NURBURGRING SPORTS CAR RACE, 1959

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29221, 3 June 1960, Page 9

NURBURGRING SPORTS CAR RACE, 1959

lap record on the eleventh lap with a time of 9 minutes 32 seconds—ll seconds faster than the old time.

Incidentally, the laps at the Nurburgring are enormously long: 14.2 miles each. Consequently, anyone who really masters the circuit can gain whole seconds a lap as opposed to tenths of seconds on shorter circuits.

back to me when a slower car forced him into a ditch. Heroically he levered the Aston out with a post ‘borrowed” from a nearby fence, pushed the car back on to the circuit, restarted, and drove back to the pits. So I went back into the race some 70 seconds behind the Ferraris of Gendcbien and Behra, who had taken first and second places respectively. By lap 29 I had overtaken them both and the Aston Martin led the race again. No driver may stay at the wheel for more than three hours in one spell, so I handed back to Jack on lap 33; but only two laps later I was back in the Aston with the Gendebien/Hill Ferrari again ahead of me. This, by the way, was not Jack’s fault; he drove a very consistent race throughout.

Now I had 22 seconds to make up. Three laps later I had closed within one second of Hill and passed him just after the North Curve, gradually drawing away from the three Ferraris behind to win by 41 seconds.