1950 Belgian A1 Grand Prix

The 1950 Belgian A1 Grand Prix was the sixth round of the inaugural A1 Grand Prix season. Alberto Ascari took pole position for his series debut with Italy.

Race


Italy's Alberto Ascari managed to hold off an early challenge from Toulo de Graffenried in the Switzerland car during the opening lap. However the largest crash of the series history so far occurred further along lap 1 down in the midfield when France's Robert Manzon and Spain's Paco Godia both switched to the opposite side of the track at the same time coming out of the Masta corners, resulting in the Spaniard clipping the back of the French car and pitching both into the barriers at high speed. Manzon would barrell roll twice while Godia was collected by some of the cars behind including a hard hit into the passenger side door from Mexico's Leo Almanza. Altogether seven cars were out of the race as a result of the pile up while Manzon and Godia were both rushed to hospital with serious but luckily not life threatening injuries.

This wouldn't be the last of the chaos during this race as on lap two, Mikhail Metelev in the Soviet Union car ran wide and crashed out at Blanchimont and collecting Germany's Paul Pietsch in the process while Peru's Luis Albizuri would have a similar incident to Metelev just behind them. This was only the first of many incidents at Blanchimont.

Meanwhile at the front Ascari was still leading from de Graffenried, who was in a close scrap with England's Reg Parnell, Monaco's Louis Chiron, Australia's Tony Gaze and the United States' Harry Schell. In the group behind was Argentina's José Froilán González, Porfirio Rubirosa for the Dominican Republic, Belgium's Johnny Claes and Thailand's Prince Bira rounded out the top 10. However de Graffenried would be the next to go off at Blanchimont, damaging his car and forcing him to pit for repairs, eventually leading to his first retirement of the season. Rubirosa unfortunately picked up a puncture which meant that he spent most of lap three crawling around back to the pits, costing him over a lap.

Schell was next to go off at Blanchimont on lap five which dropped him down to eighth behind the next group while Chiron, Parnell and Gaze had managed to catch up to Ascari by working together in each other's slipstream. Chiron managed to get past Ascari just before the end of the lap only to loose it to Gaze in the same spot on the following lap, the Aussie making great use of the slipstream to get by both Ascari and Chiron at the same time. Parnell was the next to fall victim at Blanchimont on lap seven putting him out of the race and continuing his less than stellar stint in the England car.

Ascari and Chiron both made their first stops after lap seven along with Claes from the group behind, leaving Gaze, Gonzalez and Bira as the top three. Bira pitted the lap after while Gaze and Gonzalez came in after lap nine but Ascari's and Chiron's earlier switch to fresh tyres meant that they would retake the lead while Gonzalez even dropped behind Claes and Bira.

Lap 10 saw Bira come back in again only this time he would head straight to the garage to exit the race. Schell would be the final retirement of the race on lap 13 after again going off at Blanchimont, a disapointing end to what had started out as another promising race. This promoted South Africa's Arthur Mackenzie into sixth among the ten remaining cars.

There would be no more changes in position amongst the leaders other than Gonzalez re passing Claes for fourth place on lap 16. Ascari eventually took a fairly convincing win as his Italian team expected of him, just over fifteen seconds ahead of Chiron who has closed the gap back to the top 4 in the Nations Standings. Gaze would complete the podium having finally had a clean weekend, Gonzalez fourth to keep Argentina in the championship hunt, Claes his best result in fifth, Mackenzie likewise for South Africa in sixth. Canada's Al Pease managed to stay on the road while faster cars fell apart to finish seventh while Northern Ireland's Desmond Titterington and Uruguay's Eitel Cantoni recovered to eighth and ninth after being delayed in the first lap pile up. Rubirosa managed to make to the finish in tenth after his earlier puncture and while he easily should have been at least in the top six, he'll be glad to finally get some points for the Dominican Republic.

As for Manzon and Godia's conditions. Reports from hospital are that Manzon has suffered a broken ankles from his impact with the barrier while Godia, a broken leg from the barrier and concussion and a dislocated shoulder from the impact with Almanza. Both will be out of action for the rest of the season but doctors are confident that they both will be fully recovered by next season.

Race Classification
Fastest Lap Tony Gaze 3:02.507 Lap 5

Penalty Report
No penalties were given after this round.