1960 USA Grand Prix

 1960 USA Grand Prix

Racing data
10th of 10 races of the 1960 World Automobile Championship
Surname:	III United States Grand Prix
Date:	November 20, 1960
Place:	Riverside , USA
Course:	Riverside International Raceway
Length:	395.325 km in 75 laps of 5.271 km
Weather:	dry, sunny
Pole position
Driver:	Stirling Moss	Lotus Climax
Time:	1: 54.4 min
Fastest lap
Driver:	Jack Brabham	Cooper-Climax
Time:	1: 56.3 (lap 71) min
Podium
First:	Stirling Moss	Lotus Climax
Second:	Innes Ireland	Lotus Climax
Third:	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax

The 1960 US Grand Prix took place on November 20, 1960 at the Riverside International Raceway near Riverside and was the tenth race of the 1960 Automobile World Championship .

Reports

background

After the 1959 US Grand Prix was a financial failure, the US Grand Prix returned to the Riverside International Raceway , which was the last venue for this race. The following year the venue changed to Watkins Glen for several years . The season finale of the automobile world championship was also the last race for the time being in which 2.5 liter engines were allowed. Due to numerous serious fatal accidents in the previous months, the decision was made to reduce the engine output for safety reasons. From the following season onwards, the cubic capacity of the cars could not exceed 1.5 liters. This regulation resulted in a major visual change in the car in the years to come. The change to the rear engine concept was finally completed, the cars became significantly smaller.

Ferrari , winner of the previous race, decided not to take part in the race for various reasons. On the one hand, the team could no longer win a title, on the other hand, they were already concentrating on building the new car for the coming season. Cooper expanded his team to three vehicles. Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren had already secured the first two places in the drivers' championship and continued to drive for Cooper the following year. In addition, Ron Flockhart was given an old Cooper T51 for his last race in the automobile world championship. Lotus also drove with three cars, Innes Ireland and Jim Clark stayed with the team for the next season, with John Surtees driving for Lotus for the last time in his career. He moved to the Yeoman Credit Racing Team . The third works team, BRM , also made personnel changes after the end of the season. Graham Hill was the only one of the three drivers to stay, Jo Bonnier and Dan Gurney both switched to Porsche . After a break for several races, Scarab was again registered for a Grand Prix. The team had fixed the car's engine problems, but it still lacked competitiveness. For this reason, they then withdrew from the automobile world championship. It was the last race for both Scarab and driver Chuck Daigh . The last designer on the entry list was JBW with Brian Naylor as driver.

Many teams used private cars. One of them was the American Bob Drake , who drove his only race in the automobile world championship. He ended the era of the Maserati 250F . The car had been in service since 1954 and was used one last time at the 1960 US Grand Prix. This was the longest time a Formula 1 car was used. After the vehicle was finally phased out, however, the Maserati engines were still used in various vehicles until 1969.

Stirling Moss drove for the Rob Walker Racing Team in a Lotus 18 . He stayed with that team in the final season of his career for the following year. The Yeoman Credit Racing Team registered four Cooper T51s for Tony Brooks , Olivier Gendebien , Henry Taylor and Phil Hill , who got permission from Ferrari to drive for another team. All four drove for the last time for the Yeoman Credit Racing Team. Brooks switched to BRM, Taylor and Gendebien drove various other private cars instead of Cooper and Phil Hill stayed with Ferrari. However, Phil Hill drove Cooper again in 1964 , this time with the works team. Phil Hill's teammate at Ferrari, Wolfgang Graf Berghe von Trips , had also received approval from his team. He drove for Scuderia Centro Sud , which had also registered three Cooper T51s. His teammates for this one race were Ian Burgess and Maurice Trintignant . All three drove for the team for the last time. Jim Hall also made his debut in a private Lotus and Pete Lovely drove a Cooper T45 .

In the drivers' standings there was a duel for the still open third place between Phil Hill, Ireland and Moss. Various other drivers still had theoretical chances of this rank. In the constructors' championship all positions were decided by the absence of Porsche and Ferrari. With McLaren and Daigh, two former winners took part in the race, Scarab and Cooper had previously each been successful once. In 1958, Daigh won the first US Grand Prix, which was not part of the World Auto Championship, on Scarab.

training

As at the beginning of the season, Moss and Brabham were the fastest in training and dueled for the last pole position of the season. Both drivers had already been on the first grid position three times in 1960. During training for the US Grand Prix, Moss prevailed with half a second ahead of Brabham and thus had the most pole positions in 1960. Behind Moss and Brabham, the two BRMs from Gurney and Bonnier qualified, followed by three Lotus cars from Clark, Surtees and Ireland. The first ten were completed by Gendebien, Brooks and McLaren. Daigh in the Scarab qualified for 18th place on the grid, Drake in the Maserati started the race from 22nd place.

