F1 Seasons: 1953 Trivia Quiz

Answer: Alberto Ascari

Ascari had back-to-back wins in the 1952 and 1953 World Championships. In 1953, he was followed by Fangio (6˝ points back), fully recovered from injuries suffered early in 1952. Farina was third in the Championship, 8˝ points behind Ascari and Hawthorn was fourth, 15˝ points adrift.

Answer: Maserati

Fangio returned to F1 with Maserati. A Ferrari team headed by Ascari was Maserati's biggest rival in 1953.
Gordini were a French team. Maurice Trintingnant was their best driver in the Championship, finishing twelfth. Milano were cellar-dwellers in the championship. Prince Bira achieved their best result (eleventh in the Italian GP).

Answer: Mike Hawthorn

Hawthorn's win in France was his only victory of the season.
Ascari won in Argentina, Netherlands, Belgium, Great Britain and Switzerland, while Farina came home first in the German GP. Villoresi had no wins in 1953. The only non-Ferrari wins happened in the Italian GP (Juan Manuel Fangio's Maserati won) and in the Indianapolis 500 (Bill Vukovich won in a Kurtis Kraft-Offenhauser entered by the Howard Keck Company).

Answer: Bill Vukovich

Vukovich devastated the opposition, getting pole, win and fastest lap. Agabashian, McGrath and Ayulo were, respectively, second, third and fourth.

Ferrari driver Ascari raced at Indianapolis in 1952 but did not win (the only race he started and lost in the 1952 season). He did not return for the 1953 race.

Answer: José Froilán González

González was undoubtebly fast, tying with teammate Fangio in fastest laps. The other fastest laps in the season (apart from the Indy 500) went to Ferrari drivers (four for Alberto Ascari and one for Luigi Villoresi).
Marimón, Gálvez and Bonetto (the last one being an Italian) were also Maserati drivers, though less successful than Fangio and González in 1953.

Answer: Hermann Lang

Lang raced for Maserati in the 1953 Swiss GP, where he finished fifth.
In the 1930s, there was an F1 European Championship. The 1939 season was marred by confusion, as war started before the end of the season and, more importantly, before the scoring system was decided: some associations defended the "minimum points system" (first place scored 1 point, second scored 2, etc), under which the driver with the least points was Champion; others preferred the "maximum points system (first scored 10 points, second 6, etc), under which the driver with the most points won. Lang won under the maximum points system, while Müller won under the minimum points system.
Müller switched to racing motorcycles after the war (he was the 250cc World Champion in 1955), but Stuck and Pietsch, also F1 drivers in the 1930s, entered a few F1 World Championship races in the 1950s, with little success.

Answer: BMW & Veritas

BMW and Veritas equipped several privateer teams. Hans Herrmann's Veritas was the best placed, finishing ninth. The best BMW engined car was Rudolf Krause's Reif, entered by Dora Greifzu, in fourteenth place.
Alta was a British engine manufacturer, that equipped, among others, the Cooper and HWM teams. They were also a car manufacturer. AFM (Alexander von Falkenhausen Motorenbau) made only F1 cars; not engines.

Answer: Felice Bonetto

Bonetto crashed into a balcony and died of head injuries, while driving a Lancia, in a sports car event on the open road in Mexico, the Carrera Panamericana.
Musso, Mantovani and Marimón were some of his teammates in the Maserati team (although Marimón was Argentinian; not Italian).

Answer: He shared a fastest lap, that was worth 1 point, with another driver

Alberto Ascari shared the British GP fastest lap with José Froilán González, so each got half a point.
Race wins were worth 8 points, so even a shared one would give a driver 4 points. Shared second places would give a driver 3 points (half of 6), third places 2 points (half of 4), fourth 1˝ (half of 3) and fifth place 1 point (half of 2). Keeping score was not very easy in the 50s...

Answer: He was the heir of the Johnnie Walker fortune

Rob Walker was a descendant of the famous whisky brand founder, Johnnie.
In 1953, he entered a Connaught-Francis for Tony Rolt, who finished twelfth in the British GP. Walker's best days were yet to come.