Phil Hill

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

It's the 1961 World Champion Phil Hill who retired his Ferrari 156 Dino on lap 47 of the 75 lap race. The paddock was in the middle of the circuit (and the Grand National horse racing course) and this is looking towards Ormskirk Road which is in front of the building in the background - the main stands are to the left of the picture. The only way to get from the stands to the paddock and vice versa was via a tunnel underneath the two race tracks and the sign on the right points the way to that tunnel.

Friday's Ferrari

The Christie's International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1992 featured a special display of Ferraris in the paddock and track demonstrations of some of these cars by former Scuderia Ferrari drivers, and this is one of those cars during one of the demonstration runs.

It's Phil Hill in the 1960 Ferrari 246 Dino #007 of Neil Corner which was the last front engined car to win a Grand Prix race, Phil Hill driving it to victory in the Italian Grand Prix in the next to last race of the 1960 season. At the end of the that season the car was fitted with a 3 litre 250 TR V12 engine and sold to New Zealander Pat Hoare who campaigned the car there for two years before it was sold and drastically altered with a body resembling that of the 1964 Ferrari 250 GTO. In 1978 the car was acquired by Neil Corner who had it restored to its original specifications.

Friday's Ferrari

This is a photograph I took on the Friday practice day for the 1962 British Grand Prix at Aintree with my Kodak Brownie 127 camera.

It's the 1962 Ferrari 156 that was driven in the race by Phil Hill. It had a 1,476cc 120° V8 Ferrari Type 178 engine, but was not as successful as the 1961 model in which Phil Hill had won that year's World Drivers' Championship. In 1962 the Ferrari wasn't as quick as the British BRM, Lotus, Lola and Cooper cars with their new V8 Coventry Climax engines, and they were hampered by a series of strikes in Italy which meant they were unable to compete in the French Grand Prix and Phil Hill's was the only Ferrari that took part in the British Grand Prix. The Ferraris also failed to start in either of the last two races that season, in the USA and South Africa. Phil Hill only managed to qualify the car in 12th place on the grid at Aintree, and retired from the race on the 47th of the 75 laps with distributor failure. The man in the light-coloured suit is Mauro Forghieri, Chief Engineer at Ferrari, and the man in front of him appears to be Phil Hill.

Friday's Ferrari

This car was in a display of Ferraris at the Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1997 which featured a tribute to the marque.

It's a replica of the Ferrari 156 with which Phil Hill won the Drivers' World Championship in 1961, the original cars being dismantled by Ferrari, as was then their custom, at the end of their useful working life. The singer-songwriter Chris Rea had this replica built to be used in his 1996 film 'La Passione', which he intended to be about his childhood dream of this car and driver Wolfgang von Trips, but Warner Brothers took control of the film and effectively ruined Chris Rea's concept. The 1961 car had a 1,476cc V6 engine designed by Carlo Chiti, and Phil Hill won two, was second in two, and third in two of the seven races in which the cars competed that season. They didn't take part in the final race, the USA Grand Prix, after the death of Wolfgang von Trips in the penultimate Grand Prix of the season in Italy.

On 17 March 2017 I showed a photograph of Phil Hill driving the car in a track display at this meeting.

Friday's Ferrari

I took these photographs in the paddock on practice day for the British Grand Prix at Aintree in July 1962.

It's the 1962 Ferrari 156 that was driven in the race by Phil Hill. It had a 1,476cc 120° V8 Ferrari Type 178 engine, but was not as successful as the 1961 model in which Phil Hill had won the World Championship, and Wolfgang von Trips had finished in second place although losing his life in an accident in the Italian Grand Prix in the penultimate race of the season. In 1962 the Ferrari wasn't as quick as the British BRM, Lotus, Lola and Cooper cars with their new V8 Coventry Climax engines, and they were hampered by a series of strikes in Italy which meant they were unable to compete in the French Grand Prix and Phil Hill's was the only Ferrari that took part in the British Grand Prix. The Ferraris also failed to start in either of the last two races that season, in the USA and South Africa.