run

Phil Hill and Gendebien stopped at the start, but the cars were restarted and both drivers continued the race. Brabham won the starting duel against Moss and took the lead. The order at the front of the field remained unchanged until the fourth lap of the race, when a fire broke out at the rear of the Brabham Cooper. Brabham headed for the pit to have his mechanics look for the cause. When they did not identify the problem, Brabham drove out again, later came back into the pits, as small fires sporadically occurred in the rear of his car. During that pit stop, the mechanics found that Brabham had overfilled and the gasoline had spilled, which ignited on the hot engine. Brabham had overfilled his car with fuel to avoid a situation similar to last year's US Grand Prix, where he had to push the car on the final lap of the race because he ran out of fuel. The Cooper pit crew fixed the problem and Brabham continued the race. In the meantime, however, Moss had taken the lead in the race. Surtees also spun on lap four. Surtees' subsequent team mate, Clark, could no longer evade and the two vehicles collided. The race was over for Surtees, Clark drove on with a damaged front section of his car, but at the end of the race he was more than ten laps behind the competition.

On lap six Brooks was eliminated due to a spinning, Flockhart on lap eleven with no power transmission. Gurney caught up with the leader Moss, but again the unreliability of the BRM P48 put an end to the chances of victory. Gurney parked the car on lap 18 due to overheating, and team-mate Graham Hill later retired due to a technical defect. In addition, Naylor and Burgess did not reach the goal.

Moss led Ireland and McLaren for the rest of the race and won the race by 38 seconds over the runner-up. After winning the Monaco Grand Prix in 1960 , this was his second win of the season, which made him third in the drivers' championship. It was also the second win of the season for Lotus. Ireland secured fourth place in the drivers' standings with second place, McLaren became the only driver with third place who scored points in more than six races and thus affected the regulation of the cancellation results. Brabham improved to fourth place during the race. Bonnier was fifth, Phil Hill sixth. Hall just missed out on the points in seventh place, followed by Salvadori, Graf Berghe von Trips and Daigh.

For Moss it was the only victory in the US Grand Prix, Lotus also won the two races of the following years. In 1960, Cooper in particular had dominated the majority of the season, but with the new regulations, the balance of power changed from the following season. In 1961, Ferrari and Lotus in particular battled for victories, Cooper did not achieve a win of the season.

Registration list

team	No.	driver	chassis	engine	tires
Cooper-Climax	02	Jack Brabham	Cooper T53	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
	03	Bruce McLaren
	04th	Ron Flockhart	Cooper T51
Rob Walker Racing Team	05	Stirling Moss	Lotus 18	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
Yeoman Credit Racing Team	06th	Tony Brooks	Cooper T51	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
	07th	Olivier Gendebien
	08th	Phil Hill
	09	Henry Taylor
Lotus Climax	10	Innes Ireland	Lotus 18	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
	11	John Surtees
	12	Jim Clark
High efficiency motors	14th	Roy Salvadori	Cooper T51	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
Owen Racing Organization	15th	Jo Bonnier	Cooper T51	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
	16	Dan Gurney
	17th	Graham Hill
Scuderia Centro Sud	18th	Maurice Trintignant	Cooper T51	Maserati 2.5 L4	D.
	19th	Ian Burgess
	26th	Wolfgang Graf Berghe von Trips
Joe Lubin	20th	Bob Drake	Maserati 250F	Maserati 2.5 L4	D.
JB Naylor	21st	Brian Naylor	JBW Type 59	Maserati 2.5 L4	D.
Scarab	23	Chuck Daigh	Scarab	Scarab 2.4 L4	D.
Jim Hall	24	Jim Hall	Lotus 18	Climax 2.5 L4	D.
Fred Armbruster	25th	Pete Lovely	Cooper T45	Ferrari 2.4 L4	D.

Classifications

Starting grid

Item	driver	constructor	time	Ø speed	begin
01	Stirling Moss	Lotus Climax	1: 54.4	165.87 km / h	01
02	Jack Brabham	Cooper-Climax	1: 55.0	165.01 km / h	02
03	Dan Gurney	BRM	1: 55.2	164.72 km / h	03
04th	Jo Bonnier	BRM	1: 55.6	164.15 km / h	04th
05	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax	1: 55.6	164.15 km / h	05
06th	John Surtees	Lotus Climax	1: 56.6	162.74 km / h	06th
07th	Innes Ireland	Lotus Climax	1: 57.0	162.18 km / h	07th
08th	Olivier Gendebien	Cooper-Climax	1: 57.2	161.91 km / h	08th
09	Tony Brooks	Cooper-Climax	1: 57.2	161.91 km / h	09
10	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax	1: 57.4	161.63 km / h	10
11	Graham Hill	BRM	1: 57.6	161.36 km / h	11
12	Jim Hall	Lotus Climax	1: 58.2	160.54 km / h	12
13	Phil Hill	Cooper-Climax	1: 58.8	159.73 km / h	13
14th	Henry Taylor	Cooper-Climax	1: 59.0	159.46 km / h	14th
15th	Roy Salvadori	Cooper-Climax	1: 59.6	158.66 km / h	15th
16	Wolfgang Graf Berghe von Trips	Cooper Maserati	2: 01.4	156.31 km / h	16
17th	Brian Naylor	JBW Maserati	2: 02.2	155.28 km / h	17th
18th	Chuck Daigh	Scarab	2: 02.6	154.78 km / h	18th
19th	Maurice Trintignant	Cooper Maserati	2: 03.2	154.02 km / h	19th
20th	Pete Lovely	Cooper-Ferrari	2: 03.4	153.77 km / h	20th
21st	Ron Flockhart	Cooper-Climax	2: 04.4	152.54 km / h	21st
22nd	Bob Drake	Maserati	2: 05.4	151.32 km / h	22nd
23	Ian Burgess	Cooper Maserati	2: 06.6	149.89 km / h	23

