John Surtees
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| John Surtees | Image:John Surtees.JPG John Surtees |
| Nationality | Image:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg British |
|---|---|
| | |
| Grand Prix motorcycle racing career | |
| Active years | 1952 - 1960 |
| Teams | Norton, MV Agusta |
| Grands Prix | 49 |
| Championships | 350cc - 1958,1959,1960 500cc- 1956,1958,1959,1960 |
| Wins | 38 |
| Podium finishes | 45 |
| Pole positions | N/A |
| Fastest laps | N/A |
| First Grand Prix | 1952 500cc Ulster Grand Prix |
| First win | 1955 250cc Ulster Grand Prix |
| Last win | 1960 500cc Nations Grand Prix |
| Last Grand Prix | 1960 500cc Nations Grand Prix |
| Formula One World Championship career | |
|---|---|
| Active years | 1960 - 1972 |
| Teams | Lotus, Cooper, Lola, Ferrari, Honda, BRM, McLaren, Surtees |
| Races | 113 (111 starts) |
| Championships | 1 (1964) |
| Wins | 6 |
| Podium finishes | 24 |
| Career points | 180 |
| Pole positions | 8 |
| Fastest laps | 10 |
| First race | 1960 Monaco Grand Prix |
| First win | 1963 German Grand Prix |
| Last win | 1967 Italian Grand Prix |
| Last race | 1972 Italian Grand Prix |
| 24 Hours of Le Mans career | |
| Participating years | 1963 – 1965, 1967 |
|---|---|
| Teams | Scuderia Ferrari Lola Cars/Team Surtees |
| Best finish | 3rd (1964) |
| Class wins | 0 |
John Surtees MBE (born February 11 1934) is a former Grand Prix motorcycle road racer and Formula One driver from England. He remains the only person to have won World Championships on both two and four wheels.
Contents |
[edit] Biography
Born in Tatsfield, Surrey, Surtees was the son of a south London motorcycle dealer. He had his first professional outing in the sidecar of his father's Vincent, which they won. However, when race officials discovered Surtees' age, they were disqualified. He entered his first race at 15 in a grass track competition. In 1950, when he was 16, he joined Vincent as an apprentice; whilst with them he bought his first car, a Jowett Jupiter.[citation needed] He made his first headlines in 1951 when he gave Norton star Geoff Duke a strong challenge in an ACU race at the Thruxton Circuit.
In 1955, Norton race chief Joe Craig gave Surtees his first factory sponsored ride aboard the Nortons. He finished the year by beating reigning world champion Duke at Silverstone and then at Brands Hatch. However, with Norton in financial trouble and uncertain about their racing plans, Surtees accepted an offer to race MV Agustas.
In 1956 Surtees won the 500cc world championship. In this he was assisted by the FIM's decision to ban Geoff Duke for six months because of his support for a riders' strike for more starting money. In the 1957 season, the MV Agustas were no match for the Gileras and Surtees battled to a third place finish.
When Gilera and Moto Guzzi pulled out of Grand Prix racing at the end of 1957, Surtees and MV Agusta went on to dominate the competition in the two big classes. In 1958, 1959 and 1960, he won 32 out of 39 races and became the first man to win the Senior Isle of Man TT three years in succession.
In 1960, at the age of 26, Surtees switched from motorcycles to cars full time, making his Formula 1 debut racing for Lotus in the Monaco Grand Prix in Monte Carlo. He made an immediate impact with a second place finish in only his second Formula One race, at the 1960 British Grand Prix, and a pole position at his third race, the 1960 Portuguese Grand Prix. After spending the 1961 season with the Cooper racing team and the 1962 season with Reg Parnell Racing, he moved to Scuderia Ferrari in 1963 and won the World Championship for the Italian team in 1964.
Surtees parted company with Ferrari during the 1966 season after winning the 1966 Belgian Grand Prix, citing excessive pressure as a factor,[citation needed] leaving Jack Brabham to take the Drivers' Championship. In 1967, he joined Honda's Formula 1 team. He stayed with the Japanese team for 1968 before switching to BRM. Also in 1967, Surtees drove in the Rex Mays 300 at Riverside, near Los Angeles, in a United States Auto Club season ending road race. This event pitted the best American drivers of the day — normally those who had cut their teeth as professional drivers on oval dirt tracks — against veteran Formula One Grand Prix drivers, including Jim Clark and Dan Gurney,
In 1970, he formed his own race team, the Surtees Racing Organisation, and spent nine seasons competing in Formula 5000, Formula 2 and Formula 1 as a constructor. He retired from competition in 1972, the same year the team had their greatest success when Mike Hailwood won the European Formula 2 Championship. The team was finally disbanded at the end of 1978.
