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My participation to the races stays an act of will, and it is exactly in it that the thing distinguishes itself from the passion. I feel no need to race, but I feel even less some desire to not doing it. Jacky Ickx Daily Photo
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Lord of the race
 Considered rightly as the greatest long distance driver of the history, Jacky Ickx was also one of the most brilliant representatives of his generation in Grand Prix. Between 1968 and 1972, when his equipment was as high as his immense talent, he was capable of beating the best of the era when they were called Stewart, Rindt or Fittipaldi. Return on the career at the highest level of a champion of exception.
In the majority of the cases, car-racing decides in any equity of the career of a pilot. Certainly, the mechanical factor remains an inevitable chance, but the alliance between the talent and the ambition always offers an opportunity to go out of the shadow. Nevertheless, except a prize list in F1 including eight victories in Grand Prix, Jacky Ickx's course at the highest level reflects a certain injustice : that to have never been World champion. Just like Stirling Moss or Gilles Villeneuve, the greatest Belgian pilot of all times belongs to the restricted circle of the champions without crown. But the absence of such an honor does not decrease at all the contribution of these men of exception to the history of the car-racing or does not darken in any way the glare of their exploits. Beside, how could it be done, knowing that a legend is nourished above all of marvellous stories telling the prowess of the brave men, rather than of distant and austere statistics ? The records are made to be beaten, as it is said, but nothing nor nobody can erase the memory of a memorable blow of glare or a victory torn off gallantly with an adversary or with the elements. For Jacky Ickx, the form always took the ascending on the essence, whatever was his mounting or the discipline in which he was aligned. Superbly eclectic pilot at an era when a multidisciplinary approach was the rule rather than the exception, he sowed his talent all over the world lasting more than one quarter century, collecting in particular out of Sport-Prototypes a string of successes which raised him to the rank of greatest pilot of endurance of all times. A statute thousand times deserved but which should not make forget that he was also - between 1968 and 1972 - among the best sprinters in Grand Prix.
Raised within a family resolutely turned to automobile thanks to his father, Jacques Ickx, journalist of reputation, the young Jacky was nevertheless interested in mechanics only because it offered him an invaluable release of a boring and strenuous schooling. "The school was a real nightmare for me, and my parents quickly understood it", he tells. "That is why, as soon as I felt a real attraction for my first passion which was the motorcycle, and in spite of the danger it could represent, they encouraged me. They knew that it would act as a revealing, that it would be a means for giving me the wish to go out of the pack". After brilliant beginnings in bike during which he collected many successes in trial, he gradually forsook the two wheels to be engaged in touring cars, in particular with the help of Ford Belgium which offered him the wheel of a Cortina Lotus. It is during his first international race, competed in Budapest in 1964, that the 19-year-old young fellow aroused the interest of a man who was going to help him to climb stairs towards the summit. "Having seen me raing to Budapest, Ken Tyrrell proposed me at once an attempt in single-seater", remembers Jacky. "Unfortunately, because of my military service, I was not able to give a positive answer". But it was only delayed : after a period of fifteen months of military service, Tyrrell repeated his offer to the young hope, who accepted this time. "The test proved very concluding even if I had difficulties to remain on the track. Before the season begins, I had even damaged some frames, but Ken did not hold it against me and kept all his confidence. He was the one who incontestably changed my life, because without his help, I do not know what I will have become. Gardener maybe..."
Incorporated in 1966 within the F2 team Matra Tyrrell beside Jackie Stewart, the greenhorn had to compose with a little reliable BRM engine which gave him only rarely the occasion to put himself in evidence. But when he inherited, during the Grand Prix of Germany on frightening Nürburgring, of the Stewart's single-seater powered by vigorous small Cosworth block (at the time F2 were allowed at the start of the German race), Ickx flew over his category during the practice, preceding even several private F1 drivers !
First Champion of Europe in the history of F2 with Tyrrell the following year, it is still during the German race of the World championship that the young gifted child was again going to make speak about of him. Third time absolved at the end of the practices (!), just behind the tenors Clark and Hulme, the little Matra F2 was nevertheless relegated for security reasons (and doubtless of prestige) to 50 metres behind the F1 the following day at the start. "Agile and light, the Matra was perfectly adapted for the Ring", recalls its driver. "A layout that I knew like my pocket to have buckled it an incalculable number of times at the Marathon of the Road, a long-distance race for touring cars." From the start, Ickx started a dazing increase, being found after some curves only with the favourites. "I passed the F1 ones after the others, finding me behind Jack Brabham who stopped me with rare diligence. Unfortunately, a suspension arm broke and I abandoned." Be that as it may, in the green hell of Eiffel, the demonstration had been sensational and would not delay having a determining influence on the career of the young wolf. This one made moreover at the end of season the big jump towards F1 when the team Cooper called him to replace, at Monza, Pedro Rodriguez who was injured : for his first real Grand Prix, Jacky Ickx ended on an excellent 6th place. "If he had asked me for it, I would have accompanied Tyrrell in F1 in 1968, but Matra required that the second of Jackie was French. Ken thus chose Jean-Pierre Beltoise and me, I left to Ferrari after the Commendatore had failed in his attempt to get Stewart !"
