21 replies to this topic

[Joe Fan]

One of the things that I have found as I have delved deeper and deeper into my research on Masten Gregory, is that Mike Hawthorn was a much better driver than many give him credit for. He was the first Briton to win a F1 World Championship Grand Prix, the first to win a World Drivers Championship and he was just plain FAST in anything whether it be Grand Prix car or sports car. He was also the first driver to officially break the four minute barrier at Le Mans.

Personally, had he not been killed and continued motor racing into the sixties, I can easily see him overshadowing Stirling Moss in stature of British racing icons today. Do any Brits agree? I would be interested to hear your thoughts on the matter. Am I on to something here or just on something? ;)

As much as I respect and admire the careers of drivers like Stirling, Jim Clark, Graham and Damon Hill, Tony Brooks, Nigel Mansell etc., I am not so certain that Mike Hawthorn wasn't really the greatest British driving talent.

I'll post more later but I wanted to get this thought out there for now.

[David J Jones]

This one could stir up some old skeletons from the cupboard.

I believe that up the end of 1954 he was without doubt the no 1 British GP driver.
For one reason or another JMH went off the boil or seemed to lose the thread in 1955/56. It was a shame I feel that after Ascari's death that Lancia did not continue with Mike as their no 1 - but life and F1 is full of these ifs.

1957 saw him return to Ferrari but the Lancia design had been destroyed and all that was left was a useless shell. The arrival of the Dino in 1958 gave Mike a clear shot at the title and he grasped it with both hands. I believe he had already taken the decision to retire at the end of that year - which would account for the gesture of support given to him by Collins. This in turn caused friction in the Ferrari ranks and led to the deaths of Musso and Collins.
After this JMH appears to have a single minded approach to finish as high as possible in each race to clinch the championship. He even managed to break down Ferraris resistance to disc brakes which were fitted to his car only from Monza onwards to eliminate that advantage the Vanwall team enjoyed over him. (fading brakes according to Phil Hill were common on the Ferraris and most probably accounted for the death of Collins in Germany)

I do not believe he could have continued racing into the 60's as

-after Morroco he had lost interest
-I believe at the autopsy after his death it was found that he had a very serious kidney condition
-the time of the happy go lucky drivers was over and the sport was becoming more professional

[Gil Bouffard]

Mike,

If you read "Champion Year," you see that he had mafe the decision to retire whether he won the championship or not.He had a business to run and a mother to look after.

Mike's kidney problem was what kept him from national service, years before his death.

If you ever have the chance to watch "A Gentleman's Diary of Motor Racing," you will see Mike at his best. It was not unusual for drivers of that time to race three or four different class of car on a weekend.

Mike, like Stirling Moss, would have loved to race a British car in F-1 and won, but the cars were not up to it. However, unlike Stirling, Mike was not a "professional racing driver." He considered himself a racing businessman.

Finally, it was no easy feat to get Ferrari to change to disc brakes. The only set available were on Peter Collins' personal Ferrari. Therefore they were not "racing," brakes as on the Vanwall. But, they obviously were a great improvement over the standard Ferrari drum brakes.

Gil Bouffard

[David J Jones]

Mike / Gil

'Mon Ami Mate' describes the life stories of both Mike Hawthorn and Peter Collins rather well.

It has just been reissued and is well worth investing in if you are interested in that period.

The extent of Mikes kidney problem is discussed in the book and the autopsy showed it more serious than had previously been understood.

Also the book discusses the disc brake story and reveals that the discs were supplied to Ferrari and did not come from the Collins road car - which I believe - is now in the US

Hawthorns helmet is in the museum at Donnington together with G Hills, Moss's and Ascaris amongst others

[David McKinney]

I don't believe Hawthorn was any better than he has been given credit for. In several races during his career he was as good as Moss was in all his.

[Keir]

Mike did suffer a wee bit in direct comparison with Fangio, but then didn't EVERYBODY

Michael and Peter were the typical British drivers of their era.
For god and country and a pint at the end of the day!!

[Barry Boor]

Those who have posted above along the lines of 'Mike, on his day, was as good as anyone' have, IMHO, hit the nail squarely on the head. I would not describe Mike as moody, but clearly there were days when he 'fancied it' and days when he didn't.

