On this day in Motor Racing's past

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Everso Biggyballies
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#1186

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

Bottom post of the previous page:

White six wrote: 2 years ago He didn't make his debut with mclaren like lol.

They missed an 'a' out. Nice shot I've not seen before though. There's a dent in the front wing, I trust a previous owner did that.

I'm sure I don't need tell you but a race for ensign then three for Bob Sparshott. You can see him somehow picking his way through the Ronnie Petersen carnage for his first finish
Yeah he ran with Ensign in Germany where he DNF'd (having qualified ahead of Mass Stuck and Ertl) and then next race popped up in the BS Fabrications McLaren (Sparshott)in Austria where he crashed out on lap 2, Holland a mechanical DNF and then Italy a top 10 before moving on to a 3rd Brabham for Canada where he was the only Brabham to finish.
(I know BS Fabs started the season with Lunger in the M23, before they put Lunger in the M26 they had bought and tested pre-season. After Lunger got on well with the M26 they put Nelson into the M23.)

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#1187

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this Day 16th October 2011

We lost Dan Wheldon at the season-ending 2011 IZOD IndyCar World Championship at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.


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Dan won the 2005 IndyCar Series Drivers' Championship for Andretti Green Racing (AGR). The charismatic Englishman won the Indianapolis 500 in 2005 and 2011, and was co-winner of the 2006 24 Hours of Daytona with Chip Ganassi Racing .

He was the fifth Indianapolis 500 winner to die in a racing accident in the same year as winning the race.

Contributing factors included the catchfence around the track, and the unlimited track movement while racing that increased contact between cars, making it difficult to predict what would occur around the drivers, and increased the likelihood of a major accident. Many changes and safety improvements were put in place as a result of his death.

Two days after his death, Dallara named their new one-specification chassis in Wheldon's honour. The DW12, with the new bumper/nerf bar section being featured, was designed to prevent many similar single-seater crashes such as the one that killed him.

Autosport plus have run an article today celebrating his final win. I know most cant access that and knowing we have many Indycar and Wheldon fans here thought I would share it.
Remembering Dan Wheldon and his last and most amazing IndyCar win
By:David Malsher-Lopez

Saturday 16 October marks the 10th anniversary Dan Wheldon’s death. David Malsher-Lopez pays tribute, then asks Wheldon’s race engineer from 2011, Todd Malloy, to recall that magical second victory at the Indianapolis 500.

Once upon a time, I reckoned Dan Wheldon was superficial, a pretty boy who found racing and winning came too easy because he was driving for a top team in the Indy Racing League. His winsome, cheeky smile, his bonhomie with TV cameramen and interviewers, his tendency to say only the right things in public, the kidding around with team-mates… From a distance, it all came across as somewhat forced and artificial.

And then I met him. Turns out I had been the superficial one, because I’d been judging the Emberton, UK-born lad only on what I saw or read in the media. I was on the other side of the US open-wheel split, covering the last few years of the Champ Car World Series. But at the end of 2005 I was given the opportunity to interview Wheldon, the first UK-born winner of the Indianapolis 500 for 39 years, and now also the Indy Racing League champion. Long before the end of our one-on-one time, I realised I should have had greater faith in the idiom, ‘Speak as you find’. Dan was mesmerising.

Of course he was in sparkling form as he explained the great experiences he’d had at Andretti Green Racing and why he was joining Chip Ganassi Racing for 2006. But what really left an impression was how ferocious was his will to win. I left the interview convinced that he’d retain ‘500’ and Series crowns.

And he could have done. His #10 Ganassi car led three-quarters of the 2006 Indy 500, but lost track position due to the way the cautions fell in the closing stages. Then he ended the season tied on points with champion Sam Hornish Jr, but missed out on the crown because of fewer wins than the Penske driver.

Wheldon’s three years at Ganassi produced six wins, but while he boosted Scott Dixon’s oval form by constantly striving for setup perfection, the shy Kiwi inadvertently highlighted the fact that Wheldon’s skills on street and road courses had been blunted. My own theory is that with ovals being so predominant in the IRL, Dan’s desire for success meant he focused on what might lead to more Indy 500 wins and more IndyCar championships to the detriment of evolving his talent on courses that demanded right as well as left turns.

His chances of achieving series titles took a dive following the 2008 merger of IRL and Champ Car, as the number of road/street courses started to increase. Also affecting Wheldon’s ability to win was the move from Ganassi to Panther Racing, a team that had conquered races and championships in the IRL era but was struggling to find its feet away from the ovals.

In fact, even on left-turn-only tracks, things were becoming ever tougher, for John Barnes’ team ran only one car full-time, and the IndyCar field was becoming deeper in quality. Naturally, Wheldon was missing someone with whom to share data in practice sessions and thereby halve the amount of time it took to investigate potential race day set-ups. That particularly hurt when the 1.5-mile ovals were 99 percent down to the speed of the car.

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But mercifully, Indianapolis Motor Speedway remained a major driving challenge in that era and there Wheldon was magic. In both 2009 and 2010 he drove his Panther from 18th on the grid to finish runner-up, and while we’re fond of saying that there’s no race where second place means less, his results on those two Memorial Day Weekends were the result of Wheldon’s maturity in the practice days. He knew that wherever he qualified, he could make his way to the front, so focused on making his car one of the best in traffic.

His Indy performances immortalised Wheldon, and that was appropriate. In my experience, no other racer besides Al Unser Jr. has ever conveyed so passionately the fact that he was bewitched by Indy, and no one other than Rick Mears and Dario Franchitti has more eloquently explained the techniques, demands and quirks of the Speedway.

At the end of 2010, Wheldon left Panther and was without a full-time ride – besides being test driver for IndyCar’s next-gen chassis and engine. But former Andretti Green team-mate Bryan Herta, whose eponymous squad had started just one other IndyCar race – the previous year’s Indy 500 – knew exactly who he wanted for his team for the 500 in 2011.

While many of us thought this pair’s reunification was a cool story, few reckoned it was a winning combo against the Ganassi, Penske and Andretti hordes. But Wheldon believed it, Herta was optimistic and their blend of gung-ho demeanour and meticulous analysis pervaded the little team throughout the month of May. The #98 BHA machine qualified on the second row, ran in the top six seemingly all day and Wheldon was in position to pounce on the final lap of the race when JR Hildebrand’s Panther entry struck the wall exiting the very final turn. Indy win #2 was in the bag.

After one of the most amazing final laps anyone could remember, many onlookers were mentally torn between empathising with the devastated Hildebrand and sharing the exhilaration of Wheldon and Herta. What happened at Las Vegas Motor Speedway less than five months later reminded everyone of what real devastation at a race track felt like – and made us truly gratified by the Indy outcome.

“I think all of us had reasonable confidence in the cars going into the month of May, and then we also made progress through that month, so I think that raised Dan’s optimism,” Todd Malloy

How special was that Indy win? Well, his race engineer Todd Malloy, with previous experience of star US open-wheel teams such as Forsythe Racing, Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing and RuSPORT, naturally recalls the day with great fondness. He had been doing contract work for Conquest Racing through much of the 2010 season, but in October that year he got a call from Steve Newey of Bryan Herta Autosport. The team had at that stage run precisely one previous IndyCar race – the 2010 Indy 500 with Sebastian Saavedra – but BHA had a unique project in the works, along with another Indy shot. that proved enough to entice Malloy.

“Steve told me that BHA had got the deal to do the development work on the all-new IndyCar for 2012,” he says, “and as I recall that was all agreed before I signed on. So I started working with them at the end of 2010 or the beginning of 2011, and once I knew what the team did and didn’t have, in terms of the extras you need to run competitively at Indy, I started urging them to form a technical alliance with an existing team, and Bryan did the deal with what was then called Sam Schmidt Motorsports.

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“So I spent a decent amount of time working with Schmidt’s guys on our car and their two cars [for Alex Tagliani and Townsend Bell] as we prepared for the 500.”

It was announced at St. Petersburg’s season-opener that for a second year, Indy Lights team Bryan Herta Autosport would temporarily move up to IndyCar to enter the Indy 500 but this time it would be with 2005 winner Wheldon – currently out of work. Notwithstanding the quality of the personnel involved, their mission to win looked crazy-ambitious. The Dallara IR09 in its final year was very long in the tooth, everything there was to know about the car had been learned, so it wasn’t as if anyone at BHA was going to make a sudden breakthrough to vault the team ahead of the multi-car opposition from the star squads owned by Roger Penske, Chip Ganassi and Michael Andretti.

