by Tom Rubython
Hunt knew Williamson from competing in Formula 3. He remembered his own accident at Zandvoort two years earlier, when his March turned over with fuel leaking around him. The only difference was that his car hadn’t caught fire. It was also reminiscent of Piers Courage’s accident at Zandvoort three years earlier, when Courage had burned to death.
There were clearly inadequacies in Zandvoort’s safety routines. Denny Hulme, president of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, said that unless firefighting was improved at Zandvoort, Formula One would never return to the track.
But as usual, Formula One shrugged its shoulders and carried on. Hesketh didn’t enter the next race, the German Grand Prix at Nürburgring on 5th August, as it was only seven days after the race in Holland and they did not have the resources to prepare the car again so quickly.
The team next appeared on 19th August at the Austrian Grand Prix, at the picturesque Österreichring circuit. Hunt qualified ninth but lasted only three laps in the race before retiring with fuel problems. It was the first retirement of his Formula One career.
The race was won by Ronnie Peterson’s Lotus, with Jackie Stewart second and Carlos Pace third in his Surtees-Ford.
The Italian Grand Prix was next, on 9th September. In qualifying on Friday, Hunt had his first Formula One accident. He crashed heavily when his brakes faded and caught him by surprise. The car was badly damaged and the team had no spares with which to repair it. Bubbles Horsley told Hunt he was withdrawing from the race. It was desperately disappointing, but an indication of the shoestring effort on which the team was run. Hunt admitted the accident was his fault: “I made an error and cocked up the whole thing.” But he was incensed that Horsley wanted to give up and withdraw. The race witnessed Hunt’s first tantrum and a furious row with Horsley.
After the crash, Hunt chased Max Mosley down the paddock and asked his advice on how to repair the car. He wanted the works mechanics to help fix it. According to Mosley, a repair was impossible at the track without a replacement chassis, but he had a spare chassis at the factory which could be flown out to Monza in time for the race. Reporting back to Horsley, Hunt asked him to authorise the cost of air freighting the chassis. The bill for this would have been more than US$7,000, and Horsley refused. He told Hunt there wasn’t enough time and he wanted the team to return immediately to England to prepare for the final two races of the season, to be held in North America. Horsley remembers: “James was furious and his short fuse was well and truly lit, and we had a tremendous row.” In the end, Horsley got his way and Hunt simmered for an hour before accepting his fate.
After what had been such a good start, it was rather a dejected team that made its first trip outside of Europe. They flew the Atlantic on the Formula One charter to Toronto for the Canadian Grand Prix at Mosport on 23rd September.
But before that, there had been some good news. Hunt had been signed as a client by International Management Group (IMG), the sports agency owned by super agent Mark McCormack. IMG was the leading agency in the world and McCormack, undoubtedly having been prodded by star client Jackie Stewart, recognised Hunt’s potential. Hunt was now starting to earn serious money from his outside promotional activities. He was getting a lot of work and earning around US$5,000 to US$10,000 a day for it. As much as he liked to party, he was a different person where work was concerned. He was meticulous with his business arrangements and always on time for events, and rarely failed to please. As a result, he was also starting to pay a lot of tax on his earnings as the incumbent Labour government began putting the squeeze on wealthy people in Britain.
In Canada, suffering from jet lag, which cramped his performance, Hunt qualified 15th. After the crash in Monza, Hunt was also under strict orders from Horsley not to take any risks that might damage the car. The team had hardly any spares, apart from a spare engine, and had to be cautious. If Hunt crashed again, he would have been unable to race in Watkins Glen at the United States Grand Prix a fortnight later. Hunt, who really wanted to go to Watkins Glen, played it safe and trundled in seventh, two laps behind winner Peter Revson and Emerson Fittipaldi, who finished second.
No such rules would apply in Watkins Glen, the last race of the season. Hunt was ordered to go for it by Horsley.
The race would be a significant one, as it was to be Jackie Stewart’s last and 100th Grand Prix, as his retirement became official. But no one knew that at the time, and, although Stewart had made the decision in April, some six months earlier, he had informed only Ken Tyrrell and Ford’s Walter Hayes. He had not even told his wife, Helen, nor François Cevert, the Tyrrell number two driver.
