MERCEDES W196

After tottering, stop-start, make-do-and-mend beginnings, top-level motor racing snapped into focus in 1954 as a new set of technical regulations came into force. Their purpose, explicitly, was to encourage more manufacturers to get involved; the first two years of the world championship had been dominated by pre-war dinosaurs and then, once lack of funds and willpower shuffled those into extinction, two further seasons followed in which F2 cars filled the grids.

But the radiant ambition of Formula 1’s new dawn was tempered by the return of a pre-war force which delivered a powerful lesson: be careful what you wish for. One of the manufacturers drawn back into the fray was Mercedes-Benz, and the cast of characters it deployed would have prompted its rivals to shiver with apprehension by reputation alone.

The voluminous figure of team manager Alfred Neubauer was a familiar one to those versed in the 1930s grand prix racing scene, in which Mercedes and Auto Union had humiliated all opposition. Superintending the development of the new W196