But still, SSM and BHA were rightfully considered underdogs. Yet Wheldon, despite years of experience at Andretti and Ganassi, and most recently Panther, for whom Indy always appeared to be the endgame, was no prima donna at BHA – but nor, just as importantly, did he lean on the relative newness or smallness of the team as an excuse for underperformance.

“I think all of us had reasonable confidence in the cars going into the month of May, and then we also made progress through that month, so I think that raised Dan’s optimism,” says Malloy. “Tagliani’s car was just a rocketship, wicked fast, and we rubbed and rubbed on our car but it was never going to beat that car. In the end no one did, and so Tag got pole. But we lined up sixth, and Townsend in the other car was fourth. So I think that was testament to the work that we and SSM had done together.

“But what was different about BHA is that by 2011 Dan had a lot of experience of Indy, both great and bad, and he was just so focused on the big picture, the 500 miles. Tag would be doing a lot of short runs to make sure the outright speed of his car was good, and we were doing the long runs. Dan was pretty focused on making sure we had good long run pace, good handling in traffic, good handling whatever the weather and track conditions – and to be honest, his mindset was critically important to the end result.

"And Dan knew what he wanted because he’d done it for several years, he’d been a winner, so he knew what it would take. His feedback was great – spectacular, actually – and we gelled easily. I had worked with him very briefly at Team Green in when Michael Andretti bought into the team and Dan arrived. I was assistant engineer at his first couple of tests before I went over to Champ Car. So it wasn’t a brand new relationship, but still, it was good that we gelled really well straight away in 2011. He trusted me, I trusted him.”

One of the potential weak links in any start-up/one-off Indy 500 squad can be the mechanics or pitcrew, for the simple reason that finding top quality personnel, in the month when inevitably there’s a run on them, can prove tricky. Heck, even the most experienced of squads – or the drivers – can foul up under the pressure of competing in the biggest race of the world. But BHA suffered no such problems – another case of crucial personnel gelling together for the common cause.

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Ask Malloy, in all honesty, when he believed a victory was on and he answers simply, “When JR crashed! So Turn 4, Lap 200!

“Seriously, it made no sense to us how he could be out there still running around. We thought we were in pretty good shape fuel-wise compared to the others – and we were – and in those final laps we had passed strong cars that were now running slowly, like the Ganassi cars, because they were obviously trying to squeeze that last drop of fuel without making another stop. But JR was another matter: he just stayed out, stayed out, stayed out… and it wasn’t like he was running around slowly. He was still running really strong laps, and so we just thought, ‘Huh, OK, that’s it.’ We started to feel a bit deflated because now we were expecting a P2. Then next thing we know, JR shunts and we win. I like JR a lot but that win was so sweet.”

While there was sheer elation in the BHA pit, and in the #98 car’s cockpit as Dan screamed out, yelled his thanks, and declared his love for wife Susie, there didn’t seem to be as much shock from the driver as there were from his team personnel. It almost seemed like he had expected to add another win to his Indy 500 tally…

“Yeah, it’s interesting,” agrees Malloy. “I would say there was an air of quiet confidence in the team that grew through the month as our pace increased. We definitely felt like we should be in the mix, especially as we got the car better and better in traffic. But there’s still so many things that can go wrong for any of the 33 cars that you can’t ever go in thinking you’re going to win. A huge part of it was the partnership with SSM, and Allen McDonald who was on Tag’s car – he’s a good friend and I have huge respect for him. The work that those guys had already put in, we benefited from that, in that we started from a very good point in terms of equipment and understanding of the cars.

A decade on, we as motorsport fans and observers can celebrate Wheldon's life, while acknowledging that since that day the members of his UK and US families have had holes in their lives that no one can fill

“Then we kept chipping away at it, getting the car better and better, and that was steered by Dan’s feedback, his experience, his knowledge, the little details he went into to tell me what he thought the car needed, and then his analysis of what those changes did when we tried them. I honestly don’t feel that car could have been more race-ready by the time. He worked hard, the team worked hard, so after that it’s just about executing.”

For the Las Vegas finale, in which Wheldon could win $5m if he came from the back of the 32-car field to win, he was shifted into the Sam Schmidt Motorsports #77 car with which Tagliani had taken his scintillating pole at Indy.

Malloy recalls: “This car that had been mysteriously fast at Indy was mysteriously slow in practice at Vegas, so we went from high expectations to low expectations. So there was a lot of head-scratching, we tore the car down and rebuilt it and for those first 10 laps it was looking promising.”

Indeed so – the #77 passed an average of a car per lap in those opening moments. Then on Lap 11 a predictable chain-reaction accident turned into an unpredictable and hideous catastrophe, and Dan Wheldon was gone, aged 33.

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A decade on, we as motorsport fans and observers can celebrate Wheldon's life, while acknowledging that since that day the members of his UK and US families have had holes in their lives that no one can fill. In fact, many of his close friends will say the same. But even in as narrow a field as IndyCar racing, Wheldon’s legacy is so much more than two Indy 500 wins, a championship and a total of 16 wins.

The series lost perhaps its most charismatic driver of this century, a man to whom people – fans, media folks, fellow drivers, sponsor representatives – were drawn as if by magnetic force.

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https://www.autosport.com/indycar/news/ ... n/6687372/

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#1188

Post by erwin greven »

Damn.. the same day i lost my gf in 1997...
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#1189

Post by sadsac »

:huh: Cannot believe its been 10 years since Dan's fatal crash and to add insult to injury we lost Marco Simoncelli
the following weekend :shocked: another dark time in motorsport :rip:
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#1190

Post by FedBet57 »

And about 2 weeks later Simoncelli's accident, Guido Falaschi died in a big crash in Balcarce during a Turismo Carretera race. He was only 22 years old
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#1191

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

erwin greven wrote: 2 years ago Damn.. the same day i lost my gf in 1997...
Sorry to hear that Erwin.
May she RIP

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#1192

Post by Michael Ferner »

Everso Biggyballies wrote: 2 years ago
erwin greven wrote: 2 years ago Damn.. the same day i lost my gf in 1997...
Sorry to hear that Erwin.
May she RIP
Yes, ditto here. :sorrow:
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#1193

Post by Andy »

Today ten years ago, SuperSic #58 Marco Simoncelli lost his life in an accident during the Malayan GP
You really got to wonder where time went.
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#1194

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this day 24th October 1971

Switzerland’s first F1 GP winner, Jo "Seppi" Siffert lost his life 50 years ago today
at the 1971 World Championship Victory Race at Brands Hatch


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After becoming an apprentice at the Frangi coachbuilding works, Siffert started a road-car business that helped him fund his fledgling career. Initially he raced a Formula Junior Stanguellini in 1960 and then a Lotus 18 the following year. Wins came quickly and he took the 1961 European Formula Junior title, shared with Tony Maggs.

Remarkably, he then stepped up into F1 in 1962.

While few would dispute that Jo Siffert was one of the fastest Formula One drivers of his time, it was in the exacting and exhausting field of endurance sports-car racing that he excelled.

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Siffert and Regga, two Swiss drivers in F1

The Racing Biography

Joseph Siffert was born in Fribourg, Switzerland in 1936, of a working class family. He began his racing career on motorcycles, financing this career by dealing in scrap metal and used cars. He became the Swiss 350 cc champion in 1959, and after moving up to Formula Junior, he became the European champion, in a Lotus 22, sharing the title with two other drivers.

He made his first Formula One appearance in 1962, driving a Lotus 24 in the Belgium GP. He joined the Swiss Ecurie Filipinetti team in 1963, driving a Lotus-BRM, however, he left the Filipinetti team during the 1964 season, after disagreements with team management. For the second half of the 1964 season, Siffert bought a Brabham-BRM, and served as owner / driver. Klaus Ewald (cited below) reports that life as a privateer was difficult for Siffert, with the team alternating between cheap hotels, farm houses near the tracks, or sleeping bags under the stars. He had success on the track, however, placing 4th in the German Grand Prix (at the Nurburgring) and then winning a non-championship race at Enna (in Sicily), defeating Jim Clark in the race.

