British GP 1952

British GP, 1952

Most of the teams went from the French Grand Prix at Rouen to a non-championship event at Sables d'Olonne where Gordini's Jean Behra crashed and broke his shoulder blade. This meant that at Silverstone Behra was replaced in the Gordini factory team by Maurice Trintignant. Ferrari entered its usual three factory cars for Alberto Ascari, Giuseppe Farina and Piero Taruffi. There were three cars from HWM for Peter Collins, Lance Macklin and Duncan Hamilton while Connaught entered four of its Lea Francis-engined Connaught Type As. There were a few Cooper-Bristols - notably with Mike Hawthorn driving one of them while Stirling Moss was in the ERA. The rest of the field was an assortment of private Ferraris and Maseratis.

Farina, Ascari and Taruffi shared the 4-3-4 front row with Manzon while Ken Downing's Connaught shared the second row with the Cooper-Bristols of Reg Parnell and Hawthorn.

The race was dominated by Ferrari with Ascari and Farina leading away. Taruffi made a bad start and had to fight his way past a mixture of Connaughts and Cooper-Bristols. He was soon third ahead of Dennis Poore's Connaught and Hawthorn. Farina then hit trouble and had to pit for a change of spark plugs but his car refused to run properly and he finished sixth.

When Poore stopped for fuel Hawthorn moved to third and stayed there until the finish. While the British fans had something to cheer, it had been a dominant performance by Ascari.

POSNODRIVERENTRANTLAPSTIME/RETIREMENTQUAL POS
1 15 Alberto Ascari Ferrari 500 85 2h44m11.000s  2 
2 17 Piero Taruffi Ferrari 500 84  3 
3 9 Mike Hawthorn Cooper-Bristol T20 83  7 
4 6 Dennis Poore Connaught-Lea Francis A 83  8 
5 5 Eric Thompson Connaught-Lea Francis A 82  9 
6 16 Giuseppe Farina Ferrari 500 82  1 
7 8 Reg Parnell Cooper-Bristol T20 82  6 
8 14 Roy Salvadori Ferrari 500 82  19 
9 4 Ken Downing Connaught-Lea Francis A 82  5 
10 21 Peter Whitehead Ferrari 125 81  20 
11 26 Prince Bira Gordini T16 81  10 
12 1 Graham Whitehead Alta F2 80  12 
13 19 Rudolf Fischer Ferrari 500 80  15 
14 27 Johnny Claes Simca Gordini-Gordini T15 79  23 
15 31 Lance Macklin HWM-Alta (52) 79  29 
16 3 Kenneth McAlpine Connaught-Lea Francis A 79  17 
17 33 Harry Schell Maserati Plat © 4CLT 78  32 
18 34 Gino Bianco Maserati A6GCM 77  28 
19 32 Emmanuel de Graffenried Maserati Plat © 4CLT 76  31 
20 10 Eric Brandon Cooper-Bristol T20 76  18 
21 23 Tony Crook Frazer Nash-Bristol 421 75  25 
r 29 Peter Collins HWM-Alta (52) 73 Misfire 14 
22 11 Alan Brown Cooper-Bristol T20 69  13 
r 30 Duncan Hamilton HWM-Alta (52) 44 Engine 11 
r 12 Stirling Moss ERA-Bristol G 36 Engine 16 
r 25 Maurice Trintignant Gordini T16 21 Gearbox 21 
r 28 Tony Gaze HWM-Alta (52) 20 Engine 26 
r 7 David Murray Cooper-Bristol T20 14 Spark Plugs 22 
r 24 Robert Manzon Gordini T16 9 Clutch 4 
r 20 Peter Hirt Ferrari 212 3 Brakes 24 
r 35 Eitel Cantoni Maserati A6GCM 1 Brakes 27 
ns 2 Bill Aston Aston-Butterworth NB  Withdrew 30