Today in Racing: 22 April

In a day of the champions through racing history, Sebastian Vettel won the 2012 Bahrain Grand Prix from Kimi Räikkönen and Romain Grosjean’s Lotus-Renaults, a year after the ‘11 race was cancelled due to ongoing anti-government protests.

Looking significantly further back, Tazio Nuvolari’s Bugatti 35C won a tragic 1928 Circuito di Alessandria when rival Pietro Bordino died  in a crash in the race. That race would thenceforth be known as the GP Bordino, and which Achille Varzi Scuderia won in a Scuderia Ferrari Alfa Romeo Tipo-B P3 GP in 1934  

The 1935 Monaco Grand Prix proved quite controversial when legendary Mercedes team boss Alfred Neubauer ignored Adolf Hitler's orders that only German drivers should drive German cars and hired

Luigi Fagioli to steer the Mercedes W25B to victory over Rene Dreyfus and Antonio Brivio’s Alfa Romeos.

The wild 460 bhp 4-litre Mercedes W25 was tended by a team dressed more like lab assistants, fuelled by the same potion used to fire V1 rockets, its engine oil had to be pre-heated to become fluid before the car ran and its mechanical parts were covered in heated blankets for best results….

Also pre-War, Lady driver in more ways than one, Kathleen Coad 'Kay' Petre Defries powered her Bugatti to win the ‘35 Brooklands Easter Junior Long Handicap.  

Gigi Villoresi drove a Maserati 4CL to victory in the first post-World War II Grand Prix in Nice, France on this day 1946. Alberto Ascari won the 1951 The San Remo Grand Prix, Stirling Moss the 1956 Aintree 200 and Jean Behra the 1957 Pau Grand Prix, both driving Maserati 250Fs

More recently, Jack Brabham won the ‘61 Aintree 200  in a Cooper T55, Eddie Keizan the ‘72 Goldfields Autumn Trophy in Welkom South Africa in a Surtees TS5 Cosworth and Vern Schuppan’s March 722 Hart the ’73  Singapore GP. In the US, Johnny Rutherford  won both 1979 Twin Dixie 125s, Al Unser Jr. both the ‘90 Long Beach GP and 2000 Vegas Indy 300 and Helio Castroneves ‘06 the Indy Japan 300.

Didier Auriol took his Toyota Corolla to 1998 World Rally Catalunya victory on the day that F1 driver  (Photo

Esteban Tuero has a birthday and on which day in 1978 Ray Keech set a 207 mph one-mile land speed record driving the 81-litre triple-engined White-Triplex at Daytona Beach.