IN THE DRINK part 1of 2; The amazing story of the 1955 Monaco Grand Prix.

Byline: EOIN YOUNG

]]]] The 1955 EUROPEAN motor racing season was rife with excitement mixed with tragedy. Stirling Moss won the Mille Miglia for Mercedes in June, but the following weekend Mercedes failed to win its only Grand Prix of the season when all three of its cars were out of the Monaco Grand Prix with engine failure. Alberto Ascari's D50 Lancia plunged into the Monaco harbor just after inheriting the lead. Rescued, he was killed four days later during testing at Monza. Within two weeks, Pierre Levegh's Mercedes had plunged into the crowd at Le Mans, killing more than 80. The Swiss, French and German GPs were canceled in the aftermath and Mercedes withdrew from racing at the end of the turbulent season.

Veteran BBC broadcaster Raymond Baxter, the velvet voice before the Murray Walker generation of motor racing broadcasters, recently sold his archive of motor racing notes and programs at auction. I bought his 1955 file that included the action-packed Monaco Grand Prix. His notes were almost as good as being there beside him.

Ferrari was on the ropes, designing and building a two-cylinder 2.5-liter engine in the desperate belief that a tough, torquey engine would be perfect for Monaco. The engine tore the test bed apart at Maranello and was scrapped, so Enzo entered two Supersqualo 555s for Harry Schell and Piero Taruffi, and two older Tipo 625s for Maurice Trintignant and Nino Farina. There was no optimism in the Ferrari pits.

Mercedes came to Monaco confident with new short- chassis W196s. There were cars for Juan Manuel Fangio, Stirling Moss and Hans Herrmann. Fangio's engine was mounted slightly further forward in the chassis, and after trying it, Moss fretted all weekend that it was better than his car.

Incredibly, the lap record around Monaco belonged to Rudolf Caracciola, set in 1937 in a supercharged 5.6-liter Mercedes W125 at 1:46.5. The 1952 Grand Prix had been for sports cars and there were no races in 1953 and 1954.

It was fitting that Fangio used his Mercedes to shatter the 18-year-old record, turning a 1:41.1 lap for pole position on the first day of practice. In a one-off ruling, the front row of the grid was set on the first day of practice. All practice laps counted for grid positions in those days-with the unique exception of this race at Monaco.