The victory at Enna marked a turning point in Siffert’s career. Throughout the race, Siffert battled Jim Clark, then the world champion, in his Lotus-Climax 33, and Innes Ireland, driving a BRM, with the victory coming with a margin of 0.1 of a second. (He following year, Siffert repeated the win at Enna, this time beating Clark to the line by0.3 of a second.).

With these successes in German and Sicily, Siffert was “discovered” by Rob Walker, who teamed Siffert with the Sweed, Jo Bonnier, beginning with the United States Grand Prix, in October. Repaying Walker’s confidence, Siffert achieved his first podium finish in this race, finishing behind Graham Hill and John Surtees.

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For the 1965 season, Siffert continued on Walker’s team, teamed with Bonnier and driving a Brabham-BRM. After several top-10 finishes, in July, Siffert again won the Mediterranean GP, at Enna, and beating Jim Clark in the process. Siffert managed a 4th place finish in the Mexican GP and a 5th place finish in South Africa, but the season was marked by mechanical failures that frustrated the drivers.

For 1966, the specification for Formula One engines increased from 1.5 to 3.0 litres, and Rob Walker purchased a Cooper-Maserati T81 for Siffert. The engine was an adaptation of a nine-year old 2.5 liter V-12 plant; the car produced good power, but it took some time to sort through the handling issues. Other Cooper-Maserati drivers were Jochen Rindt and Richie Ginther (for the factory team), Guy Ligier, as an owner/ driver, and John Surtees, after he left the Ferrari team mid-season. For the season, the Cooper-Maseratis had a total of 39 starts, one win (for Surtees), three 2nd place finishes, two 3rd place finishes, and nine additional finishes in the top six places. The car was plagued with problems for Siffert, producing nine retirements, one failure to qualify and a top finish of 4th in the United States GP.

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The years 1966 and 1967 marked Siffert’s transition from the world of Formula One to the world of sports car / endurance racing. In 1966, Siffert took a Porsche Carrera 6 to a 4th place finish in the 24 hours of Le Mans, with other top-six finishes at Sebring (12-hours), Monza (1000 km), Austria. In each ensuing season, his struggles in Formula One were contrasted to his great success in sports car racing, so that each year was a tale of two seasons: struggles in Formula One and success in endurance racing.

For 1967, driving Porsches (with Hans Hermann) and Ferraris, Siffert finished 2nd at Spa (a track which would later be the site of some of his most notable successes), 4th at Sebring and Daytona, 5th at Le Mans and Monza and 6th in the Targa Florio.

On the Formula One side, Cooper-Maserati introduced a lightened T81B, for Rindt and Rodriguez, but Siffert was left driving an aging Cooper-Maserati T81 for the Walker team. His best performances were 4th place finishes in the French and US Grand Prixs. At the end of the season, Maserati gave up building Formula One engines; this heavy engine had been designed in 1956, and was now thoroughly outdated.

The 1968 season is well thought of as Siffert’s break-through season, in both Formula One and endurance racing. He had a spectacular win in the British Grand Prix, driving Rob Walker’s privately entered Lotus 49 Cosworth, with 5th and 6th place finishes in the United States and Mexico. It was in sports car racing, however, that he laid claim to the title of the best racer in the world. Siffert drove for the Porsche factory team, and won the 24 hours of Daytona, the 12 hours of Sebring, the Nurburgring 1000 km race, and the Austrian 1000 km race, driving this last event single-handedly.

The 1969 season followed a similar pattern, with Siffert having four Formula One finishes in the top five (in South Africa, Monaco, Holland and Germany), but being almost unbeatable in the sports cars. Sharing a works Porsche 908-2 with Brian Redman, Siffert won the BOAC 1000 km, the Monza, Spa and Nurburgring events, as well as a Watkins Glen 6-hour race. Teamed with Kurt Ahrens in a Porsche 917, he also won the Austrian 1000 km race. Joining a third racing series during the season, Siffert drove a Porshce 917 in eight Can-Am events, recording four finishes in the top four positions.

ImageFor 1970, Siffert joined a much-heralded new Formula One team, driving for March (with Chris Amon also on the works team). The year started with great promise, as Jackie Stewart finished 3rd in the season opener at Kyalami and won the second race of the season, at Jarama. But as Ferrari and Lotus sorted their cars during the season, the March became less competitive and proved almost a total wash-out for Siffert, as the new car was plagued with mechanical failures. Siffert failed to score a single championship point — recording six finishes in the 7th to 10th range, and failing to qualify or finish in an additional seven GPs.

Once again, Siffert met with far greater success in the world of sports cars. He won the Targa Florio, driving a Porsche 908-3 with Redman, and the Spa 1000 km, also with Redman, and had 2nd or 3rd place finishes at Daytona, Watkins Glen, Jarama and Kyalami, all in Porsches. After the disappointing season with March, Siffert signed to drive for the BRM team in 1971. After disappointing finishes through the first half of the season, Siffert finished 6th in Holland, 4th in France, 9th in the British GP (at Brands Hatch), and then led the Austrian Grand Prix from start to finish to record his second Formula One victory. Ninth place finishes at Monza and Mosport were followed by a 2nd place finish at the United States GP, in Watkins Glen. Where he failed to record a single championship point during the 1970 season, he finished tied for 4th (with Jacky Ickx) in the final standings for 1971.

Once again, in 1971 Siffert had remarkable success in the endurance and Can-Am races. He opened the season with a win at Buenos Aires (driving with his new partner, Derek Bell) and finished well at Sebring (5th), Brands Hatch (3rd), Monza (2nd), Spa (2nd), Nurburgring (2nd), Vallelunga (2nd) and Watkins Glen (2nd). Across the Atlantic, racing in the Can-Am series, Siffert entered seven races in the Porsche 917-10 and had finishes ranging from 2nd to 5th in each of these races. After a 5th place finish in the Can-Am race at Leguna Seca, his season should have been finished. Just as the 1970 Formula One season ended in tragedy, with Jochen Rindt winning the World Championship posthoumously, the 1971 season finished with the tragedy of Jo Siffert’s death in its final race. Earlier in the season, the Mexican Grand Prix had been cancelled, because of safety concerns at the track. As a substitute for the Mexican GP, a non-championship Formula One races was held at Brands Hatch, on October 24, 1971.

It was expected that the Brands Hatch race (called the “Rothmans World Championship Victory Race”) would be a celebration of a great season, in which British hero Jackie Stewart had dominated the point standings. Stewart won six of 11 races, with his 62 championship points almost doubling the 33 points of Ronnie Peterson. Celebration turned to tragedy on the 15th lap, when Sifferts’s BRM P160 went off the track at Hawthorn Hill, the fastest section of the circuit. The precise cause of the accident has never baan made public, but the car hit an earth bank and erupted into flames. Siffert died of asphyxia in the cockpit, having suffered only a broken leg as a result of the impact.
http://www.onthedash.com/racer/jo-siffert/


This account of what went down that day suggest it was cause unknown.

Tony Southgate BRM designer at the time had more to say....
BRM designer Tony Southgate on the cause of Siffert’s fatal crash

“I was on holiday in Tenerife when Seppi was killed. On my return, I inspected the charred remains of the car in the factory. We hadn’t had any trouble with the car or funny handling. We’d left all the problems behind, so I was baffled.

“I couldn’t find anything that caused it. We couldn’t check the tyres as they’d burned away. But a year later I found out.

“At Monza, Peter Gethin went off in practice for no reason and came into the pits slowly. His face was white and the left-front tyre was flat – it had obviously been quite a moment. It had just turned right and we thought the left-front tyre had gone flat. But when we took it to Firestone they said there was nothing wrong with the tyre and we could use it again if we wanted.

“Then I remembered that when we first switched to Dunlop [in 1969] the tyres had been very tight on the rims and Dunlop had been reluctant to change the tyre mould. So a minute amount was skimmed off the wheels so we could get the tyres on and off. When we changed to Firestone that was long forgotten and the tyres were made perfectly to the required standard, so were a little loose.

“I concluded that the tyre beads were allowing air to escape and the tyre deflate even though there was no puncture. All F1 cars in those days used bolsters [special bolts] to keep the tyre in the wheel rims when cornering due to the very wide rims and low tyre pressures being used.

