(Redirected from Jim Clark (racing driver))
:''This article is about the racing driver Jim Clark. For namesakes, please see
James Clark.''
'Jim' (or 'Jimmy') 'Clark'
OBE (
4 March,
1936 –
7 April,
1968) was a
Scottish[1] Formula One racing driver.
He was the dominant driver of his era, winning two
World Championships, in 1963 and 1965. At the time of his death, he had won more Grand Prix races (25) and more pole positions (33) than any driver up to that time. He also competed in the Indianapolis 500 five times, and won it once, in 1965.
Early years
He was born James Clark Jr. into a farming family at Kilmany House Farm,
Fife, the youngest child of five, and the only boy. In
1942 the family moved to Edington Mains Farm, near
Duns,
Berwickshire, in the
Borders. He was educated at primary schools, first in Kilmany and then in
Chirnside, and then following three years of preparatory schooling at Clifton Hall near
Edinburgh he was sent to
Loretto School in
Musselburgh, near
Edinburgh.
Although his parents were opposed to the idea, Clark started his racing in local
road rally and
hill climb events driving his own
Sunbeam-Talbot, and proved a fearsome competitor right from the off. On 16 June 1956, in his very first event, he was behind the wheel of a DKW ''sonderklasse'' at
Crimond, Scotland. By 1958, Clark was driving for the local Border Reivers team, racing
Jaguar D-types and
Porsches in national events, and winning 18 races.
Then on Boxing Day 1958, Clark met the man who would launch him to superstardom. Driving a
Lotus Elite, he finished second to
Colin Chapman. Chapman was sufficiently impressed to give Clark a ride in one of his
Formula Junior cars. A legend was born.
Clark and Lotus
Jim Clark in German GP 1962
After
Aston Martin's F1 programme fell through, Clark was a free agent. Colin Chapman snapped him up for his F1 squad, and Clark made his debut in the
1960 Dutch Grand Prix. Throughout his F1 career from to Clark drove only for the
Lotus team. He developed a near telepathic relationship with Chapman, which contributed to their outstanding success together. Chapman's innovative and nimble designs combined with Clark's skills at the wheel made for a nearly unbeatable force. 1962 saw Clark battling
Graham Hill (who drove for
BRM) for the World Championship. Clark was driving Chapman's brilliant
Lotus 25. In the final race an oil leak caused him to drop out just as victory seemed a formality.
His first Drivers' World Championship came driving the Lotus 25 in , winning seven out of the ten races and Lotus its first Constructors' World Championship. That year he also competed in the
Indianapolis 500 for the first time, and only the oil on the track from winner
Parnelli Jones's car prevented him from winning, as he finished in second position and won Rookie of the Year honours. In 1964 Clark came within just a few laps of retaining his World Championship crown, but just as in 1962, an oil leak from the engine robbed him of the title, this time conceding to
John Surtees. Tyre failure damaging the Lotus' suspension put paid to that year's attempt at the
Indianapolis 500[2]. He made amends and won the Championship again in and also the
Indianapolis 500 in the
Lotus 38. He had to miss the prestigious
Monaco Grand Prix in order to compete at Indianapolis, but made history by driving the first
mid-engined car to win at the fabled "Brickyard," as well as becoming the only driver to date to win both that race and the F1 title in the same year.
Jim Clark at the Nürburgring 1965
At the same time, Clark was competing in the
Australasia based
Tasman series, run for older F1 cars, and was series champion in 1965, 1967 and 1968 driving for Lotus. He won fourteen races in all, a record for the series.
The FIA decreed from 1966, new 3-litre engine
regulations would come into force. Lotus were less competitive. Starting with a 2-litre
Coventry-Climax engine in the
Lotus 33, Clark did not score points until the
British Grand Prix and a third place at the following
Dutch Grand Prix. From the
Italian Grand Prix onwards Lotus used the highly complex
BRM H16 engine in the
Lotus 43 car, with which Clark won the
United States Grand Prix. He also picked up another second place at the
Indianapolis 500, this time behind
Graham Hill.
During Lotus and Clark used three completely different cars and engines. The Lotus 43 performed poorly at the opening
South African Grand Prix, so Clark used an old Lotus 33 at the following
Monaco Grand Prix, retiring with
suspension failure. Lotus then began its fruitful association with
Ford-Cosworth. Their first car, the
Lotus 49 featuring the most successful
F1 engine in history, the
Ford-Cosworth DFV, won its first race at the
Dutch Grand Prix, driven by Clark. He won with it again at the
British,
United States and
Mexican Grands Prix; and, in January
1968, at the
South African Grand Prix. He had established himself as the dominant driver in what was, aside from its unreliability, the dominant car.
