In addition to his Jaguar business, Briggs had also become the
eastern U.S. Maserati distributor. Having employed a number
of the Italian firm’s cars over the years, he was finding
their new space-frame “Birdcage” racer an immediate
winner.

Briggs ended a long spell
out of the winner’s circle in an early-spring race at Road
America in his favored OSCA. He then took two Corvettes and
a 2.9 litre Maserati to Sebring for the big spring opener,
but the team did not fare well. Although they scored wins
at Bridgehampton, Cumberland and the Road America Six Hours,
Dick Thompson, now driving Chevrolet’s new Sting Ray, would
beat Walt Hansgen for the SCCA Championship.

Briggs returned once again to Le Mans, this time to drive with Bill
Kimberly in a 2.9 litre Tipo 61. Augie Pabst paired with Dick
Thompson and Walt Hansgen teamed with a young Bruce McLaren
in a pair of 3.0 litre Tipo 63s. Walt took his car out early,
postponing McLaren’s debut at Le Mans, but the Pabst/Thompson
car finished in fourth and the little Birdcage, which spent
a grand total of twelve minutes in the pits during the entire
race, finished a creditable eighth.

The dawn of the sixties saw the SCCA’s popularity challenged by
the more professionally-oriented United States Auto Club,
whose venues ranged from Canada’s St. Jovite and Mosport to
Riverside and Laguna Seca in California. Purses and crowds
were growing exponentially as the series attracted such talents
as Stirling Moss, Jimmy Clark, Bruce McLaren and Jack Brabham.
The increasing money and competition fostered more experimentation
and development in the cars, a condition reflected in the
growing variety of vehicles in the Cunningham stable. The
Cunningham Maseratis underwent constant revisions, Cooper
sports racers were fitted with Maserati, then Buick engines,
and a Formula One Cooper wrecked by Hansgen at Watkins Glen
became Roger Penske’s famous Zerex Special.

In 1962 at Le Mans Briggs paired with Roy Salvadori to finish
fourth overall in a lightweight E-Type coupe. Driving a textbook
long-distance race, the pair avoided the early dash for position
and by Sunday morning had worked up to fifth, which Briggs
turned into fourth by passing the Grossman/Roberts GTO on
the final lap.

The team’s entry for Sebring in 1963 was significant in that the
new E-Types were equipped with aluminum blocks, larger disc
brakes and fuel injection, but they were swept by the Ferrari
prototypes, which finished in the first three places, the
Surtees/Scarfiotti 250P taking the win.

1963 was to be Briggs’ last year as an entrant and contestant at
Le Mans. The team fielded three of the new lightweight E-Types;
Augie Pabst paired with Walt Hansgen, exiting early Saturday
night with gearbox trouble, then Roy Salvadori, driving his
second Le Mans with Team Cunningham, had to be pulled from
the car he shared with Paul Richards after crashing it and
setting it alight. Meanwhile, Briggs and Bob Grossman, who
had been invited to rejoin the team after being exiled for
over-revving a Lister-Jag in an earlier race, were again driving
the long-distance drive, moving from fourteenth at midnight
to seventh by Sunday morning.

At 10:30am Sunday, while braking for Mulsanne corner from 165mph,
Grossman felt the pivot pin in the brake-pedal linkage snap.
The pedal went to the floor. Grossman tried to scrub off speed
by driving against the haybales lining the escape road, but
it wasn’t enough. The car slammed head-on into the bales at
the end of the road, folding its nose like an accordion. After
alerting Momo over the phone from the team’s nearby timing
stand, Grossman nursed the car back to the pits, where the
crew worked furiously to repair it with components from the
two retired E-Types. Thrilling the fans cheering from the
grandstands opposite the Cunningham pit, in seventy-four minutes
they replaced the battered Jag’s steering, front suspension,
wheels and tires, bonnet and lights. Having lost four places,
Briggs and Grossman eventually brought the car back to finish
ninth overall.

It was a storied end to a storied career at the Sarthe, one feted
by the local fans and the people of Le Mans when they later
conferred Honorary Citizenship upon Briggs for his years of
sportsmanship and class, as a racer, a gentleman, and a friend.

Although Ford would soon take up the challenge at Le Mans with its
GT40 prototypes, it was not until 1967, when Dan Gurney and
A.J. Foyt, during a remarkable season for both these racers,
would finally achieve Briggs’ long-held dream of an all-American
victory, driving the now-famous Number One Mark IV.