1956 Jaguar D-Type

I took this photograph in the paddock at Aintree during practice at the British Grand Prix meeting in July 1957.

It's the 1956 Jaguar D-Type of Duncan Hamilton, chassis XKD 601, with which he finished in third place in the sports car race at this meeting behind the Lister Jaguar of Archie Scott-Brown and the Aston Martin DBR1 of Roy Salvadori. It has the 6-cylinder 3,442cc XK6 engine and was originally a works car, although its first race was in the white and blue colours of Briggs Cunningham at the 1956 Sebring 12 Hour race where it was driven by Mike Hawthorn and Desmond Titterington, but retired with brake problems with about 1½ hours of the race left. At the Nürburgring 1000 Kilometre race that year with the same two drivers the car again failed to finish, this time with a broken drive shaft, but at the Reims 12 Hour race Paul Frère shared the driving with Mike Hawthorn and the car finished in second place to the Jaguar D-Type of Duncan Hamilton and Ivor Bueb. The third car of the Jaguar team was in third place and fourth place went to an Ecurie Ecosse Jaguar D-Type. By 1957 the car had been acquired by Duncan Hamilton who finished in sixth place with Masten Gregory at that year's Le Mans 24 Hour race - the first four cars in that race were D-Type Jaguars with a Ferrari 315 S in fifth place.

Jaguar D-Type

The Gold Cup meeting at Oulton Park in August 2003 included a round of the BRDC Historic Sports Cars Championship, and pictured below is one of the cars that took part.

It's the 1954 Jaguar D-Type chassis XKC402 which finished second that year in the Le Mans 24 Hour Race. It was driven in that race by Tony Rolt and Duncan Hamilton and at the end of the season the car was sold to Duncan Hamilton. I remember seeing Duncan Hamilton drive this car at the first motor race I ever attended, the 1955 British Empire Trophy Race at Oulton Park, where he finished in seventh place. At Oulton Park the car was driven by Peter Neumark.

Friday's Ferrari

Before 1955 I had, to the best of my knowledge, only seen one Ferrari. This was during a school trip to France  in 1954 when we spent a couple of days in Paris then about a week in Tours visiting the chateaux of the Loire Valley. I saw the Ferrari in Paris and don't know what model it was, although looking at the models which were around at the time it was probably a 212 Inter.

In April 1955, though, I saw my first race at Oulton Park, the British Empire Trophy race which was run on a handicap basis and won by Archie Scott Brown in a Lister-Bristol. I remember that Duncan Hamilton drove a Jaguar D-type and the Aston Martin DB3S team was there whilst Colin Chapman drove one of his early Lotus cars. But the cars which really caught my eye were the two Ferrari 750S Monzas driven by Luigi Piotti and Mike Sparken. This Scaglietti bodied car remains my favourite Ferrari and below are photographs of two examples taken at historic racing meetings at Silverstone in the 1990s. I could sit and look at one of these for hours.

1997 Coys Historic Festival at Silverstone 26 July 1997. The serial number of this car is 0520M.

1999 Coys Historic Festival at Silverstone 31 July 1999

Footnote 18 Aug 2014:

I've since found that this second car is, in fact, a 1955 Ferrari 500 Mondial Spyder Scaglietti Series II, serial number 0564MD or 0424MD. The 750S Monza and 500 Mondial Series II are almost identical and as far as I can make out it's only the sizes of the engines that differ.