“It appears that the tyre bead seat could move in between the bolsters when cornering at maximum G-force, thereby allowing a rapid deflation of the tyre. I think that happened at Brands.”

Nearly 50,000 people attended his funeral in the city of Fribourg, the cavalcade appropriately including a 917.

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Deschenaux summed up Siffert in the final line of his book: “Racing was his life and death, and he was happy.”


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Tony Southgate Pedro Rodriguez and Joe Siffert at BRM.

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Jo in a BRM p160

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Jo Siffert March 701 Mexico 1970

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Mid Ohio Can-Am 1971

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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#1195

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

Also 24th October.....

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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Everso Biggyballies
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Location: Just moved 3 klms further away so now 11 klms from Albert Park, Melbourne.

#1196

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this day, 25th October 1964....

John Surtees won the F1 World Championship on this day in 1964, making him the first — and still only — person to win world titles on two and four wheels.


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Surtees at Crystal Palace in 1967

Shortly after his death in March 2017, Doug Nye penned this wonderful tribute to Surtees and his remarkable life.
From the MotorSport Magazine archives

John Surtees, the hero of many talents



Rider, driver, team owner, fund-raiser, dad: John Surtees' remarkable life was covered in glory and touched by tragedy

Back in 1996 I stood with John Surtees above the Albert Park pits in Melbourne, watching the Australian Grand Prix, freshly relocated from Adelaide. We were gawping up at a big TV screen on which we had just seen Martin Brundle’s Jordan barrel-roll, landing in a heap of tangled scrap before Martin was winkled out from underneath, chirpily waved to the crowd to prove to onlooking officialdom that he was absolutely okay (I doubt he was) and then jogged back to the pits to take a somewhat jangled restart in a spare car.

“Now what do you think that tells us about Formula 1?” John asked cryptically, as so often he would. I knew him well enough to appreciate that whatever possible response I could give would never be right. I always suspected that he would frame questions to catch one out, whatever the reply. He wasn’t seeking an opinion, he really felt the need to declare his own. So I rather disappointed him by just saying “I really haven’t a clue, John, you tell me…” He narrowed his eyes and clearly suspected I was winding him up, but – after the briefest pause to consider that possibility, which he evidently dismissed – he, with index finger raised, then declared his case with the total self-belief of an Old Testament prophet.

It was to do with clueless, past-it has-beens, bed-blocking younger talent by hanging on to Formula 1 drives way past their sell-by dates. “We’ve just got to encourage fresh talent,” he said. “These days too many drivers have been in F1 just too long. You’ve got to realise when enough’s enough, you’ve had your chance, move over and move out.”

John Surtees in the 1971 Monaco Grand Prix

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Surtees guides his TS9 to seventh in the 1971 Monaco GP

I guess he was thinking back to his own retirement from racing, at what in many ways had become his spiritual home, the Monza Autodromo, in 1972. He more or less conducted a race-test there of his latest Surtees-Cosworth TS14, while lead driver ‘Mike the Bike’ Hailwood in the works Surtees TS9B took second place behind Emerson Fittipaldi’s winning Lotus 72. Fittipaldi clinched his first world championship title that day, but it was telling how all weekend the milling Monza tifosi had packed around the Surtees paddock area almost as much as around Ferrari’s since they perceived the two multiple motorcycling world champions – Surtees and Hailwood – as the second-best sight on offer.

In these pages Jenks then reported: “As darkness settled upon the paddock two brand-new and shiny Gilera motorcycles zoomed off into the gloom, ridden by two ex-world champion motorcyclists. It was John and Mike returning to their hotel in Arcore, the home of Gilera, and the sight warmed the hearts of a great many Italians, for the ex-MV Agusta riders are both still remembered with great affection in Italy.” That was an affection John certainly always returned.

John Surtees in the 1969 Isle of Man Junior TT
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Winning the 1959 Isle of Man Junior TT for MV Agusta

Astride works MV-Agustas, John won four 500cc world championship titles, 1956-58-59-60 and in those latter seasons added three 350cc world crowns. He won five times at Monza, then Mike Hailwood six times more, 1961-66. This duo accumulated 16 motorcycle world titles but only John made the perfect four-wheeled transition to win not only the F1 title but also two more Italian GPs at Monza. Guess his business office address in Edenbridge? ‘Monza House’.

In his pomp he could be a difficult, tricky, suspicious, untrusting, sometimes almost paranoid character – more likely to assume the worst of anyone new than to expect the best. But when he built a team around himself – as he certainly did at Ferrari from 1963-65 – the Italian mechanics just loved him for it. He told me once how, when he had first signed up with Count Agusta, the team had gone to test at the Autodromo, “But it was raining, so they spread their hands and shrugged and said ‘So sorry – we cannot test today.’ And I said ‘Why not? We race in the wet – so why don’t we test in the wet?’ And we started testing right away.” The MV engineers and mechanics melted in admiration and adored him ever after.


An MV cut-back sparked John’s four-wheeled conversion, first testing the water with Vanwall, then racing Cooper, then Lotus, soaring FJ-F2-F1 within 1960. On the rebound post-Ferrari ’66 he joined Cooper-Maserati, rather like Lewis Hamilton jumping to Williams mid-year, and the fire he put under them forged Mexican GP victory by season’s end. For John, having enabled Maserati to humble Ferrari was just delicious! In contrast, at his Team Surtees works at Edenbridge in 1970 I asked him about the Chaparral he had been driving in the Can-Am Championship. Talk about a straight answer: “That Chaparral was without doubt the worst racing car I have ever had the displeasure of sitting in.” His 1969 BRMs were “not just appalling, but unsafe too” – and he told me why he had walked out of Ferrari in mid-1966, something upon which we shook hands not to confide in his lifetime. “It finally became a shouting match with Dragoni – and a bit with Forghieri too – and then Dragoni said that if I insisted on finishing my season with Ferrari, they could no longer guarantee my safety in the cars. I could only read that as a threat.”

His wins for Ferrari included the Nürburgring 1000Kms (twice), the Syracuse GP (twice), the German GP (twice), the Italian GP, the Sebring 12 Hours and the Monza 1000Kms, in the rain, despite failed screen wipers. Never forget that he drove again for Ferrari, in the 1970 512S endurance cars. Mr Ferrari – who habitually addressed him as ‘Giovanni’ had always kept the door open – he loved his motorcyclists, like Nuvolari, Varzi, Taruffi and so many more. And of course John was Mr Lola T70 – developing the open Can-Am roadster and the closed T70GT with Eric Broadley. John shone in British Group 7 racing, won at St Jovite, Riverside and Las Vegas to become the first Can-Am Champion, and later developed and engineered his own Surtees Formula A/5000, F2 and, from 1970, F1 cars.

John Surtees in the Ferrari T car in 1964 Italian Grand Prix
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Surtees in the Ferrari T-car at Monza, 1964

But his exploits 50 years ago in the slimline 1967 Lola T100 – his 1600cc Formula 2 car – really shone. On consecutive weekends he won at Mallory Park then at Zolder in Belgium – first running rings around young upstart Jacky Ickx’s Tyrrell-Matra in pouring Leicestershire rain. So who was the rainmaster that weekend? In a two-heat race at Zolder John, Jim Clark, Jean-Pierre Beltoise and Jack Brabham all locked into a bare-knuckle street fight. The last five laps of the second heat remain an almost-forgotten classic…

On a pulsating final lap, John drew abreast of ‘Black Jack’ flat out up the hill at the back of the circuit. The two hardest men in road racing simply sat out one another into the final curves… and it was John’s tactical sense that positioned his car unerringly upon the right piece of road. Jack knew exactly what he would do, and given the chance he’d have done just the same, but he was forced to blink first and back off. Surtees won by 0.4sec.

Four months later, the Formula 1 Italian GP at Monza – John in the stop-gap Indy Lola-chassised ‘Hondola’ he had hastily co-engineered as a stop-gap to replace the bloated Honda V12, Jack in his minimalist Brabham-Repco BT24. He was leading after Jimmy Clark’s Lotus 49 had suffered a puncture. Jimmy had rejoined and screamed around, astonishingly to recatch the leading group regaining a whole lost lap. On the 59th lap everything seemed to happen: Jimmy had his sights on John’s second-placed Honda, but Graham Hill’s sister Lotus 49 had blown its DFV engine in the biggest way entering the last corner, the Parabolica.

Jimmy catapulted past the Honda but John used the Lotus slipstream to draw even closer to Brabham. Jack was just leading at the end of lap 60, but Clark was closing rapidly, and as they disappeared towards the Curva Grande the jam-packed grandstands rose to a man as the Lotus retook the lead, having regained that whole lap.

After 60 laps the three leading cars were nose to tail and Brabham locked smartly into Clark’s slipstream, with the Honda right behind.

Five more laps and Clark had dropped Brabham, which gave John his chance to slipstream into second place. But as they ripped into the last lap Jimmy’s leading Lotus was in obvious trouble. The trio tore into the 165mph Curva Grande in line astern, but Clark’s engine abruptly cut, twitching the car sideways. John and Jack just managed to dodge by.

So John led, at his beloved Monza, in his brand-new stop-gap car, with half a lap to run. The Lotus was failing to draw the last of its fuel, while the two most rugged, unforgiving Grand Prix drivers of their day ripped down the back straight at more than 180mph.

John: “I knew that Graham’s big oil slick was right down the inside line into the Parabolica, but I had to cover the inside or Jack would dive in there with his lighter car. But if I stayed wide and left the inside open – would he chance it on the oil? Knowing Jack I was sure he couldn’t resist it, so I stayed wide and made him the offer…”

John Surtees beats Jack Brabham to the finish line in the 1967 Italian Grand Prix
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Pipping Jack Brabham to the line at Monza, 1967

Jack: “I knew that John might take the wide line, leaving me the inside, over the oil slick, or nothing – but of course I had to go for it. What else could you do?”

These two genuine hard nuts both braked absolutely as late as possible, John wide, Jack inside, and sure enough the Brabham-Repco locked up on the oil-thick cement dust and slid, drifting wide as John crossed his tail, stole the tighter line and led (just) onto the finishing straight. Jack flicked out of the Honda’s slipstream for one last lunge, but John won by 0.2sec. And this was just the day job.

Make no mistake – these men were heroes. And by their deeds they are surely immortal, living on within our minds – we need never believe they are really gone. I will miss his smiling “’Ello!” For me John Surtees was a genuine warrior – in recent years a much-mellowed and warm family man, though tragically tormented by the unendurable loss of his adored son Henry at Brands Hatch in 2009.

To his lovely wife Jane, and to their daughters Leonora and Edwina, we offer – I am sure – the Motor Sport readership’s most wholehearted, and sincere, condolences.
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... rande-john


A few extra bits and bobs I found.... and thought you might find interesting.


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How it all began for John Surtees.... in the chair with his Father Jack riding.
John said: “I was 14 when I first entered a race. It was as a passenger to my father in his 1000cc Vincent sidecar outfit at Trent Park in London when his usual partner couldn’t make the race.” They were DSQ'd when officials discovered John's age!

One thing I have realised.....his motorcycling career statistics are astonishing.

Between 1951 and '60 Surtees claimed 250 race wins from 352 starts. Along with that first 500cc title in 1956, he would secure a hat trick of class doubles: six world titles in three years from '58 to '60 - and his fame spread beyond motor racing.

In 1959, Surtees won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year and remains the only motorcyclist to have claimed the accolade.

The idea of switching to four wheels had already been put to him, but John was initially sceptical. He was a motorcyclist through and through, and had no interest in cars. In fact it was only a contractual issue that had John try cars.... that was only because his contract with MV forbade him racing other bikes!

But by 1960 the lure had more appeal. MV's insistence that he could only ride the Italian bikes left him with too little racing and too many weekends free. But the agreement with Count Agusta didn't stretch to four wheels... "The first car race I ever saw was the one I was in!" he would often recall in later years, with that trademark wide smile. :haha:

Surtees found himself pitted against Jim Clark in a Formula Junior race at Goodwood, only for a rookie error to cost him a chance of victory. Lotus boss Colin Chapman took note and snapped him up to race in F1 - a rise beyond comprehension for drivers in the modern era.

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This is John Surtees in 1960, en route to winning the Senior TT. His MV Agusta was easily the fastest bike compared to the following gaggle of Norton singles, with a time of 2 hours, 12 minutes and 35.2 seconds, at an average speed of 102.44mph.
MV Agusta team-mate, John Hartle, was second, three minutes behind


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John Surtees at 1971 Italian GP in a Surtees TS9A Cosworth

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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#1197

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this Day, November 1st 1936

Jack Lewis was born


Who the hell was Jackie Lewis I hear you saying.......

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He was the F1 driver turned sheep farmer. He was the original F1 Welsh Dragon (As with Pryce did later (Lewis carried the Welsh Dragon on his car) He confirmed that the idea of having the Welsh dragon on his car was that he was going to build his own car and if the sponsorship came in, it would have been a Welsh team! He now wishes he would have carried on with it like McLaren or Brabham did, but said it was ironic that he didnt get this kind of attention at the time, but the TV and papers in the 1960s hardly featured motorsport.

Jack Lewis shot to F1 in no time, but his star shone only momentarily as he and racing parted company. No, he did not die in action like so many others of his era.... in fact he is still with us today, aged 85. So Happy Birthday Jack.


Jackie Lewis was endowed with a natural talent but undoubtedly lacked the spirit of competitiveness it takes to rise among the best. In 1958 he bought Ivor Bueb's Cooper F3 with which he won three races in his first season, which naturally led him to Formula 2 in 1959 with a Cooper. Despite the best time in the Pau Grand Prix tests (ahead of Brabham and Trintignant) and a third place in the “Aintree 200”, he was bitter in the face of the organizers' reluctance to see him take the start and returned in 1960 with the firm intention to show all his talent, which he will do by winning the English F2 championship, as well as races in Chimay and Montlhéry.....

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From the Motorsport archives Paul Fearnley met and interviewed him some 15 years ago about his coulda shoulda F1 career and why it wasnt. Interesting for one who could easily class as a Forgotten F1 star.......
There are racing drivers who do not look like racing drivers – for example, Bobby Rahal, bless his fireproof socks – and there are those who do. I cannot cite a single scientific fact to support my bold statement, but I can cite Carlos Reutemann.

If Reutemannn – surely the ideal yardstick – measures a perfect 10, then Jack Lewis registers a healthy eight. Perhaps a nine with the wind behind him. His Personality Parade mugshot in the Motoring News of August 31 1961 positively broods: Celtic shock of black hair, arched brows, Clooney jaw – impish confidence exuding from a fractionally sideways glance.

Yes, but who the hell was he?

Stroud’s finest was then 24 and in the midst of his maiden Formula 1 campaign, just three full seasons after his impressive harrying of instructor Ian Burgess at Cooper’s Brands Hatch racing driver school. Now behind the wheel of a Cooper T53 run out of his father’s successful motorbike spares business, H&L Motors, Jack was still impressing. He’d been a tenth shy of a front-row spot alongside Jack Brabham and Jim Clark at the Pau Grand Prix, and had run third before being overcome by fuel vapour and slipping to fifth. He’d been refused a grid slot at the Brussels GP even though he’d been ninth-fastest in practice; a second quicker than guaranteed starter Stirling Moss’s best. Also, he’d qualified sixth – ahead of Roy Salvadori, Tony Brooks and Dan Gurney – and finished in the same position at Aintree’s BARC 200.

The reigning Autocar British Formula 2 champion was ready for his world championship debut: the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa on June 18.

He qualified 13th, solidly mid-grid, and raced maturely to ninth. In the closing stages he was lapped by a shoal of ‘Sharknose’ Ferraris and promptly tucked in neatly behind them. Even though they had backed off as a famous 1-2-3-4 loomed, they were circulating a second faster than Jack had qualified.

Another ninth place, at the Nürburgring, reaffirmed Jack’s promise, and when he smoothly overhauled, and calmly staved off, Tony Brooks’s BRM P47/58 to finish fourth at the Italian GP, works driver stardom beckoned.

Jack, however, had only one more season in him, a disappointing one at that, as a pretend Welshman in a pretend works BRM. But whereas his fellow ‘what might have beens’ – Chris Bristow, Alan Stacey, Pete Ryan, Welsh-born Gary Hocking (Caerleon, Newport) and Shane Summers (Rossett, near Wrexham) – were scythed down prematurely, Jack slipped away quietly, to a farm near Llandovery.

