Grand Prix Insider

22 de fevereiro - Hoje Niki Lauda faz 59 anos e a imagem acima da temporada de 1977, ano em que acabou conquistando seu segundo titulo mundial, é bastante rara e é documento do estado do relacionamento entre o austríaco e Enzo Ferrari. Testando uma Ligier em Zandvoort em plena reta do Mundial de Formula 1, Lauda demonstrou ao velho dragão que não teme deixar a equipe em plena temporada e conquistar o titulo com o carro francês. No final Ferrari cedeu às exigências de tratamento que Lauda fazia e o resto é história. Mas sem duvida teria sido interessante ver como Lauda ia lutar por aquele titulo, mesmo com uma vantagem razoável, ao volante de uma Ligier.

22/2/1922, Jesus Ricardo Iglesias is born in Pergamino, Argentina.

Iglesias was a regular in the Argentine racing scene and in 1955 organized himself a Gordini T16 for his Formula 1 debut in his home Grand Prix at Buenos Aires. Outside his Country he is probably remembered best for a incident in 1958, now driving a locally built and Jaguar-powered chassis, when he clashed with Stirling Moss in the Temporada Argentina round at Buenos Aires.

Born the 22 february 1922 in Pergamino (Provincia de Buenos Aires)
Die the 11 july 2005 à Pergamino (Provincia de Buenos Aires) - 83 years

22/2/1938, Timothy Mayer is born in Scranton, USA.

Tim Mayer and his elder brother Teddy both attended Yale University. Teddy went on to law school at Cornell but, as soon as he was 21 and able to get a competition licence, Tim went racing with an Austin Healey, supported by his new wife Garrill. His exploits showed that he was very quick. For the 1960 season he decided to go into open-wheeler racing and acquired a Lotus 18 Formula Junior car. He finished second in five of the eight races in which he competed before the car was destroyed in a race at Louisville.

Tim was then drafted into the US Army and stationed in Puerto Rico but despite this he managed to organize leave on the necessary weekends and flew back and forth to the United States to compete in Formula Junior in a team organized by his brother Teddy. Rev-Em Racing featured Mayer and another brilliant youngster called Peter Revson. Mayer won the 1962 SCCA Formula Junior title in a Cooper and at the end of the year was given his chance to race a third factory Cooper in the United States Grand Prix at Watkins Glen.

In 1963 the brothers headed to Europe where Tim drove for Ken Tyrrell Racing and at the end of the year he was signed to be Bruce McLaren’s team mate in the 1964 World Championship. Before the World Championship began the pair took part in the new Tasman Cup series in Australian and New Zealand. Mayer finished second to Denny Hulme in the first event at Levin and a week later chased McLaren across the line to finish third in the New Zealand GP at Pukekohe. Finishing second to McLaren at Teretonga underlined his abilities. A month later, in practice for the final round of the Tasman series at Longford in Tasmania, he went off at high speed in the braking area for Longford Corner, where the cars went light over a slight rise, and crashed into one of the trees beside the road. He was killed instantly.

A distraught Teddy decided to continue in racing and became the force behind Team McLaren, running the business after McLaren’s death in 1970 and winning World Championships with Emerson Fittipaldi in 1974 and James Hunt in 1976.

Born the 22 february 1938 in Dalton
Date of death: February 28, 1964 - Longford Circuit, Tasmania, Australia

22/2/1949, Andreas-Nikolaus Lauda is born in Vienna, Austria.

He is The Man Who Came Back From The Dead, following his astonishing recovery from the fiery accident in the German Grand Prix of 1976 that so nearly killed him.

He is The Rat to those who remember the contretemps with fearless paratrooper David Purley during the Belgian Grand Prix in 1977.

He is a triple World Champion. The man who advised Ferrari in his retirement. The man who quit racing to start his own airline, and came back to win again.

Lauda is all of these men, and more.

Even Nigel Mansell displayed greater potential than him in the nursery formulae, and when the bucktoothed Austrian used family credit to buy himself an F1 ride with March for 1971, most happily wrote him off as a complete no-hoper. March’s engineers and managers, among them Max Mosley, later the president of the FIA, barely listened to him when he told them that their car didn’t work. Yet within two years Lauda was impressing with BRM, and by 1974 he was winning races for Ferrari, the new hot shoe grabbing at Jackie Stewart’s vacant crown.

Lauda lost the 1974 title through lack of experience and his own impetuosity, but won it conclusively in 1975. He was leading the fight again in 1976 before the accident at the daunting Nurburgring left a priest administering him the last rites, and he still only lost it by a point at the final race. In 1977 he retrieved his crown in style.

While the press romanticized his remarkable recovery, Lauda remained the supreme pragmatist. He was once told that an historical book did not credit him with starting the race which nearly killed him, because it required a restart. “So, what happened to my ear then?” he jocularly demanded to know. He lost that year’s title because he pulled out of the Japanese GP at Fuji. He said his still-healing eyes were having trouble seeing adequately in the terrible conditions. Ferrari slated him for it, but his decision not to race then was as independent and as brave as his decision to return to the cockpit only six weeks after his accident had been.

He left Ferrari for Brabham Alfa Romeo at the end of 1977, and quit the sport altogether with a sudden announcement of retirement in Canada in 1979. He set up his own airline, LaudaAir, but returned to racing with McLaren in 1982. And he started winning again as if he had never been away. Two years later, his sheer speed now honed by the canniness of an old campaigner, he won his third title when he beat McLaren teammate Alain Prost by half a point. It was the narrowest margin of title victory ever.

Lauda quit for good at the end of 1985, built up his airline further, then acted as an advisor when his old friend Luca di Montezemolo took back the reins at Ferrari in 1992. He brought his unique brand of cynicism and brutal analysis to bear in this consultancy role, and remained as outspoken as ever.

Jaguar then concentrated on his airline, which was in difficulties again until he lost control of the business. In February 2001 he was named by Wolfgang Reitzle as the head of the Ford Motor Company’s Premier Performance Division, which included Jaguar Racing and Cosworth. This resulted in a clash with Jaguar Racing boss Bobby Rahal and from the middle of 2001 Lauda was effectively running Jaguar as well. But the shifting sands of Ford politics caught him out. Reitzle left the company early in 2002 and Lauda was ousted at the end of the 2002 season.

Ever since the fire at the Nurburgring, Lauda has worn the scars without flinching, facing the new circumstances of his life with the practicality and dark humor he had always brought to his racing. They conceal a razor sharp, computer-like mind - and the relentless determination that won him three titles.

22/2/1918, George Constantine is born in Southbridge, USA.

Successful SCCA amateur racer from Southbridge, Massachusetts, Constantine won the 1956 Watkins Glen road race in a Jaguar D-type and later competed in the 1959 US Grand Prix at Sebring in a Cooper-Climax T45 entered by Mike Taylor. He failed to finish.