As it happened, Stewart and Helen had been holidaying with Cevert in the week between Mosport and Watkins Glen. They had borrowed a Ford Galaxy from Ford Motor Company and taken a trip to Niagara Falls and spent a few nights at the Essex House in New York. After that, they had spent a week on the beaches of Bermuda. Cevert was nursing an ankle injury and Stewart remembers having to carry him around.
The holiday was difficult, as Stewart was having to keep his upcoming retirement a secret. This was particularly difficult, as his job as team leader at Tyrrell was to be taken over by Cevert, and Cevert did not have any inkling thereof. But in a cruel twist of fate, it was never to be.
Meanwhile, James Hunt was enjoying the last race of the season. He loved America and said: “It was really good fun, with no pressure and just racing for racing’s sake.” He was enjoying staying at the Glen Motor Inn, just outside the circuit and mixing with many of the drivers for the first time socially. On Friday, he was 17th fastest from 28 cars. On Saturday morning, he was fifth.
But later that morning, it all became meaningless as François Cevert lost control of his Tyrrell-Ford and had a huge accident which ended with his car lying on top of a steel Armco barrier. The Frenchman died instantly.
Jody Scheckter was first driver to arrive at the scene, and Jackie Stewart was devastated when he saw Cevert’s body strapped in the car and the terrible injuries he had sustained. Both he and Scheckter were mentally scarred that day. It was the worst accident they had ever witnessed.
Upon returning to the pits and speaking to Ken Tyrrell, Stewart decided not to take part in the race, thus ending his career. But he did take part in the afternoon qualifying session and explains why: “The reason I did that was because of François’ mechanics, and particularly his chief mechanic, Jo Ramirez. Jo was fearful that [the accident] had been a mechanical failure. I was confident that it was not.”
Stewart felt he had to show confidence in the car and in the mechanics by going out again. He recalls: “I thought I knew why the accident had occurred and it was not a mechanical failure. François was using one gear lower than I was going through that corner, and there was a very bad bump on the exit of the left hander going up the hill at Turn Two. As the car went over it, the rear end got loose and went into oversteer. The barrier was hard up against the track with no run off area, and when François took his foot off the gas, the car snapped into oversteer. Being a gear lower than me, the car was very reactive [it was small wheelbase car]. The car reacted in such a vicious way that he hit the barrier quite hard and it ricocheted into the double barrier. During the accident the car somehow turned upside down and landed on top of the barrier, causing the fatal injuries.” The guardrail actually split in two but did not kill him. It was the fact that he landed upside down that did that.
Stewart was already world champion and about to compete in his 100th race – it was meant to be a perfect end to his career. Instead, it had ended in tragedy. Cevert was the fourth very close friend he had lost on the track in eight years of racing. The list included the likes of Jim Clark, Piers Courage and Jochen Rindt, but this was the most horrible death he had witnessed.
The piano-playing Cevert was a very cultured man from a very civilized and loving family. Every year from that day on, Stewart sent Cevert’s father and mother flowers to mark the anniversary of their son’s death. When they both finally pass
ed away, the flowers were put on his grave. And they continue to be placed there on 6th October every year. Stewart wearily went on the well-trodden path of repatriating Cevert’s body and effects to his home country, and preparing to fly to his funeral.
Hunt was promoted to fourth on the grid on the second row alongside Emerson Fittipaldi’s Lotus. Ronnie Peterson was on pole alongside Carlos Reutemann in his Brabham-Ford.
At the start, Hunt beat Fittipaldi into the first corner and he overtook Reutemann on lap four. For the next hour and a half, Hunt chased Peterson with Fittipaldi, Hailwood and Scheckter close behind him. To the surprise of everyone, Hunt was able to stay around a second behind Peterson as the race progressed.
