1962 BRM P578

This is a photograph I took in the paddock at Aintree on practice day for the British Grand Prix in July 1962.

It's the 1962 BRM P578 that Graham Hill drove in the race and is chassis P578/1 with the upright 'stack pipe' exhausts. He qualified in fifth place on the grid with Jim Clark in the Lotus 25 in pole position. In the race Jim Clark led from start to finish and Graham Hill ended up in fourth place, thanks in part to mechanical problems suffered by the Lotus 24 of Innes Ireland who had qualified ahead of Graham Hill. The BRM had been introduced in 1961 as the P57 with a 4-cylinder inline 1,496cc Coventry Climax FPF engine as BRM's new V8 1½ litre engine was still on the drawing board at the start of the season. By 1962 the P56 BRM 1,498cc V8 engine was available and the car was re-designated as the P578 in acknowledgement of the V8 unit. Jim Clark was the man to beat that season, but although he won three of the races he was plagued by retirements in another four and Graham Hill won the Drivers' World Championship with four victories and four other points-scoring places. BRM also won the Constructors' World Championship.

1961 BRM P57

I took this photograph in the paddock at the Aintree 200 meeting in April 1961.

It's the 1961 BRM P57 that was driven to third place in the race by Graham Hill. 1961 was the first year of the 1½ litre Formula that replaced the 2½ litre limit that had lasted from 1954 to 1960. BRM, like the other British teams had started preparations for the new Formula too late and had been caught on the back foot by the Ferrari team who had got their new Ferrari 156 with its 1½ litre V8 engine up and running by the first race of the season at Monaco. Both BRM and Coventry Climax had new V8 engines on the drawing board but the Coventry Climax engine wasn't ready till the second half of the 1961 season, and the BRM not until 1962. In 1961 the BRM team used a 4-cylinder inline 1,496cc Coventry Climax FPF engine.

1962 BRM P578

I took this picture at the approach to Waterway Corner at Aintree during practice for the British Grand Prix in July 1962.

It's Graham Hill in the BRM P578 practice car - in the race he drove the 1962 BRM P578, chassis P578/1 with the upright 'stack pipe' exhausts, in which he qualified in fifth place on the grid with Jim Clark in the Lotus 25 in pole position. In the race Jim Clark led from start to finish and Graham Hill ended up in fourth place, thanks in part to mechanical problems suffered by the Lotus 24 of Innes Ireland who had qualified ahead of Graham Hill. The BRM had been introduced in 1961 as the P57 with a 4-cylinder inline 1,496cc Coventry Climax FPF engine as BRM's new V8 1½ litre engine was still on the drawing board at the start of the season. By 1962 the P56 BRM 1,498cc V8 engine was available and the car was re-designated as the P578 in acknowledgement of the V8 unit. Jim Clark was the man to beat that season, but although he won three of the races he was plagued by retirements in another four and Graham Hill won the Drivers' World Championship with four victories and four other points-scoring places. BRM also won the Constructors' World Championship.

BRM P57

I took this photograph of a car approaching Waterway Corner during practice for the British Grand Prix in July 1962.

It's Graham Hill in the 1962 BRM P57 with which he qualified in fifth position on the grid, and ended the race in fourth place almost 2 minutes behind the winner Jim Clark in his Lotus 25. The 1962 BRM P57 was originally designated the P578 on account of the 1,498cc V8 engine replacing the previous season's straight-4 Coventry Climax FPF unit. This car is chassis #P578/1 which Graham Hill drove for most of that season, winning four of the Grands Prix and the World Drivers' Championship.

On 7 August 2013 I Showed photographs of this car, and team mate Richie Ginther's, in the paddock during that practice session.

BRM P48/57

Here's a photograph taken in the paddock at Aintree during practice for the 1961 British Grand Prix.

It's Graham Hill's BRM P48/57, the interim car, based on the 1960 P48 and fitted with a 4-cylinder 1½ litre Climax FPF engine that the team used until the P57 with the BRM V8 engine was ready. Graham Hill qualified in eleventh place on the grid but retired after 43 laps with an engine failure.

BRM P57

Here are a couple of photographs I took during practice for the Aintree 200 race in April 1962.

