Lance Macklin

Lance Macklin

Nation:	United Kingdom
Automobile world championship
First start:	1952 Swiss Grand Prix
Last start:	1955 British Grand Prix
Constructors
1952–1954 HWM  · 1955 Stirling Moss Ltd
statistics
World Cup balance:	no World Cup placement
Starts Victories Poles SR 15th - - -
World Cup points :	-
Podiums :	-
Leadership laps :	-

Lance Macklin (born September 2, 1919 in London , † August 29, 2002 in Bethersden , Kent ) was an English racing driver.

Career

As the son of the later ennobled Noel Macklin, chairman of the Invicta - sports car -Gesellschaft that flourished before 1939, Macklin was soon as a talented rider.

During the 1952 Formula 1 season he tried his hand at the wheel of an HWM - Monoposto , but only achieved a better result with an eighth place at the Dutch Grand Prix in Zandvoort , which prompted him to do it again with the same team the following year to attempt. He was eliminated from all six races started due to technical defects.

A start for Aston Martin in the Le Mans 24-hour race in 1954 was more promising - with a third place he had good hopes for further involvement in sports car races . But in 1955 he was involved with his Austin-Healey in the notorious accident that Mike Hawthorn caused with an unexpected maneuver.

Course of the accident in Le Mans 1955

At the end of the 35th lap, around 6:20 p.m., Hawthorn and his Jaguar quickly caught up with the Pierre Leveghs ( Mercedes ) and Macklins cars to be lapped, in order to overtake both on the home straight, with Juan Manuel Fangio behind him was and attacked him. When he had passed this, he shot across the slope in front of the two cars in order to reach the pits, which at that time were not yet structurally separated from the race track, as quickly as possible. Despite his emergency stop, Hawthorn only came to a stop 80 m behind his pit crew, causing a serious accident. Macklin was able to evade his maneuver with a movement of the steering wheel, but Levegh had no more room to evade and was hit by Macklin's car. After a slight contact with the Austin, which in turn was spinning around the track, Levegh's vehicle hit the balustrade at 150  mph , exploded and killed 83 spectators in the worst motor sport accident of all time. Levegh had just been able to warn Fangio with a hand signal, otherwise he would also have been involved in the accident. The Mercedes race management then withdrew their racing cars from the ongoing competition and at the end of the year carried out the previously planned withdrawal from motorsport.

Macklin was able to get out of his car unharmed and was badly affected by the events, but was available to the investigating French government authorities. In his statements, he did not blame any driver, but described it as inevitability due to the high speed of everyone involved:

"After passing me (Mike) Hawthorn turned too sharply towards the right and braked," (...) "I braked my car as hard as I could to avoid him. My wheels locked and I was carried towards the left. Levegh's car hit the back of my car. In an affair of this kind it is difficult to speak of responsibility. Hawthorn no doubt committed an error but the real responsibility was the speed of the cars. In the excitement of his struggle (with Levegh and Juan Manuel Fangio) Hawthorn executed a manouevre which astonished me and he left me no other alternative than to either run into him or turn to the left. "

Just one month later, Macklin was able to show aspiring form again with an eighth place at the English Grand Prix in Aintree on a Maserati 250F that actually belonged to Stirling Moss , but after another serious accident at the RAC Tourist Trophy at the Dundrod Circuit in late summer, he decided he decided to renounce motorsport .

Later in life, Lance Macklin spent many years of work and leisure in Spain , where he ran an import-export business. When he became seriously ill, he returned to England, where he died shortly before his 83rd birthday.

statistics

Statistics in the automobile world championship

general overview

season	team	chassis	engine	run	Victories	Second	Third	Poles	nice Race laps	Points	WM-Pos.
1952	HW Motors	HWM 52	Alta 2.0 L4	5	-	-	-	-	-	-	NC
1953	HW Motors	HWM 53	Alta 2.5 L4	6th	-	-	-	-	-	-	NC
1954	HW Motors	HWM 53	Alta 2.5 L4	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	NC
1955	Stirling Moss Ltd.	Maserati 250F	Maserati 2.5 L6	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	NC
total				13	-	-	-	-	-	-

Single results

season	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9
1952
	DNF		11	9	15th		8th	DNQ
1953
			DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF		DNF	DNF
1954
				DNF
1955
		DNQ				8th

Legend
colour	abbreviation	meaning
gold	-	victory
silver	-	2nd place
bronze	-	3rd place
green	-	Placement in the points
blue	-	Classified outside the point ranks
violet	DNF	Race not finished (did not finish)
	NC	not classified
red	DNQ	did not qualify
	DNPQ	failed in pre-qualification (did not pre-qualify)
black	DSQ	disqualified
White	DNS	not at the start (did not start)
	WD	withdrawn
Light Blue	PO	only participated in the training (practiced only)
	TD	Friday test driver
without	DNP	did not participate in the training (did not practice)
	INJ	injured or sick
	EX	excluded
	DNA	did not arrive
	C.	Race canceled
		no participation in the World Cup
other	P / bold	Pole position
	SR / italic	Fastest race lap
	*	not at the finish, but counted due to the distance covered
	()	Streak results
	underlined	Leader in the overall standings

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1950	Aston Martin Ltd.	Aston Martin DB2	George Abecassis		5th place and class win
1951	Aston Martin Ltd.	Aston Martin DB2	Eric Thompson		3rd place and class win
1952	Aston Martin Ltd.	Aston Martin DB3 Spyder	Peter Collins		failure	accident
1953	Bristol Airplane Company	Bristol 450 Coupe	Graham Whitehead		failure	accident
1954	Automobili OSCA	OSCA MT4 1500	Pierre Legonyie	James Simpson	Disqualified
1955	Lance Macklin	Austin-Healey 100S	Les Leston		failure	accident

Sebring results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
1954	Donald Healey Motor Co.	Austin-Healey 100	George Huntoon	3rd place and class win
1955	Donald Healey Motor Co.	Austin-Healey 100S	Stirling Moss	Rank 6
1956	Donald Healey Motor Company	Austin-Healey 100S	Archie Scott-Brown	failure	starter

Individual results in the sports car world championship

season	team	race car	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th
1953	Bristol Cars	Bristol 450	SEB	MIM	LEM	SPA	ONLY	RTT	CAP
					DNF
1954	Donald Healey Motor Company Osca	Austin-Healey 100 Osca MT4 Osca 2000S	BUA	SEB	MIM	LEM	RTT	CAP
				3	23	DNF	DNF	DNF
1955	Donald Healey Motor Company Lance Macklin John Dalton	Austin-Healey 100	BUA	SEB	MIM	LEM	RTT	TAR
				6th	36	DNF	DNF
1956	Donald Healey Motor Company	Austin-Healey 100	BUA	SEB	MIM	ONLY	KRI
				DNF

Web links

• Lance Macklin on gpracing.net192.com ( Memento from April 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive )