James
Hunt

James Hunt was born on 29 August 1947 in Belmont, Surrey. He began racing in a Mini, moved up to Formula Ford in 1968 and to Formula Three in 1969, where Lord Hesketh, founder of Hesketh Racing, took notice of him. Hunt made his Formula One debut for Hesketh in a March at the 1973 Monaco Grand Prix and reached the podium that same year, with second place in the United States his best result. He finished eighth in the championship. In 1974 the team ran its own car, the Hesketh 308, and Hunt won the non-championship BRDC International Trophy with it, again finishing the season eighth in the standings.

His first Grand Prix win came at the 1975 Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort, and he ended that year fourth in the championship. For 1976 he moved to McLaren.

Hunt became world champion in 1976. In his title fight with Niki Lauda he won six races, among them Spain, the Netherlands, Canada and the United States. The Spanish win was first disqualified and then reinstated on appeal. His victory at the British Grand Prix was struck out by the FIA in September after a Ferrari protest, and the win went to Lauda. After Lauda's accident at the Nürburgring, Lauda missed two races, and Hunt closed the gap. In the finale in Japan, run in the wet at Fuji, Hunt finished third while Lauda retired early, and Hunt took the title by a single point.

In 1977 Hunt finished fifth in the championship for McLaren and won at Silverstone, Watkins Glen and Fuji. He went winless in 1978 and ended that season 13th. Ronnie Peterson's fatal accident at the Italian Grand Prix affected him deeply. In 1979 he drove for Wolf, but the car was not competitive. He ended his career after the Monaco Grand Prix with 92 starts, ten wins, 14 pole positions and 23 podiums.

Afterwards Hunt worked as a BBC television commentator alongside Murray Walker until his death, and he wrote columns, including for The Independent. He also mentored young drivers for Marlboro, among them Mika Häkkinen. Hunt died of a heart attack in Wimbledon on 15 June 1993, aged 45. He was inducted into the Motor Sport Hall of Fame in 2014. His son Freddie is also a racing driver.

Source: Wikipedia, “James Hunt”. Text licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.