Finding that the straight line speed of the March was superior to that of Peterson’s Lotus, Hunt made up any time lost in the corners on the straight and decided to bide his time until the final few laps to pass Peterson. But suddenly, the March began to develop oversteer due to its lightening fuel load. However, Hunt maintained the challenge to the flag, and his next to last lap was the race’s fastest. They crossed the finish line separated by 0.688 of a second; at that time the second smallest winning margin in Formula One history. The entire Hesketh team jumped the pit wall and embraced a bemused Hunt for at least five minutes.
In his first season, Hunt drove in seven of the 15 events. He scored two podiums and was eighth in the world championship, on 14 points. Jackie Stewart was world champion with 71 points, and Hunt was eighth in the world championship behind Emerson Fittipaldi, Ronnie Peterson, François Cevert, Peter Revson, Denny Hulme and Carlos Reutemann. As Hesketh told Hunt, he was now officially the eighth best driver in the world.
With accident and engine rebuilds, Hesketh had spent US$145,000 in that first season of Formula One and had won back nearly US$80,000 in prize money, keeping Horsley just inside his US$100,000 budget. Hunt received 45 per cent of the prize money and, for the first time in his life, had serious money in the bank. Added to the money he received for his personal appearances, Hunt had earned up to US$50,000 by season end. To celebrate, he bought himself a new 3-litre Ford Capri with a proper stereo system.
Hunt said: “Nobody was prepared to give any sort of chance to a new Formula One team managed by someone called Bubbles Horsley and with a driver named James Hunt, but I have a theory about rich people – and Alexander in particular – that when they touch something, it turns to gold.” Hunt’s theory was proved correct. The Hesketh team’s performance in a customer March was nothing short of sensational.
Jackie Stewart, the retiring world champion was also impressed with Hesketh, especially by its second place at Watkins Glen. As he recalls: “As things developed, it became clear that the team knew what it was doing, and James had great skill as a driver. He had great natural talent. I could see that in the few times I raced against him before I retired. But he became abstract in quite a lot of ways.”
Hesketh, pleased that his total expenditure had been less than US$100,000, was blinded by the success of that first season. He signaled a big effort for 1974, which would cost three times as much, including the building of a new car with his name on it. But as he was revealing his plans to journalists, the Arabs and the Israelis were making plans for war – a war which would drive up the price of oil, cut many ties and plunge the world into a harsh economic recession that would jeopardise Hesketh’s businesses and his racing team. The world was about to undergo a substantial change.
On his return to England, Hunt was awarded the Campbell Trophy by the British Royal Automobile Club (RAC). It was the same club that had almost banned him from competing in Formula 3. The trophy was to celebrate the ‘Best performance in motor sport by a British driver in a British car.’ The citation read: ‘In his first season of Formula One racing, James Hunt in the Hesketh March consistently showed outstanding ability against established racing stars.’
It was the perfect description of a perfect first season in Formula One. After six years of struggling to succeed in motor racing, the world was suddenly at James Hunt’s feet.
Hunt rounded off his season by flying to Johannesburg to compete in the Nine-Hour Endurance sports car race at Kyalami. He had been invited by John Wyer’s Gulf Research Racing team to drive a Mirage-Ford M6 for the race, and was persuaded to do it by his friend Mike Hailwood, who was also driving for Gulf in a sister Mirage. Hunt teamed up with sports car specialist Derek Bell as his co-driver. Mike Hailwood retired whilst leading the race, leaving Hunt to come second behind Reinhold Joest’s Porsche 908/3. But the main motivation for the South African trip was not racing; it was to hang out with his friend Hailwood, drink himself silly and chase women.
Together, they got through plenty of both.
CHAPTER 16
Established in Formula One 1974
The year of no return
In mid-September 1973, Lord Hesketh held a press conference to announce his plans for 1974. He was in expansive mood and at the top of his game, with no idea of what was just around the corner. As the world’s economies were booming, no one suspected that a financial crash was imminent.
Hesketh told journalists he would contest the full Formula One season in 1974; a declaration which came as no surprise. But his next statement shocked them. Hesketh announced that the team would be building its own car, designed by Harvey Postlethwaite. The car, he announced, would be built by the mechanics over the winter in the converted stables at Easton Neston. Feeling that it “demonstrated serious intent”, he added: “There’s no point in playing amateur heroics at the back of the grid. Our intention is to create an exciting new car and race to win.”
