Ain Diab Circuit

Race track

Ain Diab and Morocco's Only Grand Prix

Morocco's single World Championship race, run on roads outside Casablanca in 1958, decided the title for Mike Hawthorn and claimed the life of Stuart Lewis Evans.

Only once has the Formula 1 World Championship come to Morocco, and on that day in October 1958 the title was settled on public roads outside Casablanca. The Ain Diab circuit had been laid out the year before, southwest of Ain Diab, joining the coast road to the highway for Azemmour where it passes through the Sidi Abderrahman forest. Drawn up by Morocco's Royal Automobile Club with the approval of Sultan Mohammed V, the 7.603 kilometer course was finished in only six weeks. Moroccan Grands Prix had previously used Anfa and Agadir, and Ain Diab opened with a non championship Formula One race in 1957.

The Moroccan Grand Prix of the 19th of October 1958 was the final round of the season. Stirling Moss won it for Vanwall and set the fastest lap, about as complete a day as a driver can have, yet the title went to Mike Hawthorn, who had started from pole for Ferrari, finished second and became the first British world champion. Vanwall took the constructors' title.

The day ended in sorrow. The engine of Stuart Lewis Evans's Vanwall seized, the car spun and crashed, and he was badly burned; he died eight days later in a hospital in England. Ain Diab never staged another championship round, and Morocco's place in the record rests on that one race.

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