom out of each other’s sight. Bravado got the better of the Mexican teenagers, when Parkes and Mairesse in the No. 7 works Ferrari decided to learn if they could run the same pace as the leaders. Rodriguez fell for it and engaged in a sprint race. As they flashed past the pits, someone mentioned that the tail of Parkes’ car had a dent that wasn’t there a lap earlier, and did the nose of the Rodriguez car look funny?

A routine pit stop at 7:00 a.m. turned into a racer's nightmare for the Mexicans. On the out lap, there was a small misfire; Back to the pits. It took nearly a half-hour to diagnose and solve the problem. A condenser had failed. It cost them five precious laps; still Ferraris were 1-2-3-4-6. Roy Salvadori and Tony Maggs had managed to put a DBR1 among the Ferraris again.

The NART pit set its teenagers a harsh task. There was time to make up the 27min deficit if they could run faster than they had all night. So they did. But the adults in the leading factory car did likewise, running a tantalizing four seconds slower per lap, a fast moving carrot luring the boys deeper into the fight. The fans had been behind the Mexican lads in the NART Ferrari. It was a fine story, and it made the sometimes insufferable morning-after more exciting than most grands prix.

The Brothers were promoted to third, when the Ginther coasted to a stop on the way to Mulsanne. A cracked gas tank, they said. Then the Parkes/Mairesse car began to limp with brake problems. Perhaps.

The grand tale ended not long after the end of Hour 22. NART’s Mexican Ferrari appeared out of White House trailing oily blue smoke. The Rodriguez brothers were the heroes of the race, but a broken piston had brought a premature end to the story. Gendebien smelled the oil and saw the inert shape of the children’s crusader on his next lap. No advice or instruction from the exiles in the Mulsanne signaling pits was needed to slow his pace. Hill took the final shift.

The victory was Hill’s second, while Gendebien joined the very short list of three-time Le Mans winners. Ferraris were one-two-three with Jean Guichet and Pierre Noblet third overall and first in GT in Noblet’s SWB 250 GT. Pabst and Dick Thompson were a distant fourth in the sole surviving Maserati T63, just two laps ahead of Masten Gregory and Bob Holbert in the top Porsche.

Ricardo Rodriguez posted the fastest lap, but the late Mike Hawthorn still held the Le Mans lap record, and the old order still prevailed.

A week later Phil Hill won the Belgian GP at Spa; his first Grand Prix victory of the ’61 season. In September, he won the Italian GP at Monza and became the only man to win the F1 World Championship and the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the same year. Hill still has his own page in the history books.