British GP 1959

British GP, 1959

Strikes in Italy meant that Ferrari did not appear for the British GP but the team released Tony Brooks, who had just won the French Grand Prix, and he managed to get a drive in a Vanwall which was made available by Tony Vandervell. Without Ferrari the battle was entirely between British cars with BRM (Harry Schell, Jo Bonnier, Ron Flockhart and private entry Stirling Moss), Aston Martin (Roy Salvadori and Carroll Shelby), Cooper (Jack Brabham, Bruce McLaren and Masten Gregory in factory cars and a variety of private entries) and Lotus (Graham Hill and Alan Stacey) all in action. The field was bolstered as usual by a number of local F1 cars and a number of Formula 2 machines as well.

Brabham was fastest in practice with a surprising Salvadori second, ahead of Schell, Trintignant, Gregory, Shelby, Moss and McLaren. Brooks qualified the Vanwall 17th.

At the start Brabham took the lead and never really looked under threat but there was a good battle for second place with Moss moving through to lead the chasers. This pattern would remain the same at the finish despite the fact that Moss had an unscheduled pit stop which allowed McLaren to briefly take second place. The two battled to the line side-by-side, Moss winning by two-tenths of a second.

POSNODRIVERENTRANTLAPSTIME/RETIREMENTQUAL POS
1 12 Jack Brabham Cooper-Climax T51 75 2h30m11.600s  1 
2 6 Stirling Moss BRM P25 75 2h30m33.800s  7 
3 16 Bruce McLaren Cooper-Climax T51 75 2h30m34.000s  8 
4 8 Harry Schell BRM P25 74  3 
5 18 Maurice Trintignant Cooper-Climax T51 74  4 
6 2 Roy Salvadori Aston Martin DBR4 74  2 
7 14 Masten Gregory Cooper-Climax T51 73  5 
8 30 Alan Stacey Lotus-Climax 16 71  12 
9 28 Graham Hill Lotus-Climax 16 70  9 
10 48 Chris Bristow Cooper-Borgward T51 70  16 
r 4 Carroll Shelby Aston Martin DBR4 69 Magneto 6 
11 58 Henry Taylor Cooper-Climax T51 69  21 
12 52 Peter Ashdown Cooper-Climax T45 69  23 
13 46 Ivor Bueb Cooper-Borgward T51 69  18 
r 40 Fritz d'Orey Maserati 250F 57 Accident 20 
r 42 Ron Flockhart BRM P25 53 Spin 11 
r 38 Jack Fairman Cooper-Climax T45 39 Gearbox 15 
r 10 Jo Bonnier BRM P25 37 Throttle Linkage 10 
r 22 Ian Burgess Cooper-Maserati T51 31 Gearbox 13 
r 24 Hans Herrmann Cooper-Maserati T51 21 Gearbox 19 
r 64 David Piper Lotus-Climax 16 19 Engine 22 
r 36 Brian Naylor JBW-Maserati (59) 18 Transmission 14 
r 50 Michael Taylor Cooper-Climax T45 17 Transmission 24 
r 20 Tony Brooks Vanwall VW (59) 13 Misfire 17 
ns 30 Innes Ireland Lotus-Climax 16  Driver Ill/ Car Raced By Stacey  
nq 56 Bill Moss Cooper-Climax T51   25 
nq 60 Mike Parkes Fry-Climax    26 
nq 44 Trevor Taylor Cooper-Climax T51   27 
nq 54 Keith Greene Cooper-Climax T45   28 
nq 66 Tim Parnell Cooper-Climax T45   29 
nq 62 Dennis Taylor Lotus-Climax 12   30