1937 Grand Prix season explained

The 1937 Grand Prix season was the fifth AIACR European Championship season. The championship was won by Rudolf Caracciola, driving for the Mercedes-Benz team. Caracciola won three of the five events that counted towards the championship.

This season saw the most powerful Grand Prix cars so far, Mercedes-Benz supercharged 5.6L inline-8 engines boasting nearly 650 bhp. Considering that an average saloon car produced around 25 bhp at the time, the performance of these single-seaters was extremely high compared with any other season in modern motorsport; so much so that for the first time ever, regulations were put in force for the following year to limit the engines' size capacity to reduce their power and to add weight to the cars to make them slower. Mercedes-Benz's development of their technology was thanks almost entirely to the state-subsidies that they were receiving from the Nazi German government at the time. The amount of power the supercharged Mercedes-Benz W125's had was not equaled in racing cars until American Can-Am cars in the late 1960s, and European Grand Prix cars did not have this kind of power again until the early 1980s (a span of nearly 45 years), when Grand Prix racing had long since become Formula One.

Season review

European Championship Grands Prix

RdDateNameCircuitWinning driversWinning constructorReport
111 July Belgian Grand PrixSpa-Francorchamps Rudolf HasseAuto UnionReport
225 July German Grand PrixNürburgring Rudolf CaracciolaMercedes-BenzReport
38 August Monaco Grand PrixMonaco Manfred von BrauchitschMercedes-BenzReport
422 August Swiss Grand PrixBremgarten Rudolf CaracciolaMercedes-BenzReport
512 September Italian Grand PrixLivorno Rudolf CaracciolaMercedes-BenzReport

Non-championship Grands Prix

DateNameCircuitWinning driverWinning constructorReport
January ? Grosnevor Grand PrixGrosnevor, South Africa Ernst von DeliusAuto Union1937 Grosnevor Grand PrixReport
14 FebruaryFlaten, Stockholm Eugen BjørnstadAlfa RomeoReport
18 April Valentino Grand PrixTurin Antonio BrivioAlfa RomeoReport
25 April Naples Grand PrixPosillipo Giuseppe FarinaAlfa RomeoReport
1 May Campbell TrophyBrooklands Prince BiraMaseratiReport
9 May Tripoli Grand PrixMellaha Hermann LangMercedes-BenzReport
9 May Eläintarhan ajotEläintarharata Hans RüeschAlfa RomeoReport
16 May Grand Prix des FrontièresChimay Hans RüeschAlfa RomeoReport
30 May AvusrennenAVUS Hermann LangMercedes-BenzReport
30 May Superba CircuitGenoa Carlo Felice TrossiAlfa RomeoReport
30 May Bucharest Grand PrixBucharest Hans RüeschAlfa RomeoReport
6 June Rio de Janeiro Grand PrixGávea Carlo Maria PintacudaAlfa RomeoReport
13 June EifelrennenNürburgring Bernd RosemeyerAuto UnionReport
20 June Milan Grand PrixMilan Tazio NuvolariAlfa RomeoReport
5 July Vanderbilt CupRoosevelt Raceway Bernd RosemeyerAuto UnionReport
25 July San Remo Grand PrixSan Remo Circuit Achille VarziMaseratiReport
25 July Vila Real CircuitVila Real Vasco SameiroAlfa RomeoReport
15 August Coppa AcerboPescara Bernd RosemeyerAuto UnionReport
15 August Estoril CircuitEstoril Manoel de OliveiraFordReport
28 August Junior Car Club 200 mile raceDonington Park Arthur DobsonERAReport
26 September Masaryk Grand PrixBrno Rudolf CaracciolaMercedes-BenzReport
2 October Donington Grand PrixDonington Park Bernd RosemeyerAuto UnionReport
16 October Mountain ChampionshipBrooklands Hans RüeschAlfa RomeoReport
31 October KalastajatorpanajoHelsinki Karl EbbMercedes-BenzReport

Championship final standings

PosDriverBEL
GER
MON
SUI
ITA
Pts
1 Rudolf Caracciola121113
2 Manfred von BrauchitschRet213Ret15
3 Hermann Lang372219
= Christian Kautz4636Ret19
5 Hans Stuck2Ret44920
6 Raymond Sommer5Ret7827
7 Rudolf Hasse15Ret28
= Bernd Rosemeyer3RetRet328
= Tazio Nuvolari45728
= Giuseppe FarinaRet6RetRet28
11 László HartmannRetRet929
12 Hans Rüesch88Ret31
13 Vittorio Belmondo121032
14 Hermann Paul MüllerRetRet533
15 Richard SeamanRet434
= Clemente BiondettiRetRet34
17 Luigi SoffiettiRetRet35
= Carlo Felice TrossiRet835
= Paul PietschRet1035
20 Kenneth Evans936
= Ernõ Festetics1036
= Attilio Marinoni1136
= Giovanni MinozziRetRet36
= Goffredo Zehender536
= Carlo Maria Pintacuda936
= Luigi Fagioli736
= Achille Varzi636
28 Henri SimonetRet37
= Adolfo MandirolaRet37
30 Franco CorteseRet38
= Ernst von DeliusRet38
= Giovanbattista GuidottiRet38
33 Francesco SeveriRet39
= Renato BalestreroRet39
= Edoardo TeagnoRet39
= Antonio BrivioRet39
= Max ChristenRet39
PosDriverBEL
GER
MON
SUI
ITA
Pts

References