Nowadays, races are started in a standardised and clinical manner. This is to ensure that tay get off in good time for the TV schedules, and more justifiably, for safety reasons. But that's not how it used to be.

When races were started by waving the national flag of the country concerned, there was much more scope for drama and comedy. THe actual starting was often done by a local politician who had never seen a motor race before. Even when the job was done by a regular, the results were often unpredictable.

Perhaps the greatest of te regular starters was Raymond "Toto" roche of Reims. His technique was to give the start at any time after the 30 second board. THis meant that the drivers had to keep their cars in gear for over half a minute. Racing cars are not designed to be held on the clutch with no air passing through the radiators for that length of time. Roche's "piece of resistance" was to give the starting signal while standing in the middle of the road. This was reserved for special occassions, but roche was short and fat and not designed to out run a Ferarri. Drivers who had been in a state of high tension for almost a minute were not in a mood to take prisoners.

Another starting great was Louis Chiron the GRand Prix driver of the 20s, 30s 40s and 50s who later became race director at Monaco.

Nor were drivers completely blame free in the starting procedure. Who remembers Graham hill's "triple whammy" in 1960? Run into at Reims, he stalled on the line at Silverstone. He sort of made up forit at Oporto where he was on the second row of the grid. He started creeping a little (a common occurrence in those days) and by the time the flag finally fell, he and the orginal front row were all a car's length in front of the starting line and looking over their shoulders to try and see the flag.

The classic was the one at Ballarat Air Force Base in - I think it was 1951 - when the Commander had a turn at starting a race. When he was told what to do, he said: "Like this?" - as he dropped the flag before the one-minute board!
John Cummins' story tells of mechanics 'trying to climb up each others' legs' and others having the car take off while they lay on the ground underneath them... nobody was hurt, but it was a memorable moment in racing.

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Life and love are mixed with pain...

Roger Clark,

This page on the 1957 Moroccan Grand Prix has a picture of Roche running off the track after dropping the starting flag:

http://jbbassibey.free.fr/eng-%20gp_du_maroc_1957.htm

Chiron used to stand in front of the grid and 'countdown' to the drop of the flag by indicating the seconds to go. This led to several 'jumped starts' from drivers further down the grid.

I remember when Jack Brabham started a race at Brands Hatch and was nearly taken out when there was a shunt on the grid!

At the 1939 Tripoli GP they had starting lights AND a flag-waving starter. Lang asked Neubauer which he should go by. Neubauer checked and told him it was the lights. The lights went green before the man dropped the flag, Lang vanished into the distance, and the rest is history ...

Caution: I can't remember the source of this his story - It may be apocryphal

It certainly features in Lang's autobiography. Apparently he had a seven-second lead at the end of the first lap.