He was a man of his time, treating his racing in a light-hearted and relatively amateurish way. Had he been born 15 years earlier, he would have flown Spitfires for sure. Without trying to stir comparisons, I do not think he was EVER in the Moss class, but when the car was right and the mood also, he could mix-it with and beat the best; but not often!

[Joe Fan]

When comparing Hawthorn and Moss consider this, Moss was only 5 months younger than Hawthorn. Yet Hawthorn won a Grand Prix two years sooner than Stirling, he won a World Driver Championship and Le Mans 24 Hour race that Stirling never did. Moss by all rights probably should have accomplished those feats. He was certainly good enough and yes I am aware that he was close to having both of these in the bag but they slipped away due to bad luck. However, that shouldn't diminish the fact that Hawthorn did accomplish these two prized feats and that he should garner more respect than he does by historians. Moss has a better winning percentage in F1 than Mike but Moss also drove two of the greatest cars in F1 history in 1954/56 and 1955 seasons: the Maserati 250F and the Mercedes W196C.

I think some of the lack of respect he gets from historians (and I admit that I was guilty of this at one time too), is due to the fact that he only won one race the year he won the WDC in 1958 and Moss finished second while winning four races. However, if I have read correctly, Hawthorn raced somewhat conservatively that year so that he would finish races and score points to win the championship.

[Gil Bouffard]

Re: "Hawthorn's helmet is in the museum at Donnington together with G Hill's, Moss' and Ascari's amongst others.

Yeah, and Mario Andretti and Jackie Stewart's are in the Smithsonian Institute of American History! I tried to get Phil Hill's helmet and a list of his accomplishments into the Smith in 1991 with no success.

Gil Bouffard

[David J Jones]

Gil

I was not fortunate enought to have seen Mike in action or the car in which he won his Championship.

I am afraid the helmet is about as close as I have got!

Re the JYS helmet I am almost certain that Donnington too boasted one maybe there is more than one of these. Almost every war museum boasts a piece of the Red Baron's aircraft.......

Sorry just a joke......!

[Gil Bouffard]

My comment was that the Smithsonian Institute of AMERICAN History should have Jackie's helmet rather than Phil Hill's or A.J. Foyt's or even Dan Gurney's.

Gil

[David J Jones]

Gil

Well I suppose JYS's last GP was meant to be in the US........

Joe Fan

I agree with all you said in your last post except you missed the Vannwall from the list of greats Moss drove.
My feeling about JMH is that he was at least the equal of Moss, he achieved more than Moss and even in his lifetime received scant recognition for it. (in the annual honours list in the year of his championship Moss was rewarded and JMH ignored)
Ever since his achievement has been belittled by even his piers. I suppose we should not be surprised though as history is always written by the survivors.

I do not feel in any way that the 1958 achievement was undeserved with only a single victory even if Moss had 4 wins and Brooks three. If it had gone any other way then there would have been an injustice as in those days only the best six results counted. I believe, speaking from memory, that JMH scored an overall 49 points to the 41 scored by Moss. I think that stat alone puts the feat even more into perspective.

It is often said that if todays scoring system had applied a different outcome would have occurred but I would counter that the first Moss victory of that year should be eliminated on the grounds that Moss's team was Vanwall and it had been achieved in a Cooper owned by Rob Walker. At the time the RAC were attempting to obtain removal of the race from the 58 Calendar and were embarassed when Moss won the event.

If JMH had been a little less openly anti-German maybe he would have driven for Mercedes in 55 and the course of history so different. But........................

[Criceto]

Can I just throw in a little extra thought here?

If not for team orders and a well-tuned sense of honour, Peter Collins would have had the 1956 season for the asking.

And had he lived, I think we would by now be talking in terms of Collins or Moss, rather than Hawthorn.

[David J Jones]

I agree that the sharing of cars that JMF indulged in cost Peter Collins the acolade of being the First British WDC in 1956 but rules are the rules......

I tend to think in terms of Hawtorn Moss and Collins when remembering the era because that is the way it was.

[Joe Fan]

Gil, I have read that "Champion Year" was completed three days before his death. I will have to read that book someday. I wonder if it would be useful for my Masten biography since my time is at somewhat of a premium right now. I know it is about the 1958 season for which Masten didn't get to compete much in due to injuries. I wonder if "Mon AMi Mate" might have something to offer?
A former competitor (who will remain nameless) told me that Masten chummed around with Mike at Buenos Aires one year.

