«It was fantastic! Not just for braking, but for cornering, too, because it gave you the most tremendous down-force and - wet or dry - you had the same benefit in stopping, whereas the Jags could lock a wheel. Lofty England tried to get them banned in practice because his drivers complained that they couldn't see past the Mercs when the brake went up. load of balls! Mercedes countered that by cutting little windows in the pannel. The D-type was a fantastic car, but as a road-racing car the Mercedes was certainly superior, with its independent suspension, as opposed to the jags' solid rear axle. Normally, they would have eaten us alive at the end of Mulsanne, but with the air brakes we could stay right with them. And at corners like White House we didn't bother with the foot brake at all, we just flipped the air brake up at 170 mph and sailed through at 150 without touching the pedal. That thing would really pull you back!» |
«Although Moss was the expert in Le Mans starts, I decided to drive the first session because it was a 24-hour race, not a sprint. Our Team Manager, Alfred Neubauer, gave me no instructions for the race, but before the start he spat on the ground several times to wish me luck. It wasn't much-help to begin with because when I jumped in the car I go the gear lever stuck up my trouser-leg and got away-at the back of the field.» |
«The Jaguar was not really faster than the Mercedes, in spite of having 3.5-litres to our 3. We had the air brake, which was fantastico! At 250 kph when I raised it, it was like being pushed backwards. Once, coming out of Tertre Rouge onto the Mulsanne straight, I forgot to lower it and couldn't understand why the damn car wouldn't go! It was truly wonderful, when you used it properly...» |
«Fangio and I were terribly disappointed when the cars were withdrawn because we would have won the race. John Fitch - Levegh,s co-driver - had spoken with some of the directors of D-B and told them that he thought the cars should be withdrawn, that in deference to the people who had died they should pull the team out. I thought that was wrong - I didn't think it was his place to say that.» |
«I understood why Mercedes disappointed because we would have had a very easy victory. The car was going better and better.» |
«Levegh m'a sauvélavie. Levegh saved my life. We had only a few more laps to do - Levegh, Kling and I - before stopping at the Mercedes pits to refuel and change drivers. I was driving at more than 260 Kph (160 mph) when, almost as we arrived at the first pit I saw, barely fifty metres in front of me, Levegh suddenly raising one arm. He was signalling to me about a danger that was invisible to me. I braked, but at that speed there is no question of stopping in a few metres. Everything happened so fast that I was not able to grasp the complete picture of the drama. I saw going off to my left, while the Austin-Healey of Macklin/Leston was thrown to the right. How I was able to slip through and avoid Macklin I don't know. It was purely a matter of reflexes. All I can say is that I was able to avoid the Austin-Healey just as I entered a cloud of smoke coming from my left and which was, unfortunately, from Levegh's car, as I later learned.» |