Quote:
Originally posted by Andrew Kitson
Andrew, welcome to Ten-Tenths.
The race you describe was probably the International Lombank Formula One Trophy race on Easter Saturday, 14th April 1962. Jimmy Clark won the 50 lap race in his Lotus at 101.09 mph from Graham Hill's BRM ( with the vertical exhausts).
Jo Bonnier finished third in his Republica Venetzia Porsche but the early laps were led by Stirling Moss in his pale green UDT Laystall Lotus 24 in which he set a new Snetterton lap record of 1.33.6. Stirling eventually finished 7th. Two days later, his professional driving career was at an end following his crash at Goodwood (in the same car) at the Easter Monday meeting.
The race had 20 entries from the cream of the F1 world championship. The only team not present was Ferrari.
When the old circuit closed in 1973, the outright lap record had dropped to 1.18.4 by Brett Lunger in his F5000 Trojan T101. Formula One returned to Snetterton in the late 1970's with the Aurora British F1 Championship, using the new shorter circuit.
It seems incredible now to think that the stars of the day would be racing at Snetterton in their usual Grand Prix cars and again at Goodwood two days later, both circuits not used for Grand Prix World Championship races.
Can you imagine the modern day F1 teams turning up now with their 'star' drivers to do two non -championship races in the UK (on the same weekend !) at circuits not on the usual F1 calendar?
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Andrew,for the sake of acuracy it was not on Easter saturday,but a week before.I actually went to 4 F1 races in as many weeks.
Sat 14 Apr Snetterton
Mon 23 Apr Goodwood
Sat 28 Apr Aintree
Sat 12 May Silverstone
Mon 11 Jun Crystal Palace
Sat 21 Jul Aintree (GP)
In those days you could still get to Snetterton by train.It stopped at Eccles Road station.Left out of the station,through a pig farm and down the middle of a runway,brought you to the main entrance.