And you have to say that he looks well on it; the 70-year-old who answers the door is fit and T53 trim. This Wycliffe College-educated, rock-climbing scrum-half is merely a crash helmet – one of the few pieces of memorabilia he’s kept – and goggles away from rolling back 40-plus years. Yet he has friends who have no inkling of his racing past, and, as such, his memory must be jogged gently warm. Only then does the enigma emerge: Jack Rex Lewis Jnr had the speed, and knew it; had the control, and knew it; but lacked the selfish streak to force his career over its first major hurdle, and knows it.

“I was always more interested in proving to myself that I could do it rather than impressing everyone else,” he explains. “That’s an admirable attitude, unless you want to be a world champion. Part of the reason I stopped was that I’d reached a point where I felt I could drive as fast as anyone, give or take the odd genius.

“I wasn’t worried about hurting myself. I did, however, regularly ask, ‘What the hell am I doing here?’ That’s not good, especially when you’re doing 150mph in the pouring rain at the old Nürburgring.

“Yet, perversely, I always did better at circuits perceived to be dangerous. That was because I was confident I could drive very fast and still not run off the road. While the guys who would stick their necks out to be fast at airfield circuits were thinking, ‘Shit, this is dangerous!’ and backing off, I wasn’t. At places like Pau, much less forgiving than Monaco, I did disproportionately well.

“Adrenalin shouldn’t overcome fear when you’re racing regularly, because you’re in control and concentrating hard. What’s exciting is when you go into a corner and think, ‘Shit, I’m going too fast!’ You mustn’t hunt that excitement. That’s how you get killed.”

“He should have picked up Brooks’ baton – instead he grasped a shepherd’s crook”
It’s apt that Jack had his best F1 moment against Brooks. At the time of Monza, Tony was a Grand Prix away from concluding a career that was the epitome of unflurried, accurate speed. Jack – fast, polished, unobtrusive and accomplished, according to the journalists of the time – should have picked up that baton. Instead he grasped a shepherd’s crook. Indeed, he rarely did the expected. Given his father’s background, it would have been logical to race on two wheels.

“I grew up on motorcycles,” Jack says. “The funny thing is, I never wanted to race them. Money wasn’t my motivation for racing, but I wanted to do it properly, which meant doing it full-time, which meant earning a living from it; I felt cars would give me a better opportunity of doing that.”

Speculation must always come before accumulation, of course, and luckily Jack Rex Snr, ‘Pop’, who had raced bikes pre-war, was happy to support his only son’s – and his own – ambitions. So, as soon as Burgess tipped Jack the wink about not waiting for the Brands school’s prize-drive carrot dangling hazily in the future, the Lewises purchased Ivor Bueb’s Cooper 500. And Ted Jeffs, an ex-Norton mechanic, was employed to prep and tune it.

Jack took immediately to the buzz bomb, finishing fourth in his first race, at Mallory Park. In his second, at Brands in April, he performed a handstand-with-car that got him on the front page of a national newspaper.

“Ted was bloody good, but unfortunately he’d reduced my tyre pressures,” explains Jack. “Someone told him that letting a bit of air out would make it easier for a beginner like me. Trouble was, I was going fast enough to warrant the higher pressures: the tyre folded under and flipped me over.”

Undeterred, Jack was winning by May: at Full Sutton. He added two Oulton Park victories in June/July and might have won Silverstone’s 100-mile Commander Yorke Trophy had his extra fuel tank not split. Unsurprisingly, he tended to fall back when F3’s establishment – Don Parker, Jim Russell, Stuart Lewis-Evans, etc – appeared, but still it was a strong first season.

“F3 was on the wane,” says Jack. “We might have won it had we stuck around, but there didn’t seem much point. Everyone said it would be a big jump to F2, but I didn’t find it so.”

He was a natural, and although his results wouldn’t be as good as 1958’s, the nuggets of potential sparkled. In his brand-new Cooper T45, he won a lacklustre Prix de Paris at Montlhéry in May and, at the same track in October for the Coupe du Salon, finished a “too respectful” runner-up to Harry Schell’s T51. But it was Jack’s performance at Pau, also in May, which made everyone sit up: he set second-fastest time in the first session. Only Jean Behra’s Porsche was quicker.

“I was shocked,” says Jack. “I wasn’t pushing, I was just driving around. I said, ‘Well, Pop, it looks like this motor racing lark is pretty easy!’” He eventually ‘slid’ to fourth – a tenth off the front row, but still ahead of the works Cooper of Jack Brabham, who had won the Monaco GP the week before – and raced in that position until slowed by fuel starvation.

Eleven months later, he was back. Again he set the early practice pace. Again he qualified fractions off the front row. And again he ran fourth – until his gear lever broke.

More strong showings followed: second to Maurice Trintignant’s T45 at the Prix de Paris; a win at Chimay, despite a slipping clutch; second at Snetterton’s Vanwall Trophy, ahead of Rhodesian Tony Maggs’s T51; victory in the Coupe du Salon; an F2 category win (having hunted down and passed Maggs) at Snetterton’s Lombank Trophy; and second in the Lewis-Evans Trophy at Brands Hatch, a result which clinched the British F2 title – by three points from Brabham.

“That was a weird championship,” admits Jack. “At the lesser races I’d be at the front; at the races which didn’t clash with a big F1 or sports car event I’d be back in the pack. But that was all good for my education.”

As was his subsequent stirring first season of F1. So why didn’t he graduate?

Jack was being linked to the second seat at Cooper – freed up by Bruce McLaren’s promotion following Brabham’s departure – by the end of 1961. John Cooper had had a quiet word – but no official offer came. Instead Maggs, the reigning European Formula Junior champion (jointly with Jo Siffert), got the gig.

“I was told later that Bruce had nobbled my chances,” says Jack. “He’d finished third at Monza, but I’d been catching him towards the end [the gap was 12 seconds] and perhaps he thought that was too close for comfort. If he did nobble me, I can’t criticise him. There’s no point saying ‘After you, Claude’ in racing. Anyway, I wasn’t blameless: I wasn’t sufficiently focused. I knew I’d be in F1 in 1962 whatever happened. I suppose I felt things were going to work out fine no matter what.” They didn’t.

The wily John Cooper, who would have lost a wealthy customer had he signed Jack, suggested a Cooper-BRM for 1962. But the usually closed shop of BRM surprised everyone by offering the Lewises a semi-works package: a 1961 chassis fitted with its new-for-62 V8, and help with entries. It sounded great.

“It was a nightmare,” says Jack. “I loved the car – better handling, more grip, smoother to drive than the Cooper – but the engine was hopeless: its top end was adequate, but it was useless low down. The works engines were on injection, we were on carbs – perhaps that was it. Oh, and the crankcase kept cracking.”

Jack salvaged something from Pau – third, a whisker behind Ricardo Rodriguez’ ‘Sharknose’ – but after failing to qualify at Monaco, the BRM was returned, as was Pop’s £7000 cheque, and the T51 had to be dusted down.

Jack’s mood wasn’t improved by the fact that he had been quicker than three works drivers at Monaco – Trevor Taylor (Lotus), Jo Bonnier (Porsche) and Maggs! – yet they had been allowed to start. He felt he should no longer have to rely on a word to the organisers from Wolfgang von Trips (as at the 1960 German GP), or the donation of a spare entry (by Centro Sud boss Mimmo Dei at the 1961 Italian GP), no matter how kindly meant were their actions. He felt he deserved better. Sadly, in an outdated car, matters got worse. His nadir was the French GP at Rouen. Having just been lapped by Graham Hill, Jack missed his braking point and punted BRM’s number one out of the lead.

“The season was a disaster,” says Jack, “even the Welsh bit. We’d renamed the team Ecurie Galloise because we had a Welsh sponsor lined up – but even that fell through. I felt we had completely messed up. The BRM situation hadn’t helped, but nor had losing Ted [to rival privateer Tony Marsh]. Our preparation suffered.”

After a wheel fell off at September’s Oulton Park Gold Cup, the Lewises called time. Jack didn’t know it, but he’d contested his last race.

“I was disillusioned, but that wasn’t the prime reason for stopping,” he says. “Pop said we couldn’t afford to go to the next step. He reckoned I’d built up a reputation and that I’d be able to go and get a drive, if I wanted to.”

