Stirling Moss, One of the Greatest Drivers of All Time, Dies at 90
By Douglas Martin for The New York Times
Published April 12, 2020
Known for his brash, puckish persona, he won 212 of his 529 races, including 16 Grand Prix victories, but never won the Grand Prix Championship title.
In the 1950s, small boys wanted to be Stirling Moss, and so did men.
Boys saw him as the swashbuckling racecar driver whom many considered the best in the world. Men saw this and more: Moss made more than $1 million a year, more than any other driver, and was invariably surrounded by the jet-set beauties who followed the international racing circuit.
Moss died quietly on Sunday at his home in London as one of his sport’s great legends. He was 90 and had been ill for some time.
“It was one lap too many,” his wife, Susie, told The Associated Press. “He just closed his eyes.”
Moss was a modern-day St. George, upholding the honor of England by often driving English cars, even though German and Italian ones were superior. Polls showed he was as popular as the queen.
Moss said courage and stupidity were pretty much synonymous, and may have proved it in a succession of spectacular accidents: seven times his wheels came off, eight times his brakes failed. He was a racer, he insisted, not a driver.
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