Jacky
Ickx

Jacky Ickx was born in Brussels on 1 January 1945. He began with motorcycle racing and trials, winning national and continental titles in the latter, before moving on to touring cars. He won the Belgian touring car championship in 1965 and the 1966 24 Hours of Spa with Hubert Hahne in a BMW 2000TI.

Ken Tyrrell entered him in the 1966 German Grand Prix in a Formula Two Matra. After a first-lap collision with John Taylor both cars retired, and Taylor later died as a result of the accident. In 1967 Ickx finished sixth at Monza in a Cooper. At Ferrari he took his first win at Rouen in heavy rain in 1968 and ended the season fourth in the championship. In 1969 he won for Brabham at the Nürburgring, where he also took pole position and fastest lap, and in Canada, finishing runner-up to Jackie Stewart. Back at Ferrari in 1970 he won in Austria, Canada and Mexico and was runner-up again, this time to Jochen Rindt, who had been killed in qualifying at Monza.

Ickx won in the rain at Zandvoort in 1971, and his last victory came at the Nürburgring in 1972. In 1973 he made a one-off appearance for McLaren at the German Grand Prix and finished third. At Lotus he took third places in Brazil and Britain in 1974 and second in Spain in 1975, before his time with the team ended later that year. In 1976 he drove for Wolf-Williams and Ensign, and only occasionally in 1977 and 1978. In 1979 he stood in for the injured Patrick Depailler at Ligier for the final eight races, then ended his Formula One career with 116 starts, eight wins, 25 podiums and 13 pole positions.

Ickx won the 24 Hours of Le Mans six times, a record that stood until 2005. The first win came in 1969 in a Ford GT40 with Jackie Oliver. At the start he walked slowly to his car instead of running, because he considered the Le Mans start dangerous. In 1982 and 1983 he won the World Endurance Championship with Porsche. He also won at Sebring, Daytona and Bathurst, and took the 1983 Paris-Dakar Rally. The International Motorsports Hall of Fame inducted him in 2002.

Source: Wikipedia, “Jacky Ickx”. Text licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.