1957 Sebring 12-Hour Grand Prix Race Profile

Very nicely written!

Some additions:
In 1956 Fangio was under Ferrari contract. He never felt "comftable" at Ferrari. Whatever influenced his decision to change to Maserati for the 1957-season, his first drive in a Maserati sports-racing car was in Caracas the year before in December 1955 with a Maserati 300S (#3054). He won the race clearly over Portago in his 750 Monza.

It is worth to note that Fangio never (!!) drove a Ferrari in his private race-events - he always prefered the Maserati 300S.

At Sebring `57 the big bazooka 450S blew away the Ferrari-opposition (due to a rare better preparation of cars by Maserati).

A correction:
Louis Galanos repeated the mistake, Joel Finn mentioned in his book "Maserati - The Postwar Sportsracing Cars". Car #21 was NOT a 250S driven by Shelby & Salvatori. It was the 300S #3066, a car that was loaned to the Factory by owner Francisco Godia-Sales.

Ciao!
Walter

 

Very nice article. They always talk about the 1967 Ferrari/Ford duel, but I think 1957 was the best year ever in sportscar racing. You had the wonderful 4 cam Ferrari's wich ended up needing an enlargement to beat the Maserati's. You had both the 300 and monster 450 Maserati's, the smaller engined Aston's and Jaguar's and even Porsche's that could all win overall!! The next year 1958 was the year of the 2 cam Testarossa's, but they were not nearly as technical or exciting in performance.

Wish I was around back then to have seen and heard it.

Tom Tanner/Ferrari Expo 2011-Chicago March 19th 2011