They're both of the BRM P57 that Graham Hill drove in the race. The original 1961 version of the P57 had a 4-cylinder 1½ litre Coventry Climax engine as a stopgap until BRM's new V8 unit was available and that model - as pictured here - was originally designated as a P578. The chassis number of this car is 5781.

Graham Hill qualified in second place on the grid, but retired after 45 laps of the 50 lap race with a broken piston. In July of that year Graham Hill came back to Aintree with the same car and finished in fourth place in the British Grand Prix, ending the season as World Champion. On 7 August 2013 I showed some photographs of both BRM cars at that race.

BRM P48

Here's another of the old photographs, this time from the Gold Cup meeting at Oulton Park in September 1960.

It's Graham Hill in the paddock in his BRM P48, the unsuccessful rear-engine version of the P25. Graham Hill finished in third position in the race which was won by Stirling Moss in a Lotus 18. This was the last season for the 2½ litre cars and BRM competed in the 1961 season with the P48/57, a car that was basically a P48 fitted with a 1½ litre engine, which was no more successful than the P48. The next season, however, a new car, the P57 with a new 1½ litre V8 engine was built and with this car Graham Hill won the 1962 World Championship.

Lola T90

The Oulton Park Gold Cup meeting in August 2008 featured a celebration of 50 years of Lola Cars which included a display of various models, some of which took part in a parade of the track during the meeting. One of the cars on display was the one pictured below.

The programme of the event doesn't mention this car, but it's a Lola T90 bearing the number 24 which was the number of Graham Hill's Lola T90 Red Ball Special when he won the 1966 Indianapolis 500 race. Photographs of Graham Hill's car, however, show the front part of the nose to be painted yellow with a gold stripe running up the centre of the car. The car shown here resembles Jackie Stewart's similar Lola T90 (designated the Bowes Seal Fast Special) which was number 43 and finished in 6th place

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BRM P48

The first BRM was introduced to the public in December 1949, and to mark the 50th anniversary of this there was a special tribute to BRM at the Coys International Historic Festival at Silverstone in July 1999. It featured a display of various BRM models, one of which was the largely unsuccessful P48.

In 1959 it had become clear with the ascendancy of the rear-engined Cooper Climax in F1 that the days of front-engined GP cars was coming to a close and BRM tried to do a 'quick fix' with the P48 which was basically the existing P25 with the engine moved from the front to the rear. The car was a bit of a disaster, the three team drivers (Joakim Bonnier, Graham Hill and Dan Gurney) only managing eight World Championship points all season with a third place for Hill and two fifth places for Bonnier whilst Gurney's best was a single tenth place. Things weren't much better the next season with the P48/57, but in 1962 Graham Hill won the World Championship with the BRM P57.

One of the team's better races with this car was the 1960 Gold Cup at Oulton Park where the three P48s finished in third, fifth and sixth places. The photograph below is one I took of Graham Hill's third-place car in the paddock being driven by, I think, the BRM designer Tony Rudd.

BRM P57

The BRM P57 was the car with which Graham Hill won the 1962 World Championship. Two of the cars were entered in the British Grand Prix in July of that year at Aintree, Graham Hill finishing in fourth place and Richie Ginther was thirteenth. Here are photos of the two cars, both in colour and in black and white, taken during the Friday practice session.

Graham Hill's car with the upright exhaust pipes which had a habit of falling off during races

The car being brought back from the pits to the paddock after a practice run

Richie Ginther's car with the more normal horizontal exhaust pipes

The car being driven towards the pit access track for a practice run

Racing Drivers

During race weekend current-day racing drivers are cocooned from the ordinary spectators, but this was not always the case. In the 1950s and 60s the spectators could gain access to the paddock and get close up to  the competing cars and drivers. The following photographs were taken at the Friday practice day for the British Grand Prix at Aintree in July 1962.

1961 World Champion Phil Hill who retired his Ferrari 156 Dino on lap 47 of the 75 lap race

1962 World Champion Graham Hill who finished 4th in his BRM P57

Bruce McLaren (left) and Jackie Lewis (right), team mates for Cooper driving the Cooper-Climax T60.

McLaren finished in 3rd place and Jackie Lewis in 10th.