Remarkable performances
Jim Clark's drive in the
1967 Italian Grand Prix is regarded one of the greatest ever in F1. After starting from pole, he was leading in his Lotus 49 (chassis R2), when a tyre punctured. He lost an entire lap while having the wheel changed in the pits. After rejoining sixteenth, Clark then showed his genius by driving at his own limit, something which was not required when leading. He ripped back through the field, progressively lowered the lap record, eventually equalling his pole time of 1m 28.5s, to regain the lost lap and the lead. He was narrowly ahead of Brabham and Surtees starting the last lap, but his car had not been filled with enough fuel for such a performance — it faltered, and finally coasted across the finish line in third place. This performance is considered unmatched in the long history of F1.
Other examples of his skills are his drive in a
Lotus 23, fitted with a 1500cc (90ci) Lotus-Ford twin-cam engine, for the 1962
1000km Nürburgring race, when he took pole position by nine seconds and more. The 14.2-mile
Nürburgring ''Nordschleife'' brought out the very best in Clark. On a patchily damp track, he outperformed the similar-powered
Porsche 718 and the more powerful Ferraris, of drivers like
Phil Hill,
Dan Gurney and
Willy Mairesse, and led with nearly two minutes outright until, affected by fumes from a broken exhaust, he went off course into the bushes.
Amazingly though, despite his mercurial talent, Clark never won at
Monaco. He came close once in 1963 only to be stopped with twenty-two laps to go with a broken gearbox.
The fatal crash
On
7 April 1968, Jim Clark's life tragically ended in a crash. He was originally slated to drive in the BOAC 1000 km sportscar race at Brands Hatch but instead chose to drive in a minor Formula 2 race for Lotus at the
Hockenheimring in
Germany, mostly due to contractual obligations with
Firestone. On the fifth lap, his
Lotus 48 veered off the track and crashed into the trees, killing him instantly. The cause of the crash was never definitively identified, but investigators concluded it was most likely due to a deflating rear tyre. Colin Chapman was devastated and publicly stated that he had lost his best friend. As a sign of respect, Chapman ordered the traditional green and yellow badge found on the nose of all Lotus road cars to be replaced with a black badge for a month following Clark's death. The 1968 F1 Drivers' Championship was subsequently won by his Lotus team-mate
Graham Hill, who pulled the heartbroken team together and held off
Jackie Stewart for the crown, which he later dedicated to Clark.
Legacy
Clark achieved 33
pole positions and won 25 races from his 72 Grands Prix starts in championship races. He is remembered for his ability to drive and win in all types of cars and series, including a
Lotus-Cortina, with which he won the 1964
British Touring Car Championship,
IndyCar,
NASCAR, driving a
Ford Galaxie for the
Holman Moody team,
Rallying, where he took part in the 1966
RAC Rally of Great Britain in a Lotus Cortina, and nearly won the event before crashing, and
sports cars. He competed in the
Le Mans 24 Hour race in 1959, 1960 and 1961, finishing second in class in 1959 driving a Lotus Elite, and finishing third overall in 1960, driving an
Aston Martin DBR1.
He was also able to master difficult Lotus sportscar prototypes such as the
Lotus 30 and 40. Clark had an uncanny ability to adapt to whichever car he was driving. Whilst other drivers would struggle to find a good car setup, Clark would usually set competitive lap times with whatever setup was provided and ask for the car to be left as it was.
Alec Maskell, a Dunlop tyre engineer who worked closely with Clark in the mid-1960s, reported that Clark used all four tyres equally, wearing them down at the same rate and using substantially less rubber than any other driver Maskell worked with (
Jack Brabham seemingly used his rears more;
Dan Gurney and
John Surtees used their fronts). Neither Clark nor Dunlop could explain how he did this, but it suggests rather remarkable balance.
Clark describes his unusual driving style in his autobiography: ''"I know I am inclined to go into a corner earlier than most people. By that I mean that most people run deep into a corner before turning the wheels to go round. In this way you can complete all your braking in a straight line, as everyone recommends you do, before setting the car up for the corner; but I prefer to cut into the corner early and even with my brakes still on to set up the car earlier. In this way, I almost make a false apex because I get the power on early and try to drift the car through the true apex and continue with this sliding until I am set up for the next bit of straight."''
He apparently had difficulty understanding why other drivers were not as quick as himself. After his death, Clark's father told
Dan Gurney that he was the only driver his son ever feared.
[3] When Clark died, fellow driver
Chris Amon was quoted as saying, "If it could happen to him, what chance do the rest of us have? I think we all felt that. It seemed like we'd lost our leader."
[www.grandprix.com & http://www.ddavid.com/formula1/clark.htm]
Jim Clark is buried in the village of
Chirnside in
Berwickshire. A memorial stone can be found at the
Hockenheimring circuit, moved from the site of his crash to a location closer to the current track and a life size statue of him in racing overalls stands by the bridge over a small stream in the village of his birth, Kilmany in Fife. A small museum, which is known as The Jim Clark Room
[4], can be found in
Duns.
He was an inaugural inductee into the
Scottish Sports Hall of Fame in 2002.
Complete World Championship Formula One results
() (Races in 'bold' indicate pole position; races in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)
Indy 500 results
Year[Jim Clark Indy 500 Race Stats [1]] | Car
number | Start | Qual.
speed | Speed
rank | Finish | Laps
completed | Laps
led | Race
status | Chassis |
|---|
| 1963 | 92 | 5 | 149.750 | 7 | 2 | 200 | 28 | Running | Lotus-Ford 29/3 |
|---|
| 1964 | 6 | 1 | 158.828 | 1 | 24 | 47 | 14 | Suspension | Lotus-Ford 34/3 |
|---|
| 1965 | 82 | 2 | 160.729 | 2 | 1 | 200 | 190 | Running | Lotus-Ford 38/1 |
|---|
| 1966 | 19 | 2 | 164.114 | 2 | 2 | 200 | 66 | Running | Lotus-Ford 38/4 |
|---|
| 1967 | 31 | 16 | 163.213 | 23 | 31 | 35 | 0 | Piston | Lotus-Ford 38/7 |
|---|
| 'Totals' | 682 | 298 | |
|
| Starts | 5 |
|---|
| Poles | 1 |
|---|
| Front Row | 3 |
|---|
| Wins | 1 |
|---|
| Top 5 | 3 |
|---|
| Top 10 | 3 |
|---|
| Retired | 2 |
|---|
|
★ Clark's starting positions from 1964, 1965, and 1966 represent the best 3-race starting streak of the 1960's.
★ Clark's 1965 win was the first win for a rear-engined car at the Indianapolis 500. No front-engined car has won the race since.
Awards
★ F1 World Champion, 1963 and 1965
★ Indianapolis 500 winner, 1965
★
ABC's
Wide World of Sports Athlete of The Year, 1965
★
British Touring Car Championship Champion, 1964
★
Tasman Series Cup winner, 1965, 1967 and 1968
★ Third place overall,
1960 24 Hours of Le Mans
★ He was inducted into the
International Motorsports Hall of Fame in
1990.
★ He was inducted in the
Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 1990 in the open wheel class.
Bibliography
★ Jim Clark At The Wheel; Jim Clark, Barker, 1964
★ The Jim Clark Story; Jim Gavin, Frewin, 1967
★ Jim Clark, Portrait Of A Great Driver; Graham Gauld, Hamlyn, 1968, ISBN 0-668-01842-9
★ Jim Clark Remembered; Graham Gauld, Patrick Stephens, 1984, ISBN 0-85059-730-7
★ Autocourse Driver Profile: Jim Clark; Doug Nye, Hazleton, 1991, ISBN 0-905138-77-5
★ Jim Clark, The Legend Lives On; Graham Gauld, Patrick Stephens, 1994, ISBN 1-85260-144-2
★ Jim Clark; Eric Dymock, Haynes, 1997, ISBN 0-85429-982-3
★ Jim Clark And His Most Successful Lotus; Doug Nye, Haynes, 2004, ISBN 1-84425-029-6
References
1. "Jim Clark, Scottish automobile racer who became the world driving champion in 1963", Encyclopædia Britannica, accessed 15 May 2007
2. http://eis.net.au/~bramwell/indy.htm
3. The Concise Enyclopedia of Formula One, , David, Tremayne, Parragon, 2001,
4. The Jim Clark Room
External links
★
Jim Clark, Formula One World Champion
★
Photos of Jim Clark & Quotes about him.
★ Jimmy Clark at the
Grand Prix History Hall of Fame
★
Jim Clark Memorial at Hockenheim
★
Jim Clark memorial room at
Duns, Scotland
★ Video clip:
Jim Clark breaks records at Brands Hatch (July 1964)
★
Jim Clark Memorial Rally
★
Jim Clark statistics
{{succession box|title=
Formula One World Champion |before=
Graham Hill|after=
John Surtees|years=
{{succession box|title=
Formula One World Champion |before=
John Surtees|after=
Jack Brabham|years=
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