From the archives of Bob Montgomery, motoring historian
GIANCARLO BAGETTI:
Watching the Spanish driver Fernando Alonso become the youngest F1 World Champion in the history of Grand Prix racing during the season just finished, brought to mind another much less well-known driver who also carved out a unique record for himself in Grand Prix history - Giancarlo Bagetti.
Who? Giancarlo Bagetti, an Italian Ferrari driver who uniquely won the very first Grand Prix which he contested - something no other driver (with the exception of Jacques Villeneuve) has come close to achieving.
Giancarlo came from a wealthy family whose fortunes were based on their metal foundry business. Like his brother, Giancarlo was expected to enter the family business which he duly did at the age of 17. It turned out to be a short-lived involvement, for Giancarlo soon found that work got in the way of the two most important things in his young life - girls and fast cars.
His first involvement with motorsport was in the 1958 Mille Miglia Rally, the event which had replaced the famous road race. Accompanied by his brother, Giancarlo arranged to borrow his father's Alfa Romeo 1900 Sprint Veloce for the event - without informing him of their planned use for the car in the rally.
However, the cat was well and truly out of the bag when the brothers finished second in the event and were seen on television by their parents!
The following year, 1959, Giancarlo raced an Abarth before switching to a Formula Junior Dagrada which served to make him Italian Champion. Clearly a talented young man, Giancarlo came to the attention of Enzo Ferrari towards the end of the 1960 season. Ferrari asked him to drive a restricted season in Formula 1 in 1961. The speechless Bagetti could hardly believe his good fortune, and as preparation for his debut drove a Ferrari 250GT around the Monza circuit for several days.
Despite the Ferrari being by far the most powerful car Giancarlo had yet driven, he lowered the existing GT lap record at Monza by four seconds!
Learning about his protégé's times, Ferrari drafted him into the sportscar team at Sebring to drive a 246P with Belgian driver Willy Mairesse. He didn't disappoint, and the pair were in second place when the leading Ferrari of Phil Hill and Richie Ginter broke down. Under team orders, the pair handed their car over to the American duo who went on to win.
Bagatti then went to Syracuse for his F1 debut where he won first time out in this non-championship F1 race, following this up with another win at the Naples F1 race, also non-championship, a few weeks later.
Overnight, Bagetti became a household name throughout Italy and his Grand Prix debut at the super-fast Reims circuit for the French Grand Prix had the nation tingling with eager anticipation. Incredibly, Bagetti won a monumental slip-streaming battle with the Porsche and Lotus teams, and ran out a deserved winner.
The following season, Giancarlo drove in four Grand Prix with fourth being his best result. But then internal politics reared their ugly head at Ferrari and Giancarlo signed for the new ATS team for 1963.
The ATS turned out to be a disaster and in 1964 he switched to driving a BRM for the Scuderia Centro Sud team but things didn't improve. 1967 saw a final throw of the dice for Giancarlo with a one-off drive in a works Lotus at Monza, but without success.
For several years after he finished racing, Giancarlo Bagetti simply travelled and sailed his yacht before becoming a professional photographer, being responsible for several classic Marlboro advertisements. A regular visitor to the Italian Grand Prix, Giancarlo Bagetti, the only driver to win his debut Grand Prix died from cancer several years ago