Hesketh Racing had been unexpectedly competitive with its March-Ford. Postlethwaite had made it quicker than any of the works March cars on its Firestone tyres. The choice of Firestones had given the car an advantage over its mostly Goodyear shod rivals.
But Formula One insiders believed that attempting to build its own car was a mistake for an independent team with limited resources. One said anonymously: “Now they’ll find out how difficult this business is.”
Disagreeing with the critics, Postlethwaite said: “It is almost necessary if you want to continue to grow. You have to become a constructor, you have to be masters of your own fate. If you buy a racing car off somebody else, you never have first access to the technology and the goods. To go motor racing properly, you have to build your own car; do your own thing.” He would say later, upon reflection: “It was a big moment in my career.”
Hesketh wanted people to know it was a serious effort, saying: “James has shown that he’s capable of winning Grand Prix races and, to win, I feel that you’ve got to build your own cars. But we’re in this game to entertain just as much as we are to race.”
Not content merely with announcing the team’s own car, Hesketh also announced that it would be building its own V12 engine. It was not as fanciful as it sounded. Conventional Formula One wisdom at the time held that the Cosworth V8 was no longer powerful enough and that a V12 engine would be essential in the future. But the engine project was abandoned after an initial budget forecast showed it would cost over US$250,000 just to design and build a prototype.
Hesketh also took the opportunity to stress the Britishness of the team. He said: “I am convinced that one of the essential ingredients that makes this team work is that it is decidedly British. I am a completely unashamed jingoist. I am proud to be British, to have a British passport and to paint my car red, white and blue. Our ambition is to win a world championship for Britain – with a British driver.”
The Britishness argument was put to the test as a month later, when it became clear that Emerson Fittipaldi would be leaving Lotus at the end of the year. In a strange turn of events, Hesketh offered the Brazilian a drive alongside Hunt in a two-car team. It was a serious offer, in which he tempted Fittipaldi with a US$150,000 retainer. Fittipaldi remembers: “I was interested but the team was too new, so I was not sure. I signed with McLaren and, at that time, it wa
s a good thing to do.” He added as an afterthought: “The Hesketh team was very strange.”
It was certainly very strange for Hesketh to have entered into serious negotiations with the Brazilian, but the negotiations were done with Hunt’s full knowledge; Hunt originally had introduced Fittipaldi to Hesketh.
Hesketh also announced that the team would have a budget of US$400,000 for 1974. However, having released the figure, he then told journalists that it “frightened him” and insisted the budget would be “strict.” He then announced that Hunt’s retainer to drive the car would increase to US$35,000 from US$5,000 the year before. With prize money and personal appearances, Hunt’s income for 1974 looked set to top US$100,000. To announce a driver’s salary, normally a very private and sometime contentious matter, for public consumption was certainly a new and novel way of doing things. But Hunt didn’t seem to mind.
However, between the press conference in September and the launch of the new car in January, the world began to change and Hesketh probably wished he had not been so expansive. The world’s stock markets had been declining since January 1973 as inflation started unsettling investors around the world. But the decline had not been too serious and, as the market was coming off record highs the year before, most reckoned it was a short-term adjustment.
Indeed, it might have been had the situation in the Middle East remained calm. It was later revealed that the Arab nations had begun preparing for war in late August, when President Sadat had secretly visited King Faisal in Riyadh. The Egyptian president and the Saudi Arabian King had agreed that there would be an oil embargo should western countries, primarily the United States, back Israel in the upcoming war. At the time, the idea of using oil as a weapon was an entirely new one.
There wasn’t long to wait as, on 6th October 1973, Egypt and Syria attacked Israel on two fronts; in Sinai and on the Golan s. The attack was carefully timed for the beginning of the Jewish religious festival of Yom Kippur. As all of Israel prepared for the festival, its army was caught by surprise. The attack marked the beginning of the fourth Arab-Israeli War and the resulting oil embargo destroyed the economies of the western world.