Fast Failures: The great Le Mans robbery

Raymond Sommer's speed and press-on-regardless spirit made him a target for works teams, but although the chivalrous 'Coeur de Lion' obliged them on occasion, he remained a privateer at heart.

Alfa Romeo, too, wanted greater control of its motorsport destiny: in January 1938 its Scuderia Ferrari satellite was closed and in-house Alfa Corse reopened. Charging Enzo Ferrari, disgruntled at wage-slave status, with overseeing this shift was a mistake; so, too, was the release of his engineering general, Vittorio Jano.

When Tazio Nuvolari, the other member of this holy trinity, resigned after a fiery practice accident at Pau in April, any hope of Alfa Romeo sporting success at the highest level was lost.

Sportscar racing was a different matter.

Jano's legacy was the world's fastest two-seater: the chassis and running gear - a box-section frame with independent suspension and four-speed transaxle - of his 8C-35 monoposto of 1935 fitted with a 2.9-litre version of its twin-supercharged straight-eight.

A road-going GP racer thinly disguised by skimpy mudguards, 8C 2900A scored back-to-back victories in the Mille Miglia, the most important event of the marque's marketing strategy. The B version of 1938 was more resolved and aerodynamic, made greater concession to its occupants' comfort and completed a Mille Miglia hat trick.

These competition-bred MM Spiders were undeniably handsome, with their integral wings, but the one of the five - chassis 412033 - converted to streamlined coupe form for June's Le Mans 24 Hours was a svelte sensation.

Bodied using Touring of Milan's Superleggera method - a latticework of rigid steel tubes to which aluminium sheets of various thicknesses was attached - this Berlinetta's 'wheelhouse', with its fastback roof, paid homage to the aerodynamic concepts of Paul Jaray (teardrop shape) and Wunibald Kamm (abbreviated tail). Its long, narrow bonnet, slashed by shark's-gill louvres, added old school artistic drama to a scientific shape.

Nicknamed Soffio di Satana - 'Devil's Breath' - it recorded a drag coefficient of 0.42, equivalent to a modern SUV's, in Pininfarina's windtunnel during the 1980s. Shutting its air intakes reduced that by 0.04.

Its 220bhp at 5500rpm was sufficient to propel it 1250kg (kerb weight) to 150mph; it was the first to achieve that on the Mulsanne Straight. Its French rivals were cumbersome in comparison, but Ecurie Bleue's Delahaye 4.5-litre V12s were a match in terms of bhp and team-mates Rene Dreyfus and 'Franco' Comotti used that to accelerate into an immediate lead.

By the third lap, however, the ebullient Sommer was ahead. As he rushed past the pits he thrust his straw hat through the sliding slot in the Alfa's Plexiglas side window to acknowledge an adoring crowd. He remained a favourite son despite driving foreign machinery.

Dreyfus counter-attacked and they swapped places, but both V12s quickly wilted - because of engine and gearbox problems - and the honour of France's manufacturers lay with Philippe Etancelin's 4.5-litre six-cylinder Talbot. 'Fifi' took the lead on lap 10, only for Sommer to respond with the fastest lap, at 96mph.

The Alfa Romeo apparently held an mpg advantage, too, Sommer running 45 minutes longer before making a first scheduled stop and handing to Clemente Biondetti.

Born in a hill town in northern Sardinia, the latter was eight years older than his wealthy and privileged co-driver and a latecomer to car racing, at 29. Unable to match Sommer's pace on this occasion, he was a reliable performer blessed with stamina and a knack for judging pace, as his victory - by two minutes - in April's Mille Miglia proved (he would win that event a record four times).

Though theirs was an unhurried stop, Biondetti regained the lead by 8.45pm. After six hours they led by two laps and, not long later, the chasing Talbot retired because of valve failure. French resistance was broken. By 4am, halfway, the scarlet machine, glorious and growling, was five laps to the good.

