Did Fangio Get One Of His WDC As A Gift?

[Vitesse]

Marshal: W154/W163 in 1951 - close but no cigar!!!

[Marshal]

Close though. Its an area that I found fascinating, as its one of the few times in front rank racing history when Daimler-Benz weren't really on the pace with their works team, in cars which should have been up with the best. Was it the ecenomic problems in Germany at the time which caused this poor performance?

[Vitesse]

I've always been puzzled by this too. I suppose the great distance involved and communication difficulties might have played a part in S. America, but it is nevertheless odd that the world-beating cars of 1939 were reduced almost to also-rans by 1951 when no real racing car development had taken place in the intervening years.

It's perhaps not generally known that M-B ran at Indy in 1947-8. They would have run in 1946 as well, but the car was held up in customs and Caracciola, who was scheduled to drive it, instead was hired to drive the Thorne-Sparks Thorne Engineering Special. Rudi crashed in practice, possibly due to a bird strike, and suffered a fractured skull from which he took several months to recover. The car won the 1946 500 in the hands of George Robson.

In 1947-8, Mercedes ran as Don Lee Mercedes, but they retired in both races: Duke Nalon was running fourth when he retired in 1947, but this Mercedes effort was not their final performance at the Brickyard - it would be nearly fify years before they won there!!

[fines]

Merecedes did NOT run at Indianapolis in 1947/8, it was Tommy Lee who ran the car and god knows how he got it. Also, the car George Robson (#16) won in in 1946 was not the same that Caracciola (#44) drove. It was very similar, however.

[Mekola]

Originally posted by Marshal


Yes I know, I think it was a W163 though (sorry, splitting hairs a bit I know) - Temporada races in 1950?

In 1951 more exactly, when he formed a team with Hermann Lang and Karl Kling as teammates.

That year there were two street races (in "park" zone) on the coast of Rio de la Plata. The circuit used was originally some longer but was modified to diminish the advantages of the Mercedes. Fangio was originally entered with the Ferrari of the local Automobile Club team alongside Froilan Gonzalez, but the team Mercedes went to Buenos Aires with the condition to engage Fangio to his team, condition what Fangio accepted immediately. His place on the vacant Ferrari was filled by Oscar Galvez (one of Fangio' main rivals in argentinian TC). The races presented the Mercedes on the front grid, but the Ferrari of Froilan Gonzalez easily passed them, took the lead and won the two races.

These wins impressed Enzo Ferrari in that form what after that he called Froilan to Maranello to contract him for his racing team, but first as a reserve driver because at this time the team was complete for this year. After the accident of Dorino Serafini what pulled out this driver of the activity for some months, Froilan became a main driver of Ferrari.