The 1957 season marked the end of the era of dominance of Italian teams in Formula-1 and became the crowning achievement in the career of the great Argentine champion Juan-Manuel Fangio, who, despite his 46-year-old age, once again managed to prevail over all his rivals and win his next, already fifth, world champion title.
After leaving Scuderia Ferrari at the end of last season, Juan-Manuel achieved his last title already behind the wheel of Maserati, and thanks to the efforts of the Argentine, this year became the most successful for the Modena team in their history in Formula-1, after which they left the Queen of Motorsport forever. Fangio himself won the championship much easier than in the previous year, which was largely due to the failures of his main rivals at the very beginning of the season, and after three consecutive victories in the first three stages in Argentina, Monaco and France, winning another championship title for Fangio was just a matter of technique. Meanwhile, the final chord in the fight for the title was an absolutely incredible race at the German Nurburgring, during which the Argentine, after a prolonged pit stop, managed to win back a seemingly unthinkable gap from the Ferrari drivers and, passing them one by one on the penultimate lap, Juan-Manuel still won, which, by his own admission, was the best in his career.
Fangio's main rival, as has become a tradition over the past few years, was Stirling Moss, who joined the British Vanwall team this year. Stirling himself never hid his desire to win at the wheel of a British car, and in 1957 he finally realized his dream by winning the British Grand Prix with Brooks.
This victory, which became a real triumph for British motorsport, marked a real turning point in the history of Formula-1 and the beginning of future great successes for British teams, which soon began to play a fundamental role in this kind of motorsport. At the end of the season, in front of tifosi, Stirling managed to win two more convincing victories in Pescara and Monza, easily defeating the five-time world champion, which ultimately brought him another title of vice-champion, which was awarded to him for the third time in a row. Looking at Moss' excellent performances in the second half of the championship, it is safe to say that the Englishman deserved the title this year no less than Fangio, and only unfortunate failures in the first three stages deprived him of any opportunity to take part in the fight for the title of champion.
When mentioning the successes of Tony Vandervell's team, it is impossible not to mention Moss' teammates, Tony Brooks and Stuart Lewis-Evans. Brooks started the season with a superb second place in Monaco, which was neither more nor less than the first podium in Vanwall history, but the Englishman was soon involved in a serious accident at the "24 Hours of Le Mans", the consequences of which affected his performance almost until end of the season. Even in that historic race in Great Britain, which brought him and Moss the title of the first Britons to win in Formula-1 Grand Prix driving a British car, Tony, due to severe pain, lasted only a third of the distance, after which he was forced to give up the car to his teammate, who brought the matter to an end. Nevertheless, at the end of the championship, Brooks still took a fairly good 5th place in the overall standings, but it was obvious that in good physical shape the Englishman was capable of much more.
Lewis-Evans can be called the main discovery of this season at all. Having made his debut in the World Championship in the Connaught team, Stuart managed to earn points in his very first race in Monaco, however, as it turned out, this Grand Prix was the last in the history of this British team, and soon due to financial difficulties it had to leave Formula-1, leaving the young Englishman out of work. Fortunately for Stuart, it was then that Tony Vandervell was having difficulties with both of his main drivers, and, looking for a replacement, the Vanwall boss chose Lewis-Evans, who managed to make a good impression on him with his performance in Monaco. Subsequent races showed that Vandervell was absolutely right, and Stuart, already in his first season in Formula-1, managed to demonstrate that he was one of the fastest drivers of his time. In the last Grand Prix of the season in Monza, Lewis-Evans was the fastest at all and managed to win his first pole position, ahead of even Moss, while in the race itself, which was remembered for the incredible fight for the leadership between the Vanwall and Maserati drivers, Stuart was among the main contenders for victory. Unfortunately, Lewis-Evans failed to realize his potential this season due to frequent technical failures, and in the end the Englishman scored only 5 points, which brought him only 10th place in the World Championship.