It doubled that advantage by 8am and, with four hours remaining, was more than 100 miles ahead. Sommer, a two-time winner in Alfa Romeo 8Cs - as co-driver to Luigi Chinetti in 1932 and alongside Nuvolari in 1933 - appeared serene despite running at a record average speed.

His reverie was broken by a 130mph blowout on the Mulsanne. The shredded right-front tyre gashed its wing, knocked the steering askew, damaged an engine mount and triggered an oil leak.

Sommer regained control albeit at a cost. Unable to brake for fear of spinning, he hooked a lower gear: a reflex with long-term consequence. Two laps later, with Biondetti now behind the wheel, the car was reported stationary at Arnage. Sommer dashed to the scene in an official's car and met a Biondetti exhausted by his frantic, failed push-starts.

That unavoidable over-rev had bent a valve - or, according to some reports, damaged the gearbox - and the decision was taken to abandon. This was perhaps hasty, for the car returned to the pits under its own power after the finish and, despite being stationary for more than three hours, recorded a distance only three miles shy of the third-placed Talbot coupe: 219 laps.

This most beautiful of Alfa Romeos would never race again but it had stolen the show in a commanding and stylish fashion rarely equalled since.

THE TALBOT-DARRACQ 700

The 1.5-litre Grand Prix formula of 1926-'27 produced a truly great car: Delage's no-expense-spared 15-S-8, a Swiss watch of a design that swept all before it in '27 and in updated form was winning international races nine years later.

But it only did so after adopting several features of a rival considered a failure by many: the Talbot-Darracq 700. The previous 1500cc racer from this Franco-British conglomerate - Wolverhampton's Sunbeam was the other part of STD Motors - had proved invincible in second-tier voiturette racing.

The complexity and cost of its successor, however, proved too big a leap for a company in financial strife and riven by internal division.

Conceived by ex-Fiat designers Vincenzo Bertarione and Walter Becchia and constructed in Suresnes, a western suburb of Paris, it was a ground-hugging machine of great beauty and much potential.

A supercharged 145bhp DOHC straight-eight was angled across its frame's centre line so that the driver could sit low, alongside the propshaft; his seat cushion was 8in above the track. The frame itself was a three-piece lattice-girder item that provided increased stiffness for reduced weight over conventional channel-section chassis rails.

After numerous delays, it appeared at Brooklands' inaugural British GP in August, where it had the legs of the Delages: Henry Segrave's set fastest lap. Yet all three retired - one with a snapped front axle on the opening lap and the others because of cracked supercharger casings - having been badly hampered by a severe axle tramp under braking and a persistent misfire.

They subsequently won that year's Junior Car Club's 200-Mile Race, also at Brooklands, and the Grand Prix du Salon at Montlhery - albeit in Delage's absence. The latter was busy elsewhere modifying its challenger: its engine was offset in the frame, its frame was stiffened and its radiator was rakishly reclined, though not to the extent of the Talbot's.

The rivals met again at July's 1927 French GP, also at Montlhery, and Delage scored a 1-2-3, whereupon a bickering STD board got cold feet. Unlike Louis Delage, a flamboyant private individual, it couldn't risk bankruptcy in order to become the world champion manufacturer.

The Talbots were sold to privateers and proved competitive in the Formule Libre that replaced the unpopular 1.5-litre formula. This second wind, however, blew cold when Emilio Materassi's crashed at Monza's 1928 Italian GP, killing him and more than 20 spectators.

MORE FAST FAILURES:

The final Autosport magazine of 2015 focuses on the great cars that failed to win what they should have done in our cover story - Fast Failures.

Among the cars we take an in-depth look at are the McLaren-Mercedes MP4-20 (which returns the cover of Autosport for the first time in a decade), the Toyota GT-One, the first-generation Subaru Impreza WRC and the STP-Paxton Turbocar that so nearly won the Indy 500.

We've also got a look back at the GP2 season with Edd Straw and the GP3 season with Aaron Rook, as well as Lawrence Barretto's analysis of the implications of the UK's F1 TV coverage moving to Channel 4.

Out Thursday December 31 in all good newsagents, via the Apple Newsstand or as a digital magazine.