Masten Gregory who finished 7th in the UDT Laystall Lotus-Climax 24

Aintree Motor Racing Circuit

The old motor racing circuit at Aintree was constructed round the Grand National course, crossing the horse race track at two points so that the motor racing track was partly on the inside of the Grand National course and partly on the outside. The British Grand Prix was run on this circuit five times, in 1955, 1957, 1959, 1961 and 1962, and I was fortunate enough to see all of these races as well as other events during this period such as the Aintree 200 and 100. Unfortunately in the 1950s I didn't have a camera capable of taking photographs of cars in action on the track and in the early 1960s I had a suitable camera, but not a telephoto lens. The following photographs, however show some features of the track.

This is a good picture of the pits at Aintree with some people watching the start of the 1962 Aintree 200 race. Between the pits and the line of people you may be able to make out some cars, Jim Clark in a Lotus 24 is on this side of the track leading the race (which he won) and beyond the Lotus are the number 11 and 12 BRM P57s of Graham Hill and Richie Ginther, both of whom retired. Just in front of the pit with the red 'Daily Mirror' banner is the Ferrari 156 'Sharknose' of Phil Hill who finished third.

The rest of these photographs are from the 1962 British Grand Prix, and the first one shows John Surtees in a Lola-Climax Mk4 returning to the paddock after a practice session. The paddock was in the centre of the circuit between the Start/Finish Straight and the Sefton Straight and access to the circuit was across the Grand National course using a line of duckboards. The mechanics sometimes found it difficult to push the cars along these duckboards to the pits and I remember at the practice for the 1961 Grand Prix, when Ferrari entered a team of four cars, one solitary mechanic was attempting to push the fourth car on his own. I gave him a hand in pushing the car to the pits, but have since regretted not taking the opportunity to get some photographs in the pit area. To get from the paddock to the stands on the other side of the Start/Finish Straight there was a similar line of duckboards across the Grand National course then a tunnel underneath the motor racing track.

John Surtees' car during practice just after the Start/Finish line. He finished second to Jim Clark's Lotus 25.

Phil Hill during practice in the Ferrari 156 on the Start/Finish Straight going towards the Waterway corner. He retired early in the race.

Masten Gregory, who finished seventh in a Lotus 24, signing autographs in the paddock. In the background you can see the cooling tower which was one of my enduring memories of the Aintree circuit. It apparently belonged to the power station for Courtaulds Polymer Plant and was demolished around 1969.

The favoured point from which to watch the races was Waterway, the first corner after the start. Motor racing at the time the Aintree circuit was in use was not as safety conscious as it is now and I've often told people about one feature of the track which seemed particularly dangerous even then. Just recently I've been wondering if my memory of it had become distorted by time but with the help of Google Street View I've been able to refresh my memory, and if anything it looks even worse now than I remember it. Melling Road cuts across the circuit at Melling Crossing and Anchor Crossing and had to be closed for the duration of race meetings, as still happens today for horse race meetings. The photograph below from Melling Road (courtesy of Google Street View) shows Anchor Bend, the second corner from the start, and you can see running alongside the track the concrete wall which I remember from when I used to go there.

The next photograph, from just a little further on, shows the view down the straight towards the Waterway corner and on the other side of the wall the Leeds & Liverpool Canal. You can see that there's no run-off area whatsoever - the wall runs alongside the edge of the track.

I remember on a couple of occasions seeing cars hit this wall, fortunately without injury to the drivers involved. The first one was in the Aintree International sports car race in September 1955 when Alfonso de Portago lost control of his Ferrari 750 Monza and went into the wall backwards. In the Aintree 200 race in April 1956 Horace Gould did exactly the same thing in his Maserati 250F. There was no such thing as a Safety Car in those days and when accidents such as this happened the marshals just dragged the car off the track and it was left there for the duration of the race. The spectators just stood behind a wooden fence about 3 feet high - there was no other barrier of any kind except perhaps (though I don't recall them there)  some straw bales. I also seem to recall (but can't find any confirmation of this) that on the inside of the track at Waterway, between the motor racing track and the boundary of the Grand National course, was a barbed wire fence!

Porsche 718

These are the two works Porsche 718 formula two cars pictured in the paddock at the 1960 BARC 200 race at Aintree 200. I think the photographs were probably taken during practice as the number 5 car on the right doesn't yet have the number on its nose. That car was driven by Graham Hill and finished third in the race. The number 6 car was driven by Jo Bonnier who finished second and the race was won by yet another Porsche 718, Rob Walker's car, driven by Stirling Moss.