Motor racing great Sir Stirling Moss dies aged 90

His wife Lady Moss told the PA news agency he died peacefully at his London home following a long illness.

"It was one lap too many," she said. "He just closed his eyes."

Though Moss famously never won the Formula One title, he was regarded as one of the greatest ever drivers as he survived and thrived in the sport's most dangerous era.

Enzo Ferrari once called Moss the greatest driver in the world while five-time champion Juan Manuel Fangio - who beat Moss to the title three times between 1955 and 1957 - called Moss the best of his era.

Moss finished runner-up in the championships standings four times and finished third three times in a career during which he won 16 Grands Prix.

In an age when racing drivers competed in several different disciplines alongside Formula One, Moss won a total of 212 of the 529 races he entered in his career.

Born in London in 1929, Moss was the son of amateur racing driver Alfred and his wife Aileen.

He began his career in 1948 behind the wheel of his father's car. In the early years of his Formula One career, he often struggled due to his machinery, preferring to drive British cars rather than their often superior foreign rivals.

But his breakthrough came in a Mercedes as he took his first Formula One win in 1955 at the British Grand Prix at Aintree, becoming the first British winner of the event.

It was the beginning of the best period of his career as he challenged for the title year after year, ultimately unsuccessfully.

His sportsmanship cost him the title in 1958 when he defended the actions of rival Mike Hawthorne following a spin at the Portuguese Grand Prix, sparing Hawthorne a six-point penalty. Hawthorne went on to beat Moss to the title by a single point.

"I had no hesitation in doing it," Moss recalled many years later. "I can't see how this is open to debate. The fact that he was my only rival in the championship didn't come into my thinking. Absolutely not."

A heavy crash at Goodwood in 1962 left Moss in a coma for a month, and partially paralysed for six months.

Moss officially retired in the wake of that crash, though he would continue to take part in occasional events until 1981.

He was knighted in the New Year Honours list in 2000 for services to motor racing.

Moss was taken ill with a chest infection while on a cruise in Singapore just before Christmas 2016.

He was transferred to a London hospital and finally to his Mayfair home.

News of his death on Sunday brought tributes from the world of motorsport and beyond.

His former team Mercedes tweeted: "Today, the sporting world lost not only a true icon and a legend, but a gentleman. The Team and the Mercedes Motorsport family have lost a dear friend. Sir Stirling, we'll miss you."

Commentator and former F1 driver Martin Brundle said on Twitter: "RIP Sir Stirling Moss. A mighty racer and gentleman. He had a press on style on the track and in life. Remarkable man. Survived the most dangerous era of motorsport and died today aged 90. He had such great stories to tell, and it was a privilege to know him."

Johnny Herbert added on his account: "Sad sad news that legend Sir Stirling Moss has passed. World Champion in all our eyes."

Hamilton leads tributes

Sir Stirling Moss will always remain a huge part of British motor racing, according to Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton.

Hamilton, who is a six-time world champion in the sport, led the tributes to a man who won a total of 212 of the 529 races he entered across multiple disciplines during his career.

"Today we say goodbye to Sir Stirling Moss, the racing legend," Hamilton wrote on Instagram.

"I think it's important that we celebrate his incredible life and the great man he was. Saying goodbye is never easy and can be sad but he will always be here, in our memories and will always be such a huge part of British Motorsports Heritage.

"I certainly will miss our conversations. To be honest, it was such a unusual pairing, our friendship. Two people from massively different times and backgrounds but we clicked and ultimately found that the love for racing we both shared made us comrades.

"I am truly grateful to have had these special moments with him. Sending my prayers and thoughts to his family. May he rest in peace".

Three-time world champion Sir Jackie Stewart, who came into the sport shortly after Moss' retirement, said he looked up to him as he made his own way in the sport.

"I think he's probably the best example of a racing driver there's ever been," Stewart told BBC Five Live.

"He walked like a racing driver, he talked like a racing driver, he behaved like a racing driver should behave.

Damon Hill, world champion in 1996, believed his victory at the 1955 Mille Miglia, in which he covered 1,000 miles of open Italian roads at an average speed of 97.96mph in 10 hours, seven minutes and 48 seconds, was his greatest achievement.

Hill added to Five Live: "He epitomised the idea of a racing driver. The guy cocked a snook at danger and took on an incredibly difficult challenge and prevailed. He was a winner.

"His achievement in the Mille Miglia in 1955 was one of the all-time great performances of our sport. The courage needed, the stamina needed and the concentration required for those lengths of time was remarkable.

"He never won a world championship but he won a lot of races, something like a third of all the races he entered. It's a ridiculous statistic, he was legendary."

