Ascari and that cold hand

“I’m not going to go beyond this age,” he confided with his friend and rival Gigi Villoresi, as he turned 37. A disturbing expression uttered by a driver who had already taken so many risks in his life. A driver who had claimed the first two World Titles for Ferrari and who had also won the Mille Miglia when, after leaving Maranello, he had switched to the colours of Lancia. A driver who was just as famous for his obsessive superstition that led him to a stubborn attachment to the tools of his trade: his shoes, gloves and above all that light blue helmet he never raced without.

So why this unsettling prophecy? Why summon death, a frequent visitor to the race fields in those years? For a serious and very profound reason: his father, himself a champion behind the steering wheel and race driver for Alfa Romeo, had also died when he was 37 years old while competing in the 1925 French Grand Prix at the Autodrome de Montlhéry south of Paris.

1955 had promised to be a great year for Alberto, and after winning two Grand Prix in his Lancia, he seemed to have found consistency in Formula 1 as well. The beautiful project of Vittorio Jano had struggled to get through the testing phase in 1954, but by 1955 the car was perfect. So perfect in fact that when the Italian Constructor fell into a deep financial crisis that caused it to withdraw from racing, the cars were donated to Ferrari and, with few modifications and the Rampante Cavallino on the flanks, they won the 1956 Formula 1 World Title with Manuel Fangio behind the wheel.