The Fast And The Curious

Our columnist recalls the racing legends he’s known during 60 years in the sport

- Ricardo Divila

With the racing season now at an end, all the championships decided, we are in to the build and testing seasons for 2018. But it’s also a time to look back. Because, for me, the end of the 2017 season marked a fairly major milestone in my life, as my first race was the Sao Paulo Grand Prix, on 7 December 1957.

Sixty years in racing has brought a huge cast of characters into my life, of the sort one does not usually meet in a conventional existence, racing being a high risk, high intensity sport, and like a circus – after which it is named – also highly mobile.

Racing does give us larger than life people, then. Here I shall speak about those drivers who have gone. Sadly, there are too many in this list, as the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s were dangerous years (speaking about the years I was present, here).

The maestro My list starts with Juan Manuel Fangio, nicknamed El Chueco (the bowlegged one), and my first race. He won, and we would meet several times afterwards when he came to Brazil in the late ’60s, doing some laps with a two-stroke, front-wheel drive DKW saloon racer, decently fast and showing his versatility right up to a last meeting at Vallelunga during an F2 race. We would dine at the local trattoria in the evening. Fangio was a gentle, racing passionate person, with a squeaky voice and the mild demeanour of someone who did not have to prove anything – five world championships with four different manufacturers did all the talking for him.