Engaged within the prestigious Scuderia at the age of 23, he went for the first time on the podium in Spa, in front of his public, then picked up a 4th place in Holland. It is in July, on the circuit of Rouen-les-Essarts that Jacky Ickx gained his first victory (and the first one for a Belgian driver) in World championship. Competed under a diluvian rain, the French Grand Prix revealed the devilish skill of the Belgian driver, which glanced through the event from start to finish by deceiving traps tightened by elements. But in the arrival, the enjoyment of the young hero was moderated by the terrible accident which had cost the life to the Frenchman Jo Schlesser, died in the flames of his Honda. It is with the tied up throat that he accepted his winner's first laurels. Afterward, he ended still 3rd in Silverstone and in Monza, approaching the end of the season with only three points behind the leader in the championship, Graham Hill. Regrettably, his season ended earlier than foreseen when, during the practices of the Grand Prix of Canada competed in Sainte-Jovite, Jacky Ickx pulverized his Ferrari after the blocking of his accelerator. "We had changed the profile of the intake manifolds, he explains, with for consequence a chronicle blocking of the throttle! By three times, I got myself monumental dismays, and by three times, I stopped in the pit to tell it, unsuccessfully. Fortunately, in the place where I went out, they had set up a little previously a fence which prevented me finally from smashing against trees. I went out with a broken leg only. A small price to be paid at the time for an accident of this kind."
At the same time as his campaign in Grand Prix, Jacky Ickx led so brilliantly a career in Sports-Prototypes. He was thus in 1968 in the delicate position of a driver having lent allegiance to Ferrari and Shell for F1, and to Ford and Gulf for long-distance races. A situation contractually complex which, associated to the confuse atmosphere reigning within the Scuderia, encouraged him to leave this last one and to enter with Brabham for 1969. Pursuing his learning at the highest level, Jacky gained not less than two new victories : in Nürburgring, on his favorite circuit and in Mosport. Every time, he crowned the pawn to his big rival Jackie Stewart in the term of an epic fight, and even very hard, as it was the case in Canada. "I had nevertheless more things to learn, explains the current director of race of Monaco Grand Prix, but gradually, I accumulated some experience."Subjected to a team politic which favored clearly the boss-driver, Jacky met himself alone to the commands when Brabham broke his ankle : "All the team centred from then all its efforts on my person and it was the real click. For that a driver can give the full measure of his talent, he must be surrounded by people who appreciate him and who rely on him."
Although he had ended the season on the second place of the World championship behind Stewart, Jacky Ickx decided to leave the team of Sir Jack and to return in Maranello. The support brought to the Scuderia by Fiat and its patriarch, Gianni Agnelli, and the view to use the powerful new flat engine 12 cylinders indeed seemed to augur of a happy future. "I believe to have been one of the rare drivers to have returned to Ferrari, he explains. I think that Enzo Ferrari appreciated me and this feeling was mutual. In this time, he tried to make the best that he could with his team. Doubtless it was not completed, but still it was a fantastic period." For the driver number one of the Scuderia, the season 1970 opened on an abandonment in Kyalami, but in Jarama, during the Grand Prix of Spain, he met himself prisoner (in the 2nd lap) of a terrible fire after his single-seater was crashed headlong by Jackie Oliver's BRM. In his deformed hull, he tried to release the buckle of the safety harness which finally gives up after fifteen endless seconds. Half suffocated, Jacky extricated himself finally from the fire and crossed the track blindly, the melted visor of his helmet disabling any visibility. He rolled then on the ground to extinguish his overall in flames and got out finally with burns of 2nd and 3rd degree. Hardly exhilarated by this painful episode where he escaped from few to the death, he went back circuits three weeks later only ! Regrettably, the fast Ferrari 312B turned out very fragile and its driver was forced to wait for the Grand Prix of Holland, the fifth race of the championship, to mark his first points. Leading in Clermont-Ferrand and in Brands Hatch, he did not however finished, but in Zeltweg, he and his team member Clay Regazzoni signed a magnificent doubled. While the end of season promised a sublime fight between the Belgian driver and the leader in the championship Jochen Rindt, this last one got killed in Monza at the wheel of his Lotus. Winner in Canada, Jacky Ickx was at this moment the last one to be still able to reach a total of points superior to the one of the unfortunate Austrian and beat him in the race for the world title. But a retirement in Watkins Glen granted the crown to Rindt posthumously, what left no regret to his second, on the contrary. In a letter sent later to Nina Rindt, the widow of the great champion fallen on the field of honor, Jacky explained that it had not been right that he outstrips an opponent who could not defend his chances up to the end. "Jochen deserved one thousand times this title, he confirms, because he had unmistakably been the best driver that year."
The results of the seasons 1971 and 1972 were hardly rich, spoiled by the excessively sharp character of