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by Unknown

  JACKY ICKX

  1965 - 1983

  “My first drive at the Nurburgring was in 1965 when I drove a Mustang for Ford Belgium in the Marathon de la Route. I probably had a look at the circuit before the event, but maybe not, because you must remember that the Marathon was originally the Liege-Rome-Liege Rally and you did not practice for that. It then became the Liege-Sofia-Liege, but it was so complicated to organise on the roads that it was decided to replace it with the Marathon, which involved 86 hours around the Ring. It was a regularity trial, really and at the end there was a two-hour race, which I did. “My co-driver was Gilbert Staepelaere, a rally driver for Ford Belgium and he drove through each night for 10 hours and then I did 14 hours during the day. After this extraordinary experience I knew every single bit of the Nurburgring, although it was at a very reasonable speed, in slow-motion, maybe, first in the Mustang then in 1966 with the Alan Mann Lotus Cortina. That is why when I came into F2 and then Fl I was practically unbeatable! And, of course, I knew all the short cuts.” Jacky’s memory of his first visit to the Ring goes some way to explain how he became a Ringmeister, emerging victorious twice in both the German Grand Prix and the 1000 Kms. Contrary to some reports, it was not Ken Tyrrell who first noticed the young Belgian’s raw talent, but Alan Mann, who recalls: “I saw him at Zolder in 1964. John Whitmore was driving for me and he took me to the back of the circuit to show me a lot of rubber on the outside of what was a very quick corner. John pointed to it saying, ‘That is from the Mustang of a guy called Ickx. I have followed him in practice and he is completely sideways through here. He has unbelievable car control but, of course, he is not very quick.’ “Jacky’s family was with him and his father and mother both wrote for the newspapers. Next day there was a headline saying ‘Ickx breaks Whitmore’s lap record’. That was true, but what the paper did not say was that he was still two seconds slower than John had been the day before. I had a word with his brother, Pascal, and said, ‘I don’t think that is at all helpful for such a young lad. He is trying too hard and he is not even going quickly with all this sideways stuff.’ “After the meeting I talked with Jacky and suggested that he drive a Cortina for me in Budapest, follow John Whitmore at a sensible distance and get some valuable experience. I then talked to his parents and said, ‘If Jacky is going to progress he needs to get away from easy-to-drive touring cars which he can chuck sideways all the time; he needs the discipline of being much tidier in single-seaters.’ “He did the three-hour race in Budapest for me, following John around carefully and neatly. Ken Tyrrell was there and I Calked to him about Jacky, saying ‘This kid has great talent, but he is going down the wrong avenue - he needs to be in single-seaters.’” Tyrrell watched Ickx drive the Cortina and was so impressed by what he saw that he invited him to test an F3 car in England, but as Jacky was about to join the Belgian Army for 15 months he was unable to take up the offer. Before that, however, he did the Marathon in the Mustang and, as Alan Mann recalls, he was lucky to finish at all. “Jacky was in the next pit to us. On the second day the rain was so heavy that I had our cars fitted with Dunlop SP rally tyres. Jacky was on racing tyres and so was losing time, yet his mother prepared a pit board showing his time in order to speed him up. He was coming down the pit straight in torrential rain on racing tyres and he was more sideways than straight, so I grabbed the sign before she could show it to him. His mother got all upset, but I had to say ‘Come on! he’s on the wrong tyres and there are still three days to go.’ I just could not believe the pressure they put on him.” Nonetheless, Ickx and Staepelaere finished second in the Marathon and then Jacky went off to join the Army. No sooner was he back in civvy street than he got a call from Ken Tyrrell. “So I went to Goodwood - where I crashed - and then to Oulton Park - where I crashed again! But Ken said, ‘Don’t worry we’ll fix that’. I was very fast, but too fast for my own good, obviously. Still, he saw the potential in me.” He certainly did, so much so that he invited 21 year-old Jacky to join the Tyrrell team for F3 and F2 in 1966. That was the first year of the new, 3-litre Formula One and as several 3-litre engines were still not ready by the time of the German GP, the organisers added an F2 race to be run with it. Nine 1-litre, F2 cars made it to the starting grid including four Matras, two works cars for Jo Schlesser and Jean-Pierre Beltoise and two Ken Tyrrell cars for Hubert Hahne and Jacky Ickx. After the final practice session the times were as follows: Hahne - 9 Mins 17.0 secs; Schlesser -9’ 12.5”; Beltoise - 9’ 04.4” and Ickx a remarkable 8’ 52.0”. The 21 yearold Belgian was the only F2 driver to get under nine minutes and had already raised eyebrows on the first day of practice by recording 9’ 04.4” after just two flying laps. Those 14-hour stints in the Marathon were paying off. Unfortunately, on the very first lap of the race Jacky was unable to avoid John Taylor’s crashing Brabham and went off the road. He helped extricate the unfortunate Taylor from his burning car and then drove the Matra slowly back to the pits to retire with damaged suspension. It was hardly an auspicious debut but clearly, his practice times had shown that here was a Ringmeister in the making. A few weeks later Ickx and Staepelaere did the Marathon again, this time in an Alan Mann Cortina and again they finished second. John Wyer was another team owner who was very impressed with Jacky Ickx. In his 13 years as Manager of David Brown’s Aston Martin team he had signed a slew of top flight drivers, including Stirling Moss, Peter Collins, Tony Brooks and Roy Salvadori and recognised driving talent when he saw it. By 1967 John was his own boss at JW Automotive, which he had set up with his friend John Willment. They brought in the former Vanwall Team Manager, David Yorke and, with the backing of Gulf Oil, went racing with the Ford GT40-based Gulf Mirages. And they signed Jacky Ickx, as John noted in his autobiography, The Certain Sound: ‘It is not easy now to remember the impression which Ickx, then not twenty-one, had created in Europe. His performances, particularly at the Nurburgring... had stamped him as a driver of the greatest potential.’ As did his performance with the Gulf-Mirage in the Spa 1000 Kms, as Wyer recalled: ‘When we woke on May 1 it was typical Ardennes weather - heavy low cloud with squalls of rain sweeping over the hills. Visibility was less than a mile. We drove up from Stavelot to the circuit with sinking hearts. Only Jacky Ickx, who loves Spa and driving in the rain, was elated. ‘The conditions were horrible for everyone else but ideally suited to Jacky Ickx. He swept into the lead at the start and at the end of the first lap, a little over four minutes later, he came down past the pits, over the Eau Rouge, up the hill towards Les Combes and out of sight before the next car could be heard on the back straight behind the pits. It was sublime but almost ridiculous and the spectators, 100 per cent Ickx supporters, actually started to laugh before the second car came round.’ Ickx won the race (with Dick Thompson) but he was never to have any real luck at the Nurburgring with the Gulf-Mirages. A month after Spa, Jacky shared a car with Dickie Attwood in the 1000 Kms but in practice he could not get near Phil Hill, who got the winged Chaparral round in 8 mins 31.9 secs, whereas Jacky could only do 9’ 00.4”. Ickx had trouble getting going at the Le Mans start and after four laps was in ninth place. By the time he handed over to Attwood he was third and Dickie was running in second spot and about to hand back to Jacky after 29 laps when he ran over some debris at Breidscheid and punctured two tyres. The 12-km drive back to the pits was out of the question, so he had to park the car and retire. As in 1966, the German GP included a race for F2 cars (now with 1.5-litre engines) and Ken Tyrrell took two Matras to the Ring, an MS5 for Ickx and Stewart’s MS7, which was not used. Jacky was the sensation of practice, his time of 8 mins 14.0 sees being a remarkable 21 seconds quicker than the next F2 car, which was the Lotus of Jackie Oliver. It was also 10 sees quicker than the lap record, set in ‘65 by Jim Clark (1.5-litre Lotus-Climax) with a time of 8’ 24.1”; this despite the fact that a new bend, the Bremskurve, had been built just before the start-finish area to slow the cars as they passed the pits. Jacky’s time was good enough for third spot on the grid, too, after Jim Clark’s Lot
us (8’ 04.1”) and Denny Hulme’s Brabham (8’ 13.5”). Jacky was also 1.2 secs faster than his Tyrrell F2 team¬mate Jackie Stewart (who was driving for BRM in this race) and reckoned that he would have been a good 8 seconds faster in the MS7! As the F2 cars were in a separate race the organisers made them start from their own grid behind the Fl machines. Ickx had no fewer than 17 of those ahead of him, but once the flag had dropped he set about disposing of them one by one. On the third lap he set a new lap record with 8’ 21.8” (to be beaten later by Dan Gurney (Eagle) with 8’ 15.1”) and was up to ninth place. One lap later Gurney led from the Brabhams of Hulme and Brabham and the BRM of Stewart - and Ickx was now fifth! On lap six Stewart retired and, according to Motoring News, ‘he went along to the Tyrrell pit and advised them that Papa Ickx would lose one of his sons unless they slowed Jacky down, for the attitude of the Matra on the twisty, downhill sections had worried him considerably.’ Clearly, young Jacky was still enjoying his sideways motoring! Stewart’s concern proved academic, as Jacky pulled into the pits at the end of lap 11, to retire with a fractured ball joint on the Matra’s front suspension. Denny Hulme won the Grand Prix for Brabham, but it was Ickx who was the talk of the town afterwards. Jacky himself was in no way surprised by his sensational performance. “I knew the circuit so well by then,” he says, “ and the F2 Matra was light and tiny and much easier to use than an Fl car on a circuit like the Ring. It was unfortunate that I wasn’t driving Jackie Stewart’s MS7, which had an updated monocoque and was sitting in the garage. There was a hell of a difference between his car and mine and I knew this because I drove Jackie’s car in some races for the European F2 Championship. I did not drive it at the Ring because, naturally, he did not want to risk it being damaged, but if I had driven it I would have been sensationally faster. On a normal race course there was easily one second between them, so at the Ring the MS7 would have been a match for the best Fl car.” Ken Tyrrell was now in the enviable position of having the two most promising Grand Prix drivers, Jacky and Jackie, on his books and he was eagerly anticipating taking them into F1 in 1968 with Matra. But talent such as theirs shines a light so bright that it attracts a great deal of attention and before you could say Enzo, Ferrari had approached both drivers for the coming season. Stewart was interested, but found himself dumped by the Old Man without even signing anything and Ickx eventually joined the Scuderia, but only because Stewart went with Tyrrell and Matra insisted that their second driver be French. He was sorry to leave: “Without Ken I would not have become a professional racing driver; he was the man who really gave me the push. Without him - nothing!” Ferrari naturally wanted Jacky for sportscars as well as F1, but he stayed faithful to JWA and, despite the fact that the Mirage was not the ideal car for the Nurburgring, he came close to winning the 1000 Kms in 1968. Rolf Stommelen won pole position in practice, taking his flat-eight, 2.2-litre Porsche round in 8 mins 32.8 sees, well below John Surtees’ record of 8’ 37.0” with the Ferrari. Ickx was a splendid second with the Gulf-Mirage, recording 8’ 37.4”. Unfortunately, before the race Jacky fell victim to a rare mistake by John Wyer, as John admitted in The Certain Sound: ‘It was here that David Yorke and I made a serious tactical error. We decided, for some rather obscure reason, to change our driver pairings and put Paul Hawkins with Ickx, leaving Brian Redman to drive with David Hobbs. We probably thought that Paul had more experience at the Nurburgring than Brian and we may have been influenced by Brian’s mistakes at Sebring and Monza. It was a bad decision. ‘In the race Ickx was, as usual, brilliant, but Paul Hawkins was disappointing. To quote Paul Frere writing in The Racing Porsches: “The GT40 proved to be a real menace for the Porsches as long as Ickx drove, but Hawkins could not keep up the pace”. The race was won by Siffert and Elford in a Porsche 908, with Herrmann and Stommelen second in a 907 and Ickx/Hawkins 50 seconds back in third place. Hawkins had driven for a total of 12 laps and to make matters worse from our point of view, Redman had been an average of 5 seconds per lap faster than Paul. We might thus very easily have been second, although we could hardly have won. It was not a bad result but we had paid heavily for our mistake. Siffert had made the fastest lap during the race in 8’ 33.0” while Ickx had done a barely credible 8’ 34.0”.’ In Grand Prix racing Jacky’s stay with Ferrari lasted just one season and it was not a happy one. His 312 failed to finish the first three Grandes Epreuves, he was third in Belgium, fourth in Holland and then won the French GP at Rouen with a superb drive in very wet conditions. He really excelled in the rain, so the German GP should have seen him shine through the downpour that drenched the Eifel region all weekend, but it didn’t. He began well enough, recording 9 mins 04.0 secs in Friday morning’s practice, faster by 10 seconds than the next man, his Ferrari team-mate Chris Amon. Conditions were so bad for the remaining sessions that Jacky’s time put him on pole, but he made a bad start and was sixth at the end of the opening lap. By lap six his visor had become spattered with mud and then, as Innes Ireland reported in Autocar. ‘Ickx, who had been just about to pass Rindt, had his first spin of the day, and suddenly dropped back over one minute, leaving him only 46 secs ahead of Brabham. Then at the end of lap seven he rushed into the pit lane, slowed up a bit, threw his goggles at his team manager and rushed on, skating his way past some very startled officials and mechanics as he left the pit road with wheels spinning and spray flying.’ On lap 11, Ickx actually stopped at his pit and collected a new visor provided by fellowcountryman Lucien Bianchi, who had retired his Cooper-BRM. He finally finished fourth behind Jackie Stewart (Matra), Graham Hill (Lotus) and Jochen Rindt (Brabham). It was ‘the other Jackie’, not Jacky, who had shone through the gloom like a beacon and driven like a true Ringmeister to win the race. Jacky’s year with Ferrari ended on an unhappy note when a sticking throttle caused him to crash during practice for the Canadian GP and he suffered a broken leg. Ferrari wanted him to sign exclusively with the Scuderia for 1969, but he was very happy with JWA and determind to stay there for endurance racing. Also, Ferrari was with Shell and Firestone, whereas JWA was with Gulf and Goodyear. As he had not enjoyed any real success with Ferrari he signed with the Brabham Fl team, which was also backed by Gulf and Goodyear. For the 1000 Kms Ickx was paired with Jackie Oliver in the new Gulf-Mirage M2, powered by a 3-litre Ford Cosworth engine. However, as John Wyer noted, ‘The roadholding of the Mirage was a disaster at the Nurburgring. Even Ickx in the Cosworth car could do no better than a lap in 8’ 27.2”, which compared very unfavourably with the fastest lap of 8’ 03.3” by Chris Amon in the Ferrari 312P while Oliver, in the same car, could do no better than 8’ 43.4” which was equalled by Hailwood in our second car with the BRM engine. None of this had any effect on the result because the Ickx/Oliver car broke a pivot bolt in the rear suspension and the Hobbs/ Hailwood car ran out of fuel.’ However, JWA’s next race was Le Mans where, reverting to the trusty GT40s, they scored a famous victory, the Ickx/Oliver car winning by a few feet from the Hans Herrmann/Gerard Larrousse Porsche after Ickx and Herrmann had fought wheel-to-wheel for the final three hours. Another famous victory followed at the Nurburgring, where Jacky drove out of his skin to win the Grand Prix for Brabham. His was the team’s lone entry, for Jack had broken a leg while testing at Silverstone a few weeks earlier. By this time ‘the other Jackie’ was running away with the World Championship, having won five of the first six races with the Tyrrell Matra-Ford. Ickx had finished fifth in the Dutch GP, third in the French and second in the British so maybe it was to be his turn to be Number One in Germany. In the first practice session on the Friday morning Stewart was fastest with 7 mins 55.6 secs. Ickx could only manage 8’ 33.8”, but that was his one flying lap, as a piece of metal became stuck under the fuel relief valve. He may have been earthbound in the morning, but that afternoon, he flew! Out in the country, Motor Sport’s Denis Jenkinson watched in awe: ‘The Nurburgring offers unlimited opportunities for spectators to see Grand Prix driving at its best. It is an easy matter to position yourself at a point where cars come into
view long before they are recognisable and having come out of a fast bend or a series of bends the driver’s knowledge of the circuit and his ability can easily be seen by the speed at which he comes into view. Ickx. Stewart and Siffert (Lotus) were outstanding on Friday afternoon... ‘Moving to a point where the cars went out of sight round a blind right-hand bend, and being high above the track on a bank, it was possible to look down into the cockpits as they disappeared behind the trees. Siffert and Ickx were going out 1969 Germany GP, Nurburgring. Qualifying resulted in Jacky Ickx (No. 6) taking Pole Position, with Jackie Stewart (No. 7) 2nd and Jochen Rindt (No 2) 3rd of sight with the power still on and a lot of opposite lock, demonstrating that they knew not only where they were going, but were complete masters of their cars. Stewart was only applying correction to the power steering when the need called for it, rather than deliberately provoking the situation like the other two... Ickx, Siffert, Stewart, Rindt (Lotus) and McLaren (McLaren) had all broken the eight-minute barrier in that order, the young Belgian Brabham driver having recorded an unbelievable 7 mins 44.2 secs. It would have been unbelievable had not three or four rival teams in the pits agreed with the official time. ‘Bearing in mind that Ickx and Siffert have already been to the Nurburgring once this season, with a lot of experience of fast laps, to say nothing of the hundreds of laps they have completed over the past four years, the pattern that was taking shape was to be expected. Both drivers love the circuit and treat it as a friend, rather than a challenge and were obviously as happy as the proverbial pigs in the proverbial fertilizer. Stewart was viewing the circuit as a challenge to his ability and was proving that ability beyond question... ‘The third and final practice session was on Saturday and further spectating from the excellent public enclosures merely confirmed which drivers had ability, which were enjoying themselves and which were wasting time. Ickx improved his best time to 7 mins 42.1 secs, proving that his performance the day before was not a fluke, while Stewart responded to the challenge of the little Belgian with 7 mins 42.4 sees, a remarkable equality bearing in mind all the variables in a lap of 22.8 kilometres.’ On race day the weather was perfect and some 350,000 spectators had positioned themselves around the fabulous Ring in keen anticipation of a battle between Jackie and Jacky. The former had had it all his own way thus far in the season - would the latter be able to put a stop to the run of Stewart/Tyrrell/Matra successes? He would indeed. He made a good start from pole position, but several drivers, led by Stewart, made a better one and by the time the dust had settled on the grid he was in seventh place as the field hurtled down towards the Adenau crossing. ‘At the end of the opening lap Stewart had a sixsecond lead over Siffert and Rindt,’ wrote Jenks, ‘but Ickx was right behind them and going like the wind. He had come up behind McLaren, Hill (Lotus) and Hulme (McLaren), who were together, so fast that they had moved smartly out of the way.’ Stewart completed his second lap in 7 mins 50.9 secs, a new record, but on lap three Ickx passed Rindt and then Siffert to claim second place, setting a new record in the process with 7’ 45.9”. Next time round he took 1.4 sees off that and was now right on Stewart’s tail. Down the three-kilometre straight the Matra and the Brabham were side-byside, but Stewart had the line for the Bremskurve before the pits and held his first position. ‘All round the fifth lap the battle continued,’ wrote Jenkinson, ‘with Ickx trying desperately to get by the Matra, but to no avail and they finished the lap nose-to-tail... As they came up the back straight behind the pits and into the North Curve Ickx made a desperate do-or-die attempt and went by on the inside under braking. In a cloud of dust and locked wheels he went across the apex of the corner, slid out wide and Stewart dived through behind him and retook the lead; it was truly heroic motor racing. Undaunted, Ickx continued to harry the Scot all round the sixth lap, the two of them averaging nearly 108 mph in a breathtaking battle of sheer driving skill. As they crested the rise of Tiergarten Ickx was a few feet closer and alongside as they passed the pits. He sat it out with Stewart, wheel-to-wheel as they raced towards the South Turn and this time he was into the corner first and leading as they came back up behind the pits. With a clear road ahead Ickx used everything the Brabham could give and set yet another lap record with a time of 7 mins 43.8 secs, which gave him a narrow two second lead on Stewart.’ Jackie managed to stay with Jacky for the next two laps, but then the Matra’s gearbox began to play up and he dropped back. Ickx eased up, lapping at around 7 mins 52 secs and still going away from Stewart, who was well ahead of Bruce McLaren. And that is how they finished, Ickx completing the 14 laps at an average speed of 108.43 mph/174.498 kph and demolishing the lap record of 8 mins 05.3 secs (set by ‘the other Jackie’) with a time of 7 mins 43.8 secs (110.13 mph/177.244 kph). That drive established Jacky Ickx as King of the Nurburgring. “At that time Jackie Stewart was the man to beat and I beat him there.” he recalls. “Also, because Jack Brabham had broken his leg I had the whole team behind me, which gave me the extra confidence I needed to take off. That was really the start of things for me in F1.” Ickx went on to win the Canadian GP for Brabham (ahead of his boss, Jack) and was second in Mexico, which made him second in the World Championship behind Stewart. However, in October, 1969 he tested a Ferrari 312B at Vallelunga and was immediately impressed with the power and torque of Mauro Forghieri’s superb flat-12 engine. He decided to rejoin Ferrari and drive their Fl and sportscars in 1970. John Surtees had also rejoined the Scuderia (although only for four endurance races) and, driving a 512, he and Ickx finished second to the Porsche 917K of Jo Siffert/Brian Redman in the Spa 1000 kms. As the Nurburgring is just ‘up the road’ from Spa, Ferrari went straight there to test a 512 Spyder prior to the German 1000 kms race two weeks later. Unfortunately, Jacky spun the car and bent it somewhat, which curtailed the testing but the Scuderia still entered three cars for the race, to be driven by Ickx/Ignazio Giunti; Surtees/Peter Schetty and Arturo Merzario/Nino Vaccarella. However, as Patrick McNally reported in Autosport: ‘Ferrari were having their usual share of aggravations. The cars are a bit big and heavy for this tight circuit and no match for the scuttling Porsche 908s. Added to this, Ickx had hurt his wrist when he slipped on some stairs. He arrived late and did a single lap before deciding that his damaged wrist wasn’t up to the task. As he said afterwards: “To drive a Ferrari round the Ring you need three hands, and I’ve only got one!’” Fair enough, but it was a shame, nonetheless, as it would have been interesting to compare the lap times of the new Ringmeister and the old in the big Ferrari. Jacky did not get to drive at the Ring again that year, and nor did anyone else, as the German GP moved to Hockenheim, while the bulldozers moved in to make the Nürburgring acceptable to the GPDA. However, the GPDA itself was not acceptable to Jacky Ickx and in October, 1970, he resigned (See Der Nürburg-Ring -A History). Much of the work was completed in time for the 1000 Kms race on May 30, 1971. This looked as though it would be a straight fight between the four Alfa Romeo Tipo 33-3s, fresh from their superb 1-2 victory in the Targa Florio two weeks earlier, and the four Porsche 908s, of which there were two each entered by JWA-Gulf and Martini International. But lurking menacingly in the garage square was a lone Ferrari wolf, eager to devour the Alfa and Porsche sheep in the race. This was the 312P, as near as dammit Ferrari’s Fl car in disguise. The FIA had announced a 3-litre limit for Prototypes to begin in 1972, so Ferrari simply adjusted their GP car to carry an all-enveloping ‘two-seater’ body and hey, presto - a sportsracer! Porsche had already discovered that their nimble, 3-litre 908 could run rings around the awesome, 5-litre 917 at the Ring, and Ferrari was about to learn the same regarding their 312P and 512. The three-litre car took to the Eifel like a duck to water. It had, as Denis Jenkinson noted in Motor Sport, ‘a Grand Prix-type 3-litre flat-12 cylinder engine, Grand Prix brakes, gearbox and suspension and Grand Prix drivers Ickx and Regazzoni to drive it.’ This was the first race on the ‘new’ Nürburgring and, as Patrick McNally revealed in Autosport, ‘Since the GPDA turned down this circuit last year the famous Nürburgring has had a
complete facelift. Most of the places where the cars used to become airborne have been levelled off, including the notorious 13.2-km post going up towards the Karussell, while the difficult section through Wippermann and Brünnchen has been substantially altered, although the track still goes the same way. There are run-off areas around most of the track, which is also bordered with curbs; however the dangerous run down to Adenau remains little altered, and the straight is still lined with hedge rather than guard-rail. Before the Grand Prix in August more changes will no doubt be made, but drivers were already complaining that the work had removed many of their markers and they were having to learn the course all over again! ‘Jacky Ickx lost little time in familiarising himself with the changes and soon had the little Ferrari whistling round; the Belgian’s uncanny skill was confirmed with a lap in 7 mins 36.1 secs, a full 9 seconds faster than any other car. Clay Regazzoni managed 7’ 42.4” although it was only his second time here, so the Ferrari started as superfavourite.’ It looked a sure-fire winner from the start of the race, too, for Ickx simply drove away from the opposition and after five laps he was 40 seconds ahead of the Alfa Romeo of Rolf Stommelen, having broken his own sportscar lap record with a time of 7 mins 40.8 secs. Stommelen was being harried by the Porsches of Vic Elford and Jo Siffert, but they could do nothing about the Ferrari. Until one lap later, when Ickx made for the pits having noticed that the water temperature in the flat-12 was rising rapidly. There was no apparent reason for this, so more water -and fuel - was added and Jacky was sent on his way, but not before Stommelen, Elford and Siffert had all gone by. Mauro Forghieri then went searching among the British pits for some Radweld, but to no avail, so when Ickx stopped again next time round nothing could be done except to tell him to drive on the water temperature guage, which he did, and to great effect. Jacky was now back in sixth place, but going like the wind and when, on lap 11, the Alfas and the Porsches all seemed to stop at once for fuel, he moved up to third. On the very next lap he passed the Stommelen/Galli Alfa and then the Elford/ Larrousse Porsche to take the lead and, remarkably, was almost a minute ahead by the end of that lap. Things got even better for Ferrari when the Alfa pulled in to retire with a broken con-rod next time round. Ickx finally handed over to Regazzoni after 15 electrifying laps and Clay went back into the race without losing the lead. He proved to be an excellent foil for Ickx and kept the pursuing Porsche of Elford/Larrousse some 20 seconds behind the Ferrari, until the inevitable happened, as Patrick McNally reported: ‘The Ferrari challenge disappeared on lap 21 when Regazzoni came into the pits and Larrousse swept by into the lead. The 312P was completely out of coolant and when they added water it poured straight out of the exhaust pipes, indicating cracked heads. The mechanics wheeled the red car away; they hadn’t won, but they had certainly proved a point.’ And Jacky Ickx had proved once again (as if proof were needed) that he was a true Ringmeister. Unfortunately, he blotted his copybook a couple of months later when he went off the road in the German GP. He was brilliant in practice, vying for pole position with ‘the other Jackie’ in the Tyrrell, who was fastest on the Friday morning with a time of 7 mins 21.9 sees. Ickx could only do 7’ 35.8”, but the engine in his Ferrari 312B2 was running hot and refusing to pull maximum revs. In the afternoon Stewart recorded a stunning 7’ 19.0” and Jacky got down to 7’ 22.9”, reducing that to 7’ 19.2” on the Saturday. Sunday, it seemed, would see true ‘Battle of the Ringmeisters Sadly, it was not to be, for although Ickx took an immediate lead in the race, Stewart passed him as they went into the North Turn and was never again headed. At the end of lap one he had a lead of three seconds over Ickx and team-mate Regazzoni, but on the second tour Ickx made a rare mistake in the climbing right-hand turn at Wippermann and clouted the new Armco barrier hard. He was unhurt, but the Ferrari was hors de combat. However, Jacky would make amends for this faux pas in fine style in the next two years, winning the German GP and then the l000Kms. ‘Of all the circuits in the Grand Prix series it is the Nurburgring which provides the greatest test of driver skill.’ wrote Autocar’s Ray Hutton in 1972. ‘14.2 miles of twisting tarmac, over 170 corners, call for experience and familiarity. Naturally the car needs to be fast - average speeds at the Ring are around 115 mph these days - and must be well set up for the continuous curves and changes of camber. When all these factors come together the combination is irresistible. They come together with Jacky Ickx. Ever since he shocked the Establishment by setting third fastest time overall in a Formula 2 Matra in practice for the 1967 German Grand Prix, the young Belgian has been acknowledged as the “man to beat” at the Ring.’ Jackie Stewart would no doubt have something to say about the last sentiment, but not even he could beat ‘the other Jacky’ to pole position for the German GP. As in the previous year, the two Ringmeisters were locked in battle throughout practice but, as Patrick McNally noted in Autosport: ‘There was absolutely no doubt about who was the star of practice; Ickx was fastest on Friday with 7 mins 10.0 sees, over 9 secs under Cevert’s existing lap record, the Ferrari going superbly. On Saturday Ickx, as if to endorse the point, put in four fantastic laps: 7’ 07”, followed by 7’ 07.6” and a couple around the 7’ 10.0” mark - a simply incredible performance. Jacky was going down the tricky section towards the Adenau Bridge using every bit of road, visibly closer to the limit than anybody else. At the end of practice he said that he wouldn’t have liked to have been watching his own performance as it would be too frightening. Needless to say the Ferrari was on pole position, having made mincemeat of the lap record.’ In Motor Sport, Denis Jenkinson was equally impressed: ‘Ickx was consistently below 7 mins 10 secs and ended up with a shattering 7’ 07.0”, a speed of 192.5 kph (approx 119.5 mph). It was Grand Prix driving at its best and a complete justification of the “face-lift” given to the Eifel circuits, making it the sort of challenge to man and machine that is sadly lacking on the flat Autodromes. A lap at nearly 120 mph round the Nurburgring is the sort of performance that makes the most blase follower of the sport reel back and exclaim “Kee-rist” or “Mon Dieu”. Ickx was not alone in these lastminute heroics, for Stewart was well under 7 mins 10 sees and right at the end of practice got one in at 7 mins 08.7 secs, a mere 1.7 sees slower in more than seven minutes of 100 per-cent concentrated high-speed driving. These were the undisputed “Ringmeisters”.’ Other fine performances came from Emerson Fittipaldi (Lotus-Cosworth), making only his second appearance at the Ring and Ronnie Peterson (March-Cosworth). Emerson was third fastest in practice with a remarkable 7 mins 09.9 secs, ahead of Peterson, who recorded 7’ 12.4”. Happily, the length of the Grand Prix had been restored to 14 laps (200 miles) this year, which was a distinct boon for spectators, who saw little enough of the cars, due to the 14.2-mile lap. From the start it was Jacky Ickx’s race and after a standing lap in 7 mins 29.1 sees he began to annihilate the lap record, emulating Juan Fangio’s astonishing attack in the 1957 Grand Prix and Phil Hill’s similar assault on the sportscar record in 1961. His first flying lap took 7 mins 20.7 secs, then it was: lap three - 7’ 18.8”; lap four - 7’ 16.7”; lap five - 7’ 16.8”; lap six - 7’ 16.2”; lap seven - 7’ 15.1”; lap eight - 7’ 14.7”; lap nine - 7’ 14.5”; lap ten - 7’ 13.6”; lap eleven - 7’ 14.9”; lap twelve -7’ 15.7”; lap thirteen (easing up, now) - 7’ 20.4” and lap fourteen 7’ 25.1”. “That wasn’t difficult,” says Jacky. “When you warm up the muscles you get efficient lap after lap and that year the Ferrari was an excellent car. We should have won the Championship, but there were too many small failures with the 312.” After five laps Jacky was 13.6 secs ahead of the second man, Emerson Fittipaldi, who was going like gangbusters in the Lotus. Third was Ronnie Peterson in the March, closely followed by Clay Regazzoni in the second Ferrari and Jackie Stewart in the Tyrrell. At half-distance Ickx had increased his lead to 17 seconds and on lap ten he recorded his fastest lap of the day in 7’ 13.6”, now having, as Ray Hutton pointed out: ‘that clear indicator of Nurburgring dominance - the whole of the start area loop, from the chicane through to
