The 1953 French Grand Prix was a Formula Two race held on 5 July 1953 at Reims. It was race 5 of 9 in the 1953 World Championship of Drivers, which was run to Formula Two rules in 1952 and 1953, rather than the Formula One regulations normally used. It is popularly known as The Race of the Century because of the sixty lap battle between Briton Mike Hawthorn and Argentine Juan Manuel Fangio. Hawthorn won the duel after they reportedly swapped the lead at virtually every corner on the Reims circuit. In addition, after 500 km of racing, the four lead cars were less than 5 seconds apart. Background For 1953, the Reims-Gueux circuit's layout changed. The new, faster and slightly longer circuit bypassed the town of Gueux and as a result, the circuit was now called just Reims. Coming into the French Grand Prix, Ferrari driver, and 1952 World Champion Alberto Ascari had a large lead in the championship, having won the first three races of the season (not including the Indianapolis 500 in which none of the Grand Prix contenders took part). Meanwhile, early favourite, 1951 World Champion Juan Manuel Fangio, driving for Maserati, had yet to even finish a World Championship qualifying event in 1953. Unlike in 1952, in 1953 Maserati and Ferrari were quite evenly matched. The Maseratis had slightly more power, and hence straight-line speed, but the Ferraris had slightly better brakes, road holding, and low-end acceleration. Both works teams sent four drivers. For Ferrari there was Ascari, Luigi Villoresi, Nino Farina and Mike Hawthorn. Maserati had Fangio, José Froilán González, Onofre Marimón and Felice Bonetto. Both Ferrari and Maserati were also represented by a single private entry each, Louis Rosier driving a Ferrari and Toulo de Graffenried a Maserati. All of the other entries had little chance of winning, as they had significantly less power than the Ferraris and Maseratis, as well as generally worse road holding. They consisted of two privately entered OSCAs (one to be driven by Louis Chiron in his last French Grand Prix start), four works Gordinis and three of each of Connaught, HWM and Cooper. The works Gordinis were poorly prepared, the team instead focusing on the 12 hour race which ran from midnight to midday on the same day as the Grand Prix. Two of the Connaughts were works entries, and were notable as the first fuel