David, I hadn't heard about Mike being Anti-German. If that was the case then it his racing career certainly suffered for it. I have read that many Brits were upset when Stirling raced for Mercedes. I think it was mainly that they wanted him to race for a British team.

At any rate, I personally think many fans and historians probably look at Mike's three career F1 wins and the WDC that he won only with one win (when Moss had four that year) and discard him as being one of the lesser F1 champions. However, after doing my research I am convinced that he has to be in the top half of the 28 drivers who have won a F1 WDC. He was known to be a real "tiger" on the track and he had raw speed that didn't come as easily to other great drivers. Besides, how many drivers have outdueled Fangio before in a Grand Prix car? Mike did.

[Gil Bouffard]

I have read both of Mike's books and I do not get the impression that he was anti-German. And if he was anti-German, you have to remember that he was a child of the Blitz. He, like Stirling were very patriotic and tried to race green cars. In 1955 he was THE Vanwall driver. Of course, the team owner and he didn't get along and the association ended. In 1956 Mike drove BRM another British car that wasn't up to it.

His relations with Ferrari were always good and when he rang him up and asked for a ride, Ferrari had a car for him.

Re: "If not for team orders and a well-tuned sense of honour." At Monza there were no team orders. The two Italians, Castelotti and Musso raced off and tried to win their home Grand Prix and (as the Brits say) blotted their copy books.

Collins came in for tires and saw Fangio standing in the pits, He offered Fangio his car and the Maestro went on to finish fourth and win his fourth championship.

Re: Moss winning more races than Hawthorn in 1958. Hawthorn was more consistent than Stirling, finishing more races than Moss.

Gil

[oldtimer]

Originally posted by Keir
Mike did suffer a wee bit in direct comparison with Fangio, but then didn't EVERYBODY

Michael and Peter were the typical British drivers of their era.
For god and country and a pint at the end of the day!!

Michael didn't suffer in 1953 at Rheims, nor in Spain or Silverstone in 1954 when he also beat him. In contrast to Moss and Collins, he gave Fangio a hard time racing wheel to wheel both in GPs and sports car racing.

A feature of his championship season was the points he collected for fastest laps. Without checking a post I made in another thread, I think he had 5 poles and 5 fastest laps, one at Monaco, which doesn't make much sense to me considering the car. He was around in a big way, and the one win doesn't reflect his speed that season.

And the lanky prankster did some hard work off track. I saw him basically managing the Ferrari team during the first practice session at the British GP in 1958. If he wasn't managing, he was sure giving orders and direction.

[David J Jones]

Oldtimer

Not to mention his performance vs Fangio at Le Mans in the first two hours of the 24 hour race in 1955 - although that had a tragic end.........

[Joe Fan]

I have read something along the lines that Mike was accused of dodging national service. I don't know if it is true or not but do you think that this coupled with the fact that he was blamed for the horrific crash at 1955 Le Mans, plays into Mike's devaluation in the eyes of historians?

I know that he was unfortunate to come along in the Fangio/Ascari era of total domination. Fans (and historians are fans too) often look at the bottom line, wins. However, maybe podiums were a better indicator of greatness coming up in that Fangio/Ascari era. If so, head-to-head, Mike scored more podiums Moss. It is funny how when both Fangio and Ascari were finally gone from F1, he won a WDC.

[Gil Bouffard]

Joe Fan,

Don't forget to pick up both of Hawthorn's books. He discusses his national service call up and that he showed up and because of his kidney problem, he was declared unfit for service. Here in America 4F would be the word.

The British tabloid press went after Hawthorn like a dog. It was even brought up in the House of Commons.

Gil

[David J Jones]

Yes

I think what would appear strange is why they (the press) went after Mike in that way.

They also went after Collins who had moved to France to avoid being called up.

They did not to my recollection go after Moss whom I cant recall doing national service.

A famous cricketer was exempted at the same time for 'having flat feet'!

[oldtimer]

I don't recollect the press going after Moss over the national service thing, either. Anything to do with Moss' manager?

Hawthorn did not have a manager, and, remembering that the press were hounding him about the issue on the week-end when his father was killed, I doubt that they got quotable copy from him. We all know what happens then...