STORY OF THE DAY: A Shared Second Place at Silverstone

The British Grand Prix at Silverstone on 14 July 1956 was the sixth round of the Formula One World Championship. Alfonso de Portago started the number 4 Lancia-Ferrari D50 and shared the drive with Peter Collins, who brought the car home in second place behind Juan Manuel Fangio’s sister D50. The result strengthened Ferrari’s position in a season that would end with Fangio as World Champion.

The defining feature of the race was Ferrari’s use of shared drives, then permitted under Formula One regulations. De Portago completed most of the distance before handing the number 4 car to Collins, whose own D50 had retired. De Portago subsequently took over Eugenio Castellotti’s number 3 entry, which was classified tenth, giving the Spaniard the unusual distinction of appearing in two classified cars in the same Grand Prix. Second place remained the best World Championship result of his brief Formula One career.

The D50 had been conceived by Vittorio Jano for Lancia and passed to Ferrari when Lancia withdrew from racing in 1955. Its compact 2.5-litre V8 was installed at an angle within the chassis, allowing the driveshaft to run beside the driver and helping to lower the seating position. Ferrari revised the original design during 1956, incorporating the former Lancia machines into its own Grand Prix programme.

Alfonso de Portago was a Spanish aristocrat and versatile sportsman, born in London in 1928 and raised in an international milieu. Introduced to major road racing through Luigi Chinetti, he competed for Ferrari in sports cars as well as Formula One and also represented Spain in bobsleigh at the 1956 Winter Olympics. His second place at Silverstone was the high point of a World Championship career cut short when he and co-driver Edmund Nelson were killed in the 1957 Mille Miglia.