Drivers

Emmanuel de Graffenried

The dapper, trim profile of "Toulo" de Graffenried continued to be a familiar sight in the European Grand Prix paddocks more than 40 years after he won the second postwar British Grand Prix to be held at Silverstone in 1949. In the early 1930s de Graffenried drove his own private 1.5-liter Maserati in national events at Berne's Bremgarten circuit, striking out to take part in overseas races in partnership with an old school friend John de Puy. In the immediate postwar years he teamed up alongside Prince Bira in Enrico Plate's team of Maserati 4CLTs during which period he scored that memorable Silverstone victory. He stayed with Maserati through to the end of his career, interrupted by three outings in an Alfa Romeo 158 during the summer of 1951, including for his home Grand Prix. In 1953 he scored his best World Championship race placing with fourth place at Spa, now driving a 2-liter Maserati for the Plate team. His final Formula 1 outing came in a Maserati 250F at Monza in 1956 after which his career petered out, but not before coming out of semiretirement in order to double for Kirk Douglas in action scenes during the making of the film The Racers(italics). In retirement de Graffenried continued his successful Lausanne-based garage which had sold Alfa Romeos since 1950 and later also Rolls-Royces and Ferraris. For many years from the start of the 1970s he started attending races again as an ambassador for the Lausanne-based Philip Morris tobacco company which had become one of the sport's biggest sponsors.