84th, Vanwall's Glory Marred by Loss: Moss Wins, Hawthorn Clinches F1 Title

Constructed in a matter of weeks close to the Atlantic coast, Ain-Diab welcomed teams for a non-championship race in October 1957, when Jean Behra won for Maserati and Stirling Moss flew home early after being struck by an Asian flu pandemic that was sweeping the globe. The event, wrote Jenks, was “on a scale equal to any of the Grandes Épreuves held this year”. One year on, it would be the stage for the title decider.

Britain would have its first world champion and the mathematics were simple: Moss needed to win for Vanwall and collect a bonus point for fastest lap, then hope Mike Hawthorn could finish no higher than third. For Hawthorn, second place would be enough no matter what Moss achieved. They qualified first and second, with Hawthorn’s Ferrari on pole and Stuart Lewis-Evans completing the front row in his Vanwall.

Moss made a brighter start and soon found himself tussling with a Ferrari – albeit that of Phil Hill – and this pair would be the class of the field. Hill lost a little time early on, when he slid up an escape road, and Moss survived a clash with lapped backmarker Wolfgang Seidel’s Maserati, the Vanwall sustaining a scuffed nose but suffering no loss of performance. The team hung out a “WATCH TEMP” board, just in case, but Moss remained calm and controlled.