His former team Mercedes tweeted: "The sporting world lost not only a true icon and a legend, but a gentleman. The Team and the Mercedes Motorsport family have lost a dear friend. Sir Stirling, we'll miss you."

Commentator and former F1 driver Martin Brundle paid tribute to "a mighty racer and gentleman", David Coulthard said Moss "was the reason so many of us became racing drivers" while fellow British Grand Prix winner Johnny Herbert wrote that he was "world champion in all our eyes".

Former F1 team boss Eddie Jordan told Sky Sports News: "You say he's one of the greatest drivers not to win the world championship but actually he was one of the greatest drivers ever. He was the one person that transcended the sport."

Ferrari called Moss a "formidable opponent" while FIA president Jean Todt wrote: "He was a true legend in motor sport and he will remain so forever".

Silverstone, the home of British racing, said: "In the history of motor racing, not just in his home country but also wherever he raced around the world, Sir Stirling held a unique status which continued throughout his life."

Ex-England striker Gary Lineker and former heavyweight world champion Frank Bruno were among the other figures from the sporting world who paid tribute to Moss.

Sir Stirling Moss: The greatest all-rounder in motor racing's most dangerous era

By Philip Duncan

Sir Stirling Moss was once the most recognisable sporting star in the world.

Moss, who has died aged 90, never won a Formula One world championship, yet his remarkable talent at the wheel set him apart from his peers.

Enzo Ferrari, the founder of the biggest car brand on the planet, described Moss as the greatest driver in the world. Five-time champion Juan Manuel Fangio called Moss the best of his era. He was a driver who defined the very essence of style, sophistication, but bravery too in an age where death was synonymous with the sport.

Moss' brilliant career ended on Easter Monday 1962 when he was cut out of his car following a terrifying 100mph crash at Goodwood that almost killed him.

The accident led the front pages of every national newspaper. It was a month before Moss was fully conscious. He received thousands of goodwill letters from fans. Moss tried to test himself behind the wheel again, but reluctantly called time on front-rank competition, aged 32.

Despite his official retirement, Moss continued to race until he was 81. But in the remarkable post-war years where he carried British sporting fame across the globe - although air travel was still a rarity then - Moss accumulated a world record 212 wins from 529 races in 15 scintillating seasons.

He raced in every sort of car, and perhaps his most famous and greatest victory of all was the 1955 Mille Miglia in which he covered 1,000 miles of open Italian roads at an average speed of 97.96mph in 10 hours, seven minutes and 48 seconds.

Moss was taken ill with a chest infection while on a cruise in Singapore just before Christmas 2016. He was transferred to a London hospital and finally to his Mayfair home.

After retiring from public life at the start of 2018, he died on April 12, 2020 with Lady Susie Moss, his wife of four decades, at his bedside. He is also survived by his son Elliot and daughter Allison.

Moss was born in London on September 17, 1929. The son of Arthur, a dentist and amateur driver, who finished 14th at the world-famous Indianapolis 500 in 1924, racing was in Moss' genes.

He spent his formative grand prix years in unsuccessful machinery - preferring to compete in British-built cars - before joining Mercedes in 1955 and teaming up with Fangio.

Moss claimed his first of 16 F1 triumphs at the British Grand Prix, before finishing runner-up in the championship - a position he would occupy for four successive years.

In 1958, Moss missed out on becoming the first British driver to win the F1 world title following an extraordinary act of sportsmanship - the like of which we are unlikely to see again.

Moss' championship rival Mike Hawthorn was set to be excluded from the Portuguese Grand Prix after a marshal claimed he had illegally rejoined the track following a spin. Hawthorn's disqualification would have seen Moss crowned champion.

But Moss, who had dominated the race to win by more than five minutes, jumped to his rival's defence and rubbished the marshal's claim.

Hawthorn was reinstated to second and Moss, despite winning four races to his rival's one, would miss out on glory by a single point.

"I had no hesitation in doing it," Moss recalled many years later. "I can't see how this is open to debate. The fact that he was my only rival in the championship didn't come into my thinking. Absolutely not."

Moss broke both his legs in a qualifying crash at the 1960 Belgian Grand Prix - a tragic weekend which claimed the lives of his compatriots' Chris Bristow and Alan Stacey - before somehow surviving his horror Goodwood accident.

In 2010, Moss, then 80, broke both ankles, four bones in his foot and chipped four vertebrae after falling down a lift shaft at his Mayfair home.

Yet, just four months later, he was on the Silverstone podium to present Lewis Hamilton with his trophy for finishing second.

"Stirling is a great ambassador for the sport, and the UK," said the six-time world champion in 2019 in celebration of Moss' 90th birthday, who simply described him as a "legend".