As for Scuderia Ferrari, this season was extremely unsuccessful for them. Already at the very beginning of the season, the Maranello team lost two of their drivers, Eugenio Castellotti and Alfonso de Portago, whose deaths immediately became the reason for harsh criticism of Commendatore from both drivers and those in power, while at the end of the season Ferraris failed to win any one victory, which has not happened to them since back in 1950. Considering that the Scuderia drivers had at their disposal, albeit modified, but essentially the same last year’s champion D50 cars, the main reasons for the team’s failure were the insufficient reliability of these cars and, we must admit this , the absence in their ranks of a driver capable of fighting on equal terms with Fangio or Moss. Having parted ways with the Argentine champion at the end of last season, Commendatore relied on youth this year, but neither Collins, nor Hawthorn, nor Musso ever managed to defeat the greatest pair of Formula-1 drivers of the 50s, who, without losing to anyone, shared all the victories this season. Especially revealing in this regard was the famous German Grand Prix at the Nurburgring, in which Hawthorn and Collins, having a more than 45(!) second advantage over Fangio, still could not escape the world champion pursuing them and became only heroes of the second plan amid the Argentine's stunning achievement.
If we talk about leadership within the Maranello team, then the strongest of the Ferrari drivers in 1957 was obviously Collins, however, apparently, the Englishman had spent all his stock of luck last season, and now failures were falling on him like from the cornucopia. Being one of the main contenders for victory in the first two stages, Peter in Argentina became a victim of a clutch failure, which burned like a candle on almost all the Ferrari cars, while in Monaco, closely pursuing the leading Moss, the Englishman was unable to dodge logs that rolled onto the track after Stirling's accident, and in his turn rammed the fence.
As a result, having won only two podiums throughout the entire season, the Englishman took only 8th place in the championship, while the most successful Ferrari driver turned out to be Musso, who lost only to Fangio and Moss in the overall standings.
In addition to Collins, another main loser of this championship can be called the second Maserati driver, Jean Behra. Unlike Fangio, who had problems with his car only once, the Frenchman suffered from a lack of reliability for almost the entire season, and as a result he managed to score points only at the first stage of the championship in Argentina, where he managed to finish 2nd. At the same time, the retirement in Great Britain was especially offensive for the Frenchman, where Jean could have finally won his first Grand Prix in the World Championship, however, the transmission that shattered in the last third of the distance dashed all his hopes, and this race, to the delight of local fans, was still won by Moss.
As for the third Maserati driver, Harry Schell, although he did not shine with much speed, he spent this season quite confidently and after seven years of racing in Formula-1, he finally managed to score his first podium, finishing 3rd in Pescara.
This season in general became quite successful for the USA, since, in addition to Harry, the American Formula-1 debutant Masten Gregory, who competed in a Maserati of the private team Scuderia Centro Sud, also looked very worthy. Already in his debut Grand Prix in Monaco, Masten managed to finish 3rd, while in the remaining races he also scored points quite regularly and eventually shared 6th place in the overall standings with Schell, becoming the best driver of the championship who competed in a private car.
In addition to Vanwall, two more British factory teams, BRM and Cooper, also took part in the 1957 World Championship, however, unlike Tony Vandervell's team, they failed to achieve any great success. The BRM P25, which received a longer wheelbase in the off-season, could not boast of either high speed or reliability, however, a much bigger headache for Alfred Owen was the constant change of drivers. Having started the season with Ron Flockhart and Roy Salvadori, Owen was first forced to part ways with the latter, who preferred to try his luck with the Vanwall team, and then with the former, who had a serious accident at the French Grand Prix and was out of action for the rest of the season.
The talented American Herbert MacKay-Fraser, who replaced Salvadori, managed to hold only one Grand Prix in BRM, after which he tragically died behind the wheel of a Lotus in the Formula-2 race in Reims. Given a series of these accidents, at the home Grand Prix in Great Britain BRM had to resort to the services of not the fastest Jack Fairman and Les Leston, after which, without achieving any results, Alfred Owen decided to interrupt his team’s participation in the championship and focus on refining cars and searching for new drivers.
Nobody really expected outstanding results from the Cooper team, which entered the World Championship with their rear-engined Formula-2 bolids, since the power of these cars was approximately 100 hp less than that of the cars of leading teams.
However, already in Monaco, the ironic smile that arose on many faces at the sight of miniature, sprawling cars gave way to amazement when Jack Brabham began to overtake drivers in “real” Formula-1 cars one after another and almost brought Cooper a podium, which he only lost in the last laps due to lack of fuel.
Despite this setback, Cooper still managed to earn their first points at the home track in Great Britain, but it was not Brabham who brought them, but Salvadori, who never came to court in Vanwall and became a permanent member of the Surbiton team. Given that the remaining Grands Prix were held on faster tracks, where engine power was crucial, the points earned in Great Britain remained the only ones for the team for the entire season, but, by and large, this no longer mattered much, since the revolution of rear-engined cars, started by Cooper, could no longer be stopped...
Alternative driver standings
Alternative team standings