This was a surprising and sudden change of heart for Snr. It wasn’t much more than a year since he’d given Jeffs the go-ahead to build the Lewis F1 car. (He got as far as its chassis, suspension and bodywork before feet got cold and it was sold). The harsh truth was that Pop had cut the purse and apron strings at precisely the wrong time. He should have done it when Ken Tyrrell offered to run his son in Formula Junior.

“I’m sorry to say that Pop kept that from me,” says Jack. “I always felt he was going racing just for me – but my mother told me much later that he had wanted to do it anyway. I guess he was living vicariously. I’m sure he’d rather have his son driving for him. And I was happy to drive for him – he was taking me into F1, don’t forget. So I might not have accepted Ken’s offer. But it would have been nice to have had the choice.”

Maggs didn’t turn Tyrrell down. It was the making of him, a springboard to a sturdy first season of F1 with Cooper: fifth in Holland, second in France, third in South Africa.

“Tony was a good driver,” says Jack. “But in my own mind I know that those results could easily have been mine.” This is no idle boast – but Jack admits that he didn’t work at it. “I was lazy, I guess. When I stopped, I didn’t decide there and then never to race again. It was meant to be a sabbatical. My father was looking to semi-retire and had this big idea about living in the mountains. He bought a large house which had a farm attached. He asked if I fancied running it. ‘No, not really.’ But we bought some sheep… It just happened.

“Mum had been brilliant throughout my career: timekeeper, no fuss, stiff upper lip. But it became clear to me how much more relaxed she was when I wasn’t racing. Plus I discovered I didn’t need racing to be happy. Sheep farming [and breeding Arab horses] proved pretty interesting, and I stayed there for 14 years. I just didn’t make a big effort to carry on racing.

“I don’t have any regrets. You only have regrets if you think about something, and I don’t think about motor racing unless prompted. Yes, I might have had an illustrious career. But equally, I might have been killed the next weekend.”
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... -encounter

Trying to find pictures of him is not easy.... Enter anything with Lewis in the name into our friend Google is quite frustrating.....

A few....

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In a T53 Cooper Climax.

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Jack-Lewis.-1962-Aintree.-Ecurie-Galloise-Cooper-Climax-T53

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1961 German GP.

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Italian GP (1961)

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Jack Lewis Principal Results


British F2 Championship
Cooper Climax T45 Winner


Event Car Qualified Result
1959 F2 Prix de Paris - Montlhery Cooper Climax T45 1st + FL
1960 30th Grand Prix des Frontires - Chimay, Belgium Cooper Climax T45 1st
1960 XVI Coupe du Salon - Montlhery Cooper Climax T45 1st + fastest lap

1961 Belgian Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 13/25 9th
1961 French Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 18/25 Retired
1961 British Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 15/28 Retired
1961 German Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 18/27 9th
1961 Italian Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 16/30 4th

1962 Dutch Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 19/20 8th
1962 Monaco Grand Prix BRM P48/57 15/23 DNS
1962 Pau Grand Prix BRM P48/57 5/13 3rd
1962 British Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 15/22 10th
1962 French Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 16/18 Retired
1962 German Grand Prix Cooper Climax T53 21/25 Retired

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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EB
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#1198

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I don't need to ask who the hell he was - I went to the same school as him.
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Everso Biggyballies
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#1199

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

EB wrote: 2 years ago I don't need to ask who the hell he was - I went to the same school as him.

I imagine not at the same time though! :rofl:

Out of interest were his motor racing achievements held in high regard at the school, ie was he regarded as some sort of luminary figure in the school's alumni for want of a better word?

Just in passing I note I was a little remiss in my summary of his achievements.... I failed to highlight that he scored three points in the WDC in 1961 (a time when scoring was something of a lofty achievement)...... impressively scored with his 4th at the fateful 1961 Italian GP, at a race held on the daunting banked circuit.
More impressive was he entered the race privately, and was the first privateer home, behind Phill Hill, Gurney and McLaren's works cars, beating many other works (including Brooks works BRM) and semi works drivers.

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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Everso Biggyballies wrote: 2 years ago Out of interest were his motor racing achievements held in high regard at the school, ie was he regarded as some sort of luminary figure in the school's alumni for want of a better word?
These days the road leading up to the main school building has a statue on either side, one of him and one of me.

Honestly? No, he never got a mention, even though the school is usually quick to celebrate its successful past pupils. The headmaster did a speech about Jim Clark once but that's the only motor racing themed thing I can ever remember, and sadly I am pretty sure Clark did not go to school there.
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Favourite Circuit: Nordschleife, Spa, Mt Panorama.
Car(s) Currently Owned: Audi SQ5 3.0L V6 TwinTurbo
Location: Just moved 3 klms further away so now 11 klms from Albert Park, Melbourne.

#1201

Post by Everso Biggyballies »

On this day.....

21st December 1962


Motorcycle legend and promising grand prix driver Gary Hocking was tragically killed on this day whilst practicing for the 1962 Natal Grand Prix in South Africa.


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Gary Hocking: a natural on two wheels and four

Hocking called a premature halt to his meteoric bike career earlier that year, ironically feeling that Formula One was a safer option.

His giving away a promising motorcycle career happened following the fatality of his good friend Tom Phillis at the 1962 Ulster TT in July.It was a remarkable opening lap of a remarkable circuit. Rhodesia’s Gary Hocking had been drawn at six, his MV Agusta team-mate Mike Hailwood at three and his good friend, Honda’s Aussie charger Tom Phillis, at one. Yet as this talented trio flashed past the huge scoreboard which crowned Bray Hill, it was Hocking, the reigning 350 and 500cc world champion, in the lead on elapsed time — and on the road. He had taken 20sec out of Phillis and 10 out of Hailwood.

But tragedy struck on the second lap of the 1962 Junior TT, Phillis crashing fatally at Laurel Bank. For Hocking, who eventually finished second to Hailwood by less than 6sec after a titanic two-hour struggle, and who won the Senior race two days later, this crash marked the end — of his first motorsport career...


“Gary was forever saying that we were going to kill each other because we were all trying so hard,”
says fellow expat Rhodesian Jim Redman, a six-time world champion with Honda. “We were gunning for MV Agusta and the competition was fierce. Gary was still pushing on the bike, but off it he kept saying that we were all going too fast.” Perhaps he was right: Honda’s Bob McIntyre would also be dead, killed at Oulton Park, before the year was out. “Gary was a religious bloke who used to pray every day,” Redman continues, “and after that Junior TT he felt that he had lured Tom to his death. And that was that. He walked away from a world championship. He was his own man.”


From the archives of Motorsport Mag, Paul Fearnley wrote more about Gary... Back in 2004 he recalls a talent that shone brightly, but much too briefly

Gary Hocking: An easy rider born to drive

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Hocking at the TT
Born in Caerleon, just north of Newport in South Wales, in 1937, Hocking was a glittering star on two wheels. But there was no Stan Hailwood — an ambitious millionaire father — in his corner. Raised simply in Bulawayo, he learned his trade in a hard-knocks national scene. But, says Redman, Hocking was no trial-and-error merchant: “He was a natural, confident of his own ability. But instead of jumping on and learning by his mistakes, he waited and waited until he was sure that he and his Triumph were exactly right before starting that first race. He was absolutely determined to win it. And he would have too, but for some small problem when leading. He was a thinker, Gary.”

It was the older Redman who flew the nest first, handing over his repair business to Hocking and arriving in the UK in 1958 — whereupon he immediately went head-to-head with Derek Minter, the ‘King of Brands’.

“Derek was very good, but he was just a bloke on a bike as far as I was concerned,” says Redman. “Sometimes you can leave the comfort of your national championship only to discover that the rest of the world has forgotten more than you ever knew. Fortunately, it turned out that our local scene was competitive enough to put us in good stead when we ventured abroad. When Gary read that I had finished second in that race at Brands Hatch, he said he could have won it So he packed up and came over. He arrived in England with £200 and a suitcase that rattled.”


Hocking was an instant hit on privateer Nortons, and MZ gave him his first works ride in 1959; he won first time out on its 250 two-stroke at Kristianstad in Sweden. He won at Dundrod, too. And all-conquering MV came a-calling. Its team leader John Surtees was making noises about switching to four wheels — he would successfully mix and match codes during ’60— and Count Agusta needed a new talent to pick up the torch. He chose wisely. Hocking finished runner-up to MV’s Carlo Ubbiali on the 125s and 250s and to Surtees on the 350s in his first year with the team, and leapt seamlessly onto its number one saddle when Surtees, a seven-time champ with MV, went cars for good in ’61.