the North Curve - in hand over Fittipaldi.’ He slowed slightly on the next tour as an exhaust manifold had split and the Ferrari flat-12 was lacking some 400 rpm on the straight, but as he now had a lead of some 45 seconds over teammate Clay Regazzoni, he was in no trouble. Jacky took the chequered flag to win his second Grand Prix at the Nurburgring after a truly sensational drive. As Jenks wrote: ‘To say that the Ferrari victory was popular would be an understatement, while Ickx was smiling happily because any driver knows when he has done a superb job of driving, and he knew.’ He did indeed. “That win with the Ferrari was my most satisfying drive at the Nurburgring,” says Jacky. “I was at the peak of my ability then and very few people could match me there.” On July 30, 1972, for “very few”, read “nobody” and that drive marked him truly as a King of the Nurburgring. He was, indeed, at the very peak of his ability, so it is ironic that his superb performance should bring him what was to be his last Grand Prix win of all. He had every reason to believe that he would add many more to the eight he had already accumulated but, despite his undoubted skills, from that point on his Grand Prix career went nowhere. However, whereas Scuderia Ferrari’s Fl programme was in disarray at this time, their sportscars were virtually unbeatable and in marked contrast to his Fl season, in 1972 Jacky won no fewer than six of the eleven Championship endurance races. Unfortunately, the Nurburgring 1000 Kms was not one of them. Ferrari entered three 312Ps for Ickx/Regazzoni, Brian Redman/ Arturo Merzario and Ronnie Peterson/Tim Schenken. The race started on a wet track and so the Ferraris were on Firestone tyres with a medium wet compound. Jacky took the lead on lap three and handed over to Regazzoni on lap 10. Clay retained the lead, but the track was now drying rapidly and the tyres were losing their grip, so much so that on lap 17 he clobbered the Armco at Wippermann and that was that. The other two Ferraris managed to stay on the road and finished first and second. Jacky put things right the following year, but with no thanks to his team-mate, Arturo Merzario. Ferrari entered two 312Ps for Ickx/Brian Redman and Merzario/Carlos Pace. They were up against the Alfa Romeos of Rolf Stommelen/Andrea de Adamich and Clay Regazzoni/Carlo Facetti and the Matras of Henri Pescarolo/Gerard Larrousse and Francois Cevert/ Jean-Pierre Beltoise. It was Cevert in the Matra who was the sensation of practice, beating Ickx’s Fl lap record of 7 mins 13.6 secs by 0.08 secs to take pole position. He didn’t bother to practice any more after that! Rolf Stommelen was second fastest in the Alfa, with 7’ 19.5”, but the Ferraris were in trouble, as Jeff Hutchinson noted in Autosport: ‘Ferrari were obviously way off the mark and just not quick enough, which was rubbed in when Ickx spent several laps trying to keep up with Beltoise (Matra) on Friday and came back in after losing a lot of ground, with a best time of 7’ 23.5”. The second Ferrari did not better 7’ 28.2” on the first day. ‘Timekeeping was very suspect and one could not help thinking that the organisers were doctoring the times to suit the pre-race publicity. It became a bit naughty when, after Saturday’s practice, Ickx was credited with 7 mins 15.5 secs, much to the surprise of Ferrari. General opinion was that the timekeepers had timed the wrong car, for all the pits got Ickx at a best of 7’ 21.7”, which was the time they ended up giving to Merzario in the second Ferrari.’ Francois Cevert ran away with the race to begin with, setting a new lap record of 7 mins 20.3 sees on lap eight and being some 15 seconds ahead of Jacky Ickx in the Ferrari. This increased by a further 10 seconds at their respective pit stops, as a fuse had to be replaced on the Ferrari before the fuel pumps would work. The Merzario/Pace Ferrari was in third place, ahead of the Stommelemn/de Adamich Alfa, but the latter retired with various engine troubles on lap 11. This was good news for Ferrari, and things got even better two laps later when the Cevert/ Beltioise Matra threw a rod and handed the race to Jacky and Brian Redman. But not quite, for Arturo Merzario decided to upset the Ferrari apple cart. His co-driver, Carlos Pace, had made his first pit stop a lap early by mistake and Merzario, who had not yet climbed into his driving suit, had to take over without even putting on his gloves. He shook his fist in fury at Pace as he rejoined the race and, just to make his point he, too, stopped a lap early after seven laps, but at least Pace was ready. Meanwhile, Brian Redman had done two stints on the trot after taking over from Ickx and now Jacky did likewise, so when Merzario went back into the second Ferrari Ickx was some 20 seconds ahead of him. Both drivers were signalled to take it easy, as a Ferrari one-two was virtually in the bag but Arturo, still fuming, decided to Hell with that! He drove faster and faster, ignoring the ‘slow’ signals from his pit and was lapping at around 7 mins 30 sees, a good 20 secs faster than was necessary. On lap 36 he took the lead! He and Ickx went past the pits with Jacky’s flat-12 mis-firing on the rev-limiter, which was cutting in early and preventing him from keeping Merzario at bay. ‘Three times they hung out “in” signs to the Italian but he took no notice,’ wrote Jeff Hutchinson, ‘finally letting Ickx ahead again on lap 38 and then stopping a lap later. Sig Caliri (the Ferrari Team Manager) had to order Merzario out of the car as he did not want to get out. Pace finished the race to orders, but no doubt made Caliri feel he had a mutiny on his hands when he closed right up on Ickx again for the finish, although he did not attempt to pass. Merzario took off his helmet and stormed off, which was probably the best thing he could do.’ So Jacky Ickx won the 1000 Kms at his sixth attempt. It was hardly a classic drive in the mould of his Grand Prix victory the year before, but any victory at the Nurburgring is worth more than most and it further enhanced his status as a Ringmeister, now with three wins to his name. However, it would be ten years before he would win again at the Ring. By the time of the German Grand Prix Scuderia Ferrari was in complete disarray once more. Throughout the season Ickx had been slipping further and further back on the starting grid until, at Silverstone for the British GP, he found himself in 20th position with his Ferrari 312B3. He finished a lowly eighth and decided that it was time to leave the Scuderia, as he explained to Mike Doodson in Autosport: ‘I had a long discussion with Ferrari last week. They have decided to withdraw for a period of time, which may be for one week, but might be three months. Mr Ferrari agrees that since he himself does not know how long this period will be - and since I might not be driving for him in 1974 - there would be no point in my trying to develop a car that I was not going to use next year. ‘So we finally reached the decision to bring our existing agreements and contracts to an end now, instead of letting them run to the end of the year. My Ferrari contract is now finished and I am free to go where I want, when I want and with who I want.’ Jacky went to McLaren. ‘I was in Zandvoort as a spectator (for the Dutch GP) and discussed the matter with McLaren there. It was a car I very much wanted to drive because the previous races - particularly Paul Ricard and Silverstone - proved that it was the most competitive. I asked if there could be a spare car for me at Nurburgring, provided I could be released by Ferrari, and that is exactly what happened. ‘It was very nice of McLaren to let me have the third car in the middle of the championship season. As far as I am concerned, the first practice day with the McLaren was very important, because in a very few laps I proved that I was still quick and that I still had the incentive to drive fast. ‘It is good for Ferrari, too. He will not have to ask any more “Is it the driver or is it the car?” Now he will be able to say to the engineer, “I regret, Jacky Ickx has done a good time at the Nurburgring with another car. Your job is now to make the Ferrari work properly.’” All this was very important to Ickx, for the Italian press had been quick to blame him for Ferrari’s lack of success, claiming that he had lost the will to win. McLaren sent three M23s to the Nurburgring, the first two for Denny Hulme and Pete Revson. As Pete Lyons noted in Autosport: ‘The Yardley-McLarens were as before, with one alteration - big red letters on the airbox of the “spare” car reading JACKY ICKX... Obviously the intelligent Belgian is now looking for work and it was a good chance to display his value to the world after the questioning statements issued in Italy; in return the Kiwis got the services of one of the undisputed Eif
el specialists - and incidentally the race organisers got the entry of last year’s winner! Jacky settled into his large new cockpit with grace and wit, and within minutes had charmed the lads preparing his car firmly into his camp.’ In the first practice session Ickx wasted no time in showing his stuff. Although he was sitting in a Cosworth-powered car for the first time in four years, in five laps he got down to 7 mins 09.7 sees, only to have the engine blow up on the next tour. He was unable to practice again that day, but reckoned that he might well be able to break the seven-minute barrier in the McLaren. He never got the chance, as Saturday’s practice was run in pretty damp conditions and although Jacky was fastest of the lot with 7’10.3” he was still fourth on the grid, behind Jackie Stewart (Tyrrell-Ford - 7’ 07.8”); Ronnie Peterson (JPS Lotus-Ford - 7’ 08.3”) and Francois Cevert (Tyrrell-Ford - 7’ 09.3”), who had set their times the day before. Still, he had the satisfaction of knowing that his pole position time of the previous year - 7’ 07.0” - was unbeaten. And he was embarrassingly quicker than his team-mates Revson and Hulme, who could only do 7’15.9” and 7’ 16.5” respectively, in cars they had been driving all season. The race was dominated by the Tyrrells, which romped home less than two seconds apart after Peterson’s Lotus came to a halt on the opening lap with a failed distributor. Ickx finished a lonely third, 40 seconds behind the Tyrrells. He may well have given them a fight had not Denny Hulme decided to race the McLarens on the same Goodyear tyre compounds that the Tyrrells were using. Unfortunately, there was no time to practice with them in the dry, so the team started the GP with an unknown quantity. All they did know was that the new tyres were of a harder compound than the G70s they had used in practice and Ickx discovered that the new rubber didn’t get up to racing temperature until he had completed two laps, by which time the Tyrrells were long gone. He put in a fine drive, nonetheless, and finished more than a minute and a half ahead of Revson and almost three minutes ahead of Hulme. Jacky had proved his point, and a fat lot of good it did him! “I was quick immediately in a car I did not know,” he recalls, “which gave me some hope for the future, but that didn’t happen because in 1974 I joined Lotus and they were just another type of problem from Ferrari. And that was the end of my Grand Prix career!” But not his racing career, for Jacky went on to become the most successful sportscar driver of all time, an achievement acknowledged by Motor Sport in January, 2004. Between 1967 and 1985 he accumulated an astonishing 37 World Championship victories, which included three at Le Mans, and three more there when the 24-hour race did not count towards the Championship. In 1976 he joined Porsche and over the next ten years he would win 24 endurance races for the Stuttgart concern, 19 of them with Jochen Mass. Remarkably, only one of those victories came at the Nurburgring. In 1978 he finished third with Manfred Schurti. The race was a somewhat curious affair, being run in two, 22-lap halves for GT cars, with posses of Porsche 935s doing battle with bags of BMW 320s. Finally, Jacky won the event for the second time in 1983 and that was the very last 1000 Kms race to be held on the Nordschleife. On a personal note, despite the fact that I had been on the staff of Autosport from 1957-1962 I had never managed to get to the Nurburgring so, fully aware that this was my last chance to see a race on the great Nordschleife, I determined not to miss it. Before I left for Germany I spoke with the editor of Motor to ask if he was sending anyone to cover the event. He had not made plans to do so and was happy to take up my offer of supplying words and pictures. This means that having consulted numerous other reporters’ accounts of races from the very first in 1927,I can close this book by quoting from my own report of Jacky Ickx’s win with the Porsche 956 in the very last, in 1983. Here are my opening paragraphs, beginning with a quote from the winner: ‘”Not to sound immodest, but I have been racing here for nearly twenty years and sometime ago I was called The Ringmeister, so it was very special for me to win here today.” It was also right and proper that Jacky Ickx should win the last 1000 Kms race to be held on the Nurburgring, arguably the greatest and most demanding racing circuit of all time. ‘Ickx was indeed called The Ringmeister, a title he lived up to admirably on May 29, when he stamped his class on a race that was not, sadly, one to remember, apart from the fact that re¬marked the end of an era.’ It must be said that Jacky and his co-driver Jochen Mass did not appear to be the likely winners after practice. That was dominated by the stunning performance of their Rothmans-Porsche team-mate, the young wunderkind, Stefan Bellof. At the time the new, modern GP circuit was in the process of being built, which meant that the old pits straight and return road via the South and North Turns had been by-passed and the length of the real Ring was reduced to 12.9 miles. As I noted in Motor-. ‘The only benchmark for this “shortened” circuit was Christian Danner’s F2 pole position time of 6 mins 29.0 sees, set in April. In one sensational flying lap, young master Bellof was out and back again in an unbelievable 6 mins 11.1 secs - the first-ever 200 kph lap at the Ring and, by a nice co-incidence, almost exactly double Caracciola’s winning speed on the full circuit in the very first race back in 1927 - 202.053 kph against 101.1 kph! Without question, here was a Ringmeister in the making.’ (I was wrong about Caracciola’s winning speed, which was 96.5 kph. He set fastest lap at 101.1 kph.) At the time, work on the new Nurburgring was well under way and the old pits had been demolished, but the main grandstand incorporating the Sport-Hotel was still in use. Unfortunately, constant heavy rain over several months had turned the building site into a quagmire and most of the workforce had been laid off until conditions improved. Happily, the weather was fine over the race weekend. With a number of other scribes I made my way down to the Tiergarten Bridge to see the cars start the race behind the pace car on the threekilometre straight. ‘Standing on tables kindly laid out for the Press all along the bridge,’ I wrote, ‘we saw the pace car pull off in the distance and the field of 34 starters launch itself towards us. As they flashed under the bridge at close to 200 mph, Bellof led by a whisker from Patrese (Lancia), Wollek, Mass, Fitzpatrick, Rosberg (Porsches) and Hans Stuck (Sehcar-BMW). ‘Seven minutes later Bellof flew under the bridge all on his own and way down the straight we could just see one other car -Mass’s Porsche which took a full eight seconds to reach us, and that was after just one lap! Clearly Herr Bellof was a young man in a hurry!’ After seven laps Bellof and Mass were replaced by Derek Bell and Jacky Ickx, the gap between the two leading Porsches being around 25 seconds. Jacky set a new lap record with a time of 6mins 34.3 secs before the drivers changed over again at the end of lap 15. Then, as I wrote in Motor: ‘The two works cars now had a huge lead over the opposition, but once behind the wheel again Stefan Bellof proceeded to go very fast indeed, setting a new lap record at 6’ 25.9” and then, three laps later, having a monumental accident at Pflanzgarten. The Porsche took off at around 160 mph and Bellof was a passenger until it finally ground to a halt on the grass, having clobbered the Armco on both sides of the track with a vengeance. The car was written off at all four corners and it speaks volumes for the design of the modern racing car that the cockpit and the footwell were undamaged and Bellof walked away with nothing worse than a bruised hand.’ As Jacky Ickx recalls, “That was the race that Stefan Bellof should have won. He was doing very well with Derek Bell, and that car was very heavy, with no power steering or power brakes.” (Sadly, Bellof’s brilliant career was to come to a tragic end two years later, at Spa, when he made an impossible move on Ickx at Eau Rouge in the 1000 Kms race. Ickx survived the resulting accident; Bellof did not.) As a first-timer at this fabulous circuit I noted in Motor that, ‘One of the great things about the Ring is that you can get to see almost all of it with the aid of a car and a pair of wellies. Having seen the start from the Tiergarten Bridge I then drove round the old South circuit to Mullenbach and followed the very twisty road to Potsdammer Platz and then on to where the road goes under the circuit at the delightfully named QuiddelbacherHöhe. Later I drove through the village of Quiddelbach to Breidscheid and on to Adenau Bridge. This road, and the one lea
ding back up from Adenau, through Breidscheid to Nürburg castle, is like a miniature Nurburgring, with some lovely plunging twists and turns that you can enjoy while on your way to watch the aces on the real thing.’ I was at Bergwerk when the circuit suddenly fell silent and no cars appeared. This was because Walter Brun in his Sehcar-BMW had had an even bigger shunt than Bellof, crashing into the Armco at Kesselchen at high speed, destroying the car and breaking his arm. The Armco was so battered that the race was halted for 90 minutes while it was repaired. By this time the leaders had completed 25 laps, so the organisers decided to send the cars off for another 19, making 44 in all, rather than the 48 that had originally been scheduled for the shortened circuit. On the sixth lap Jochen Mass suffered a broken rear wishbone on the 956 at Flugplatz. He hobbled round to the pits where the Porsche mechanics did a fantastic job, getting him back in the race in just under six minutes. He and Jacky had lost the lead on the road, but when the times of the two parts of the race were added up on the ADAC’s computers, there was no doubt about the winners - Jacky Ickx and Jochen Mass in the works Rothmans Porsche. I concluded my race report by noting that despite the fact that this was the last 1000 Kms race on the great Nurburgring, ‘Happily, you and I will still be able to pay our 10 Marks and drive round this fabulous circuit (as 100,000 people do every year) and wallow in the sheer excitement it brings and the breathtaking effort it requires. And those of us who care about such things can take comfort from the fact that the last great race on the Ring was won by the last of the great Ringmeisters Jacky Ickx.’ Looking back on the race in 2004 I have three abiding memories of that historic weekend, 1) the look of sheer disbelief on the faces of everyone in the pits when we learned of Stefan Bellof’s stunning 6 mins 11 secs lap in practice; 2) having lunch in the restaurant of the Sport Hotel while Brun’s accident was cleared up and looking out over that depressing sea of mud that had replaced the historic start/finish area and 3) a charming incident in the Rothmans marquee after the race. I was there to get the winner’s quote from Jacky Ickx, who happily obliged, while watching his daughters Larissa and Vanina (then aged ten and eight, respectively) enjoying ice-creams. “May I have some, please?” he asked. One of the girls dutifully offered hers for her father to lick - and then pushed it right into his face. Shrieks of laughter from the girls - and a crème surprise for the last of the Kings of the Nurburgring!