In the Portuguese GP Stirling had stood up for Mike when the Ferrari driver spun on the final lap as he was about to be lapped. Mike went up an escape road and over a footpath while getting back onto the track, and the stewards wanted to disqualify him from his eventual second place which, with fastest lap, was worth seven points. Stirling’s defence enabled Mike to keep them.
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Stirling duly won the final race, but when Ferrari’s Phil Hill moved over to let Mike take second place, it secured his team mate the title by a single point. Only the six best results counted, and Hawthorn’s single victory and five second places, allied to four fastest laps, trumped Stirling with 42 points to 41. Vanwall, however, took the first World Championship for constructors.
“To me, it just felt quite wrong that Mike should be disqualified,” Stirling would say with simple grace. “And I put forward the idea that he was still on the track, albeit the escape road, which they accepted. And it turned out that it lost me the title. But it’s a case of what winning means to you.”
To have won a title that would always elude him, if it had meant keeping quiet when he witnessed injustice, would have been complete anathema to a great racer.