“Gary was a very serious competitor,” says Surtees, “very determined and more interested in the technical side of things than Mike Hailwood. I felt happier leaving MV in the knowledge that he would be there to guide them.”

Hocking won 12 times in 1961, including seven of the nine 500cc GPs he contested, and secured that and the 350 title. However, the late-season arrival at MV from Norton of Hailwood — who promptly ended Hocking’s 500cc domination with a win at Monza — and the increasing threat from Honda indicated that a more testing ’62 was on the cards. Hocking’s win in the year’s Senior TT proved that his talent was still up to it; but his heart was no longer in it He flew straight to Italy to tell Agusta that he was retiring forthwith.

John Surtees came to car racing in 1959 after a highly successful motorcycle racing career. He drove in Formula 1 from 1960 to 1972, winning 6 races and becoming World Champion in 1964 with Ferrari, for whom he drove between 1963 and 1966. He formed his own team in 1970, which ceased competing in 1978.

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Surtees saw Hocking as the ideal person to take over for him as lead rider at AV Augusta

“Gary asked my father for advice about getting started in cars,” says Tim Parnell. Dad Reg was adamant that good biker rider equalled good car driver — Surtees was capably heading up his Lola GP squad — and Hocking seemed to be cut from the same cloth. “I had injured myself in 1961 and was out of racing that year,” continues Tim, “so dad offered him my Lotus.” The four-cylinder 18/21 was outdated in Fl ‘s new V8 era, but it would do — for now.

Hocking took the Alan Smith-prepared car to Mallory Park and planted it on pole for the August Bank Holiday Formula Libre race. He led it too, only to be denied a win by an engine failure. Tim was bowled over: “I have never seen anybody compete so fiercely and competitively in their first-ever car race — except perhaps John Surtees. They’re a different breed those bike boys. It was raining a bit and Gary was amazing in those conditions. Totally at home.

“It was a slightly tricky situation given that Dad had John on his books, but he knew that he had somebody else with incredible potential in Gary, and so he entered him in the Lotus for the Danish Grand Prix.”

Held at the 43sec lap Roskildering, this non-championship Fl race was a step up for Hocking, who had no chance against the V8s. But he impressed as the fastest four-cylinder runner and finished fourth overall. He also proved that he was no respecter of reputations, tangling with and sidelining the Lola of Roy Salvadori on the first lap of the second heat Er… sorry, Reg.

Hocking made up for his faux pas by buying the Lotus, and entered the following week’s Oulton Park Gold Cup. He qualified 11th — fastest four-pot — and was in among the V8s at the end of the first lap. He was still clinging to their coat-tails when his temperature gauge started to climb. The radiator cap had come off and he lost 2min in the subsequent pitstop, but thereafter he strung together a telling comeback that saw him retake the four-cylinder lead on lap 45. He was heading for fifth overall when the Lotus started to sound rough and he stopped to investigate at Cascades on lap 63 of 73. An oil pipe had broken; he was out. The Establishment had taken note, though. Bruce McLaren’s column in Autosport marked Hocking as a “coming man”.

But right now he was going — back home. The southern African single-seater scene was enjoying a boom time
: its Gold Star series was thriving; Bruce Johnstone had just had his first BRIM F1 outing at Oulton; John Love and Tony Maggs had impressed with Ken Tyrrell’s team during 1961-62. So there was no reason to expect that Hocking would steal the show at Kyalami’s Rand Spring Trophy in October, for although the big overseas names had yet to arrive for two warm-up races before the GP, there was plenty of rival local talent.

He walked it, from pole, regularly breaking the lap record on his way to winning both 24-lap heats. The similar car of the highly regarded Neville Lederle was 28sec in arrears.

(British born Rhodesian racing motorcyclist Jim Redman riding a Honda to victory in the Lightweight 250cc event at the Isle of Man TT races, 9th June 1964.)
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Rival and friend Jim Redman: “He was a thinker, Gary”

Gary dished up more of the same in the Total Cup in November, slicing 6sec from the lap record at Zwartkops. And in searing heat at the following weekend’s Rhodesian GP, he dominated this 50-lapper at Kumalo from start to finish, breaking the lap record a reported 36 times. Among the vanquished that day was the ex-works Cooper of Maggs — and Love, whom Hocking beat in the Formula Libre race. “Once you’ve been first, you don’t ever want to be second,” he told a local reporter.

“When I spoke to Gary about switching,” says Redman, “he told me that the biggest problem was that it was too easy. And he wasn’t the sort of guy to boast.”

Hocking was learning fast. Parnell asked Rob Walker to put him in his Lotus 24 for the bigger South African races to come, including the GP. Rob’s quest to find the next Moss had (understandably) proved impossible: his old hands were generally off the pace, and his team was still reeling from the fatal crash of 20-year-old Ricardo Rodriguez at the Mexican GP in early November. Rob was persuaded that Hocking was worth a flutter, and a deal was done.

In fact, it was Hocking who was the disappointed party when he got his first taste of V8 power. He qualified 11th for the Rand GP at Kyalami, 2.5sec slower than his lap record in the Lotus 18/21. Unhappy with the 24’s handling, he stuck at it manfully in the race and finished a lapped fourth, first local man home. There followed some hyped-up talk of him “doing a Baghetti” at East London’s South African GP in two weeks’ time, but Hocking knew that the intervening Natal GP at Westmead would be crucial to any chances he might have of upstaging the December 29 world title showdown between Jim Clark and Graham Hill. The new-to-him 24 was a long way from that honed-to-perfection, fits-like-a-glove Triumph and he wanted a number of changes made. Indeed, he was thinking strongly of reverting to the 18/21…

The 24 was going better at Westmead, though, and a spot on the outside of the Heat One front row beckoned. But Hocking wasn’t satisfied — “Once you’ve finished first…” His Lotus left the road at more than 100mph in the second session. He might have got away with it elsewhere, but this year-old track’s ‘run-off’ was littered with builders’ rubbish, boulders and just-cut tree stumps. The Lotus dug in and flipped. Hocking was dead and the theories began.

“Gary had a thing about not drinking before a race,” says Redman. “He used to say that it made you sweat more. Nobody really knew about dehydration in those days — you just jumped on your bike, or in your car, and got on with it. But even we noticed that he didn’t take in much liquid. The examining doctor said that Gary had been dehydrated enough to pass out — and I’m sure that’s what happened. That’s why there were no marks on the road. If his steering had failed he would have jammed the brakes on; if his brakes had failed he would have spun the car. He had the talent to get out of any situation.”

But Paddy Driver, a motorcycling rival of Hocking’s and a later four-wheel convert, has good reason to believe that mechanical failure was the cause. Driver made his F1 debut in the 1963 Rand GP, finishing 11th. Two weeks later he was trying to qualify for the South African GP at East London when his car left the road at speed and flipped. He was in a privateer Lotus 24.

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Team owner Tim Parnell, seen on the right here talking with Jo Siffert, saw Hocking’s grand prix potential

“Its steering rack was from a Triumph Herald, and where the ball meets the cup was heavily radiused; ideal if you want a tight turning circle in your road car, not so good if you’re pulling big loads in an Fl car. I went over a bump just before a fast bend and saw the steering arm fall down.”

This experience, and a close friend’s eye-witness account of Hocking’s shunt, convinced Driver that Gary had suffered a similar failure: “He was accelerating hard uphill when the car turned sharp left. He was a long way from the preceding corner, almost at the crest of the rise. He would have had no time to react; I didn’t leave any marks on the road either.”

An examination of Hocking’s wreck suggested that incorrectly reassembled steering — he’d asked for a change on this item — might have been the cause. But suspension failure wasn’t ruled out. Only two things were beyond doubt: early-1960s F1 cars were fast and flimsy — and a great talent had been lost.
https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/arch ... n-to-drive

Potentially another life lost to a Colin Chapman design quirk......??

* I started life with nothing, and still have most of it left


“Good drivers have dead flies on the side windows!” (Walter Röhrl)

* I married Miss Right. Just didn't know her first name was Always
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