In 1996, he was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame. The FIM honored him as a Grand Prix "Legend" in 2003. He continues his involvement in motorcycling, participating in classic bike events with bikes from his stable of vintage racing machines. He also remains involved in single-seater racing cars and currently holds the position of chairman of A1 Team Great Britain, in the A1 Grand Prix racing series. His son, Henry, currently competes in the Formula BMW UK series for Carlin Motorsport.[1]
[edit] Motorcycle Grand Prix Statistics
| Position | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
| Points | 8 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| Year | Class | Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | Points | Rank | Wins |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1952 | 500cc | Norton | SWI | IOM | NED | BEL | W.GER | ULS 1 | NAT | ESP | 1 | 18th | 0 |
| 1955 | 250cc | NSU | FRA | IOM | W.GER | BEL | NED | ULS 8 | NAT | 8 | 7th | 1 | |
| 350cc | Norton | IOM 3 | W.GER 4 | BEL | NED | ULS 4 | NAT | 11 | 6th | 0 | |||
| 1956 | 350cc | MV Agusta | IOM | NED 6 | BEL 8 | W.GER | ULS | NAT | 14 | 4th | 1 | ||
| 500cc | MV Agusta | IOM 8 | NED 8 | BEL 8 | W.GER | ULS | NAT | 24 | 1st | 3 | |||
| 1957 | 350cc | MV Agusta | W.GER | IOM 3 | NED | BEL | ULS | NAT | 3 | 10th | 0 | ||
| 500cc | MV Agusta | W.GER | IOM 6 | NED 8 | BEL | ULS | NAT 3 | 17 | 3rd | 1 | |||
| 1958 | 350cc | MV Agusta | IOM 8 | NED 8 | BEL 8 | W.GER 8 | SWE | ULS 8 | NAT 8 | 48 | 1st | 6 | |
| 500cc | MV Agusta | IOM 8 | NED 8 | BEL 8 | W.GER 8 | SWE | ULS 8 | NAT 8 | 48 | 1st | 6 | ||
| 1959 | 350cc | MV Agusta | FRA 8 | IOM 8 | W.GER 8 | SWE 8 | ULS 8 | NAT 8 | 48 | 1st | 6 | ||
| 500cc | MV Agusta | FRA 8 | IOM 8 | W.GER 8 | NED 8 | BEL 8 | ULS 8 | NAT 8 | 56 | 1st | 7 | ||
| 1960 | 350cc | MV Agusta | FRA 4 | IOM 6 | NED 8 | ULS 8 | NAT | 26 | 1st | 2 | |||
| 500cc | MV Agusta | FRA 8 | IOM 8 | NED | BEL 8 | W.GER 8 | ULS 6 | NAT 8 | 46 | 1st | 5 |
[edit] Complete World Championship Formula One results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; Races in italics indicate fastest lap)
[edit] References
- 50 Years Of Moto Grand Prix (1st edition). Hazelton Publishing Ltd, 1999. ISBN 1-874557-83-7
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ How to become F1 champion. Sarah Holt. www.bbc.co.uk (2007-08-22). Retrieved on 2007-08-22.
[edit] External links
- Biography from GrandPrix.com
- Biography from F1db.com
- John Surtees statistics
- Sky Sport video documentary on John Surtees
| Sporting positions | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Geoff Duke | 500cc Motorcycle World Champion 1956 | Succeeded by Libero Liberati |
| Preceded by Libero Liberati | 500cc Motorcycle World Champion 1958-1960 | Succeeded by Gary Hocking |
| Preceded by Jim Clark | Formula One World Champion 1964 | Succeeded by Jim Clark |
| Awards | ||
| Preceded by Ian Black | BBC Sports Personality of the Year 1959 | Succeeded by David Broome |
| Preceded by Jim Clark | Hawthorn Memorial Trophy 1964 | Succeeded by Jim Clark |
500 cc/MotoGP Motorcycle World Champions |
|---|
| (1949) Leslie Graham • (1950) Umberto Masetti • (1951) Geoff Duke • (1952) Umberto Masetti • (1953, 54, 55) Geoff Duke • (1956) John Surtees • (1957) Libero Liberati • (1958, 59, 60) John Surtees • (1961) Gary Hocking • (1962, 63, 64, 65) Mike Hailwood • (1966, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72) Giacomo Agostini • (1973, 74) Phil Read • (1975) Giacomo Agostini • (1976, 77) Barry Sheene • (1978, 79, 80) Kenny Roberts • (1981) Marco Lucchinelli • (1982) Franco Uncini • (1983) Freddie Spencer • (1984) Eddie Lawson • (1985) Freddie Spencer • (1986) Eddie Lawson • (1987) Wayne Gardner • (1988, 89) Eddie Lawson • (1990, 91, 92) Wayne Rainey • (1993) Kevin Schwantz • (1994, 95, 96, 97, 98) Michael Doohan • (1999) Àlex Crivillé • (2000) Kenny Roberts, Jr. • (2001, 02, 03, 04, 05) Valentino Rossi • (2006) Nicky Hayden • (2007) Casey Stoner |
350 cc Motorcycle World Champions |
|---|
| (1949) Freddie Frith • (1950) Bob Foster • (1951, 52) Geoff Duke • (1953, 54) Fergus Anderson • (1955, 56) Bill Lomas • (1957) Kieth Campbell • (1958, 59, 60) John Surtees • (1961) Gary Hocking • (1962, 63, 64, 65) Jim Redman • (1966, 67) Mike Hailwood • (1968, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74) Giacomo Agostini • (1975) Johnny Cecotto • (1976) Walter Villa • (1977) Takazumi Katayama • (1978, 79) Kork Ballington • (1980) Jon Ekerold • (1981, 82) Anton Mang |
Formula One World Drivers' Champions | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
cs:John Surtees da:John Surtees de:John Surtees es:John Surtees fr:John Surtees hr:John Surtees id:John Surtees it:John Surtees lv:Džons Sertīss nl:John Surtees ja:ジョン・サーティース pl:John Surtees pt:John Surtees ro:John Surtees sl:John Surtees fi:John Surtees sv:John Surtees
Categories: All articles with unsourced statements | Articles with unsourced statements since July 2007 | Articles with unsourced statements since October 2007 | English motorcycle racers | 500cc World Championship riders | 350cc World Championship riders | 250cc World Championship riders | Isle of Man TT Riders | Motorcycle racers who have driven F1 cars | English Formula One drivers | Ferrari Formula One drivers | International Motorsports Hall of Fame | Formula One drivers and team owners | BBC Sports Personality of the Year winners | People from Surrey | Members of the Order of the British Empire | 1934 births | Living people | BRDC Gold Star winners
