Phil Hill’s car was so fast that it became a point of contention in the elaborate game-within-a-game that preceded each race. Wolfgang Von Trips groused to Tavoni that Hill had an unfair advantage. Hill knew that von Trips was right. “God, my car was clearly superior to Trips,” he said. “I mean, my car was a full half-second, three quarters of a second faster.”

Von Trips demanded that Hill take a few laps in his car to demonstrate its slowness. If Hill also logged sluggish lap times it would prove that the problem lay with the car, not the driver. “I didn’t really want to,” Hill said. “After all, it might not be running right and they might fix it so that it would be faster than mine.”

Ferrari normally prohibited drivers from handling a teammate’s car for fear of sabotage. In this case Tavoni relented under pressure from von Trips. “Sure,” he told Hill, “take it around.”

Michael Cannell | Author of The Limit: Life and Death on the 1961 Grand Prix Circuit.