Phil Hill only managed to qualify the car in 12th place on the grid, and retired from the race on the 47th of the 75 laps with distributor failure. The Chief Engineer at Ferrari, Mauro Forghieri, is sitting in the cockpit of the car in both of these photographs.

Friday's Ferrari

The Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1997 featured the Ferrari marque and there was a display of cars in the paddock, some of which took part in track displays on the circuit.

This is one of the cars during a track display, a 1947 Ferrari 166 Corsa Spyder, and it’s being driven on a very wet day by Phil Hill who was a Ferrari team driver in the late 1950s and early 1960s driving both Grand Prix and sports cars. A board alongside the Ferrari in the paddock display read as follows:

1947

FERRARI 166

SPYDER CORSA 002C

WON THE FIRST GRAND PRIX

FOR FERRARI AT

VALENTINO PARK TURIN

Ferrari 002C started off in 1947 as a Ferrari 159C with a 1.9 litre engine, but that winter it was given a 2 litre engine and upgraded to a Tipo 166.

Friday's Ferrari

Here's another photograph taken with my Kodak Brownie 127 camera on practice day for the British Grand Prix at Aintree in July 1961.

It's the Ferrari 156 driven into second place in the race by Phil Hill, and alongside you can see the number 6 of Richie Ginther's car that finished in third place. Another of the cars is behind Phil Hill's and to the left of that the fourth car is still covered to keep out the Liverpool weather. The rope across the centre of the photograph is to stop the spectators getting too close to the cars when the mechanics are working on them. On 28 February 2014 I showed photographs of this car and Giancarlo Baghetti's.

Friday's Ferrari

The Coys International Historic Festival meeting at Silverstone in July 1997 featured a tribute to Ferrari with a large display of notable Ferraris and track demonstrations by former Ferrari team drivers amongst others. This is one of the cars taking part on a typically British wet summer's day.

.It's 1961 World Champion Phil Hill driving Chris Rea's recreation of the 1961 Ferrari 156 - the car with which he won that title.

Friday's Ferrari

Here are two old photographs I've come across taken with my Brownie 127 camera during the Friday practice session at the 1961 British Grand Prix at Aintree.

This is Phil Hill's Ferrari Dino 156 (serial number 0003 61) which finished second in the race to Wolfgang von Trips' identical car whilst Richie Ginther was third in the third Ferrari team car. Phil Hill ended the season as World Champion though.

Four Ferraris were entered in this race, this being the car of Giancarlo Baghetti who had won the French Grand Prix two weeks earlier in his first World Championship race. No such luck in this race, however, as he retired following an accident after 27 of the 75 laps. The serial number of this car is 0002 61.

Friday's Ferrari

Another contemporary photograph of the 1962 Ferrari 156 Dino 'sharknose' in the paddock at Aintree in the British Grand Prix of that year during practice.

The man in the suit and tie on the right-hand side leaning over the car is, I think, Mauro Forghieri, at that time the Chief Engineer at Ferrari.

The car, serial number 0007 62, was driven by Phil Hill and was the only Ferrari in the race, qualifying 12th on the grid but retiring after 47 of the 75 laps.

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!

Friday's Ferrari

This is a black and white photograph of a Ferrari at the 1962 British Grand Prix meeting at Aintree, although I don't remember taking it. It looks as if it was taken behind the grandstands at the start/finish line when I was on my way into or out of the circuit and I think it's a 212 Inter.
(Note 31 May 2014: I've since been investigating further and I now think it's a 1952 Ferrari 225 Sport, serial number 0152EL)

The next two photographs were taken during practice at the same meeting  and are of the Ferrari 156 Dino driven by Phil Hill. The paddock was in the centre of the circuit between the start/finish straight and Melling Road and pedestrian access from the main stand was via a tunnel under the racetrack then a pathway of duckboards across the Grand National racecourse. The cars were taken to and from the circuit on a roadway of duckboards and the first photograph below shows a mechanic driving the car back to the paddock from a practice session.

This car's serial number is 0007 62