run

Item	driver	constructor	Round	Stops	time	begin	Fastest lap	Failure reason
01	Stirling Moss	Lotus Climax	75		2: 28: 52.2	01	1: 56.6
02	Innes Ireland	Lotus Climax	75		+ 38.0	07th	1: 56.6
03	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax	75		+ 52.0	10	1: 57.8
04th	Jack Brabham	Cooper-Climax	74		+ 1 lap	02	1: 56.3
05	Jo Bonnier	BRM	74		+ 1 lap	04th	1: 57.2
06th	Phil Hill	Cooper-Climax	74		+ 1 lap	13	1: 59.2
07th	Jim Hall	Lotus Climax	73		+ 2 rounds	12	1: 59.3
08th	Roy Salvadori	Cooper-Climax	73		+ 2 rounds	15th	2: 00.0
09	Wolfgang Graf Berghe von Trips	Cooper Maserati	72		+ 3 rounds	16	2: 01.5
10	Chuck Daigh	Scarab	70		+ 5 rounds	18th	2: 05.0
11	Pete Lovely	Cooper-Ferrari	69		+ 6 rounds	20th	2: 03.0
12	Olivier Gendebien	Cooper-Climax	69		+ 6 rounds	08th	2: 00.0
13	Bob Drake	Maserati	68		+ 7 rounds	22nd	2: 09.2
14th	Henry Taylor	Cooper-Climax	68		+ 7 rounds	14th	1: 59.3
15th	Maurice Trintignant	Cooper Maserati	66		+ 9 rounds	19th	2: 03.5
16	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax	61		+ 14 rounds	05	1: 59.0
-	Graham Hill	BRM	34		DNF	11	1: 59.8	transmission
-	Ian Burgess	Cooper Maserati	29		DNF	23	2: 06.0	ignition
-	Brian Naylor	JBW Maserati	20th		DNF	17th	2: 04.7	Engine failure
-	Dan Gurney	BRM	18th		DNF	03	1: 58.0	Overheating
-	Ron Flockhart	Cooper-Climax	11		DNF	21st	2: 05.2	Power transmission
-	Tony Brooks	Cooper-Climax	06th		DNF	09	1: 56.4	Lathe operator
-	John Surtees	Lotus Climax	03		DNF	06th	1: 58.6	Spin / collision with Jim Clark

World Cup stands after the race

The first six of the race got 8, 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 points. Only the six best results from ten races counted. Only the points of the best placed driver on a team counted in the constructors' championship.

Driver ranking

Item driver constructor Points 01  Jack Brabham Cooper-Climax 43 02  Bruce McLaren Cooper-Climax 34 (37) 03  Stirling Moss Lotus Climax 19th 04th  Innes Ireland Lotus Climax 18th 05  Phil Hill Ferrari / Cooper-Climax 16 06th  Olivier Gendebien Cooper-Climax 10 07th  Wolfgang Graf Berghe von Trips Ferrari 10 08th  Jim Rathmann Watson-Offenhauser 8th 09  Richie Ginther Ferrari 8th 10  Jim Clark Lotus Climax 8th 11  Tony Brooks Cooper-Climax 7th 12  Cliff Allison Ferrari 6th 13  Rodger Ward Watson-Offenhauser 6th 14th  John Surtees Lotus Climax 6th

Item driver constructor Points 15th  Graham Hill BRM 4th 16  Paul Goldsmith Epperly-Offenhauser 4th 17th  Willy Mairesse Ferrari 4th 18th  Jo Bonnier BRM 4th 19th  Henry Taylor Cooper-Climax 3 20th  Carlos Menditeguy Cooper Maserati 3 21st  Don Branson Phillips-Offenhauser 3 22nd  Giulio Cabianca Cooper-Castellotti 3 23  Johnny Thomson Lesovsky-Offenhauser 2 24  Eddie Johnson Trevis-Offenhauser 1 25th  Lucien Bianchi Cooper-Climax 1 26th  Ron Flockhart Lotus Climax 1 27  Hans Herrmann Porsche 1

Constructors' championship

Item	constructor	Points
01	cooper	48 (61)
02	lotus	34 (37)
03	Ferrari	26 (27)
04th	BRM	8th
05	Porsche	1

Web links

• Results at motorsportarchiv.de
• Photos at f1-facts.com
• Grand Prix Results: United States GP, 1960 at grandprix.com
• The 1960 United States Grand Prix ( Memento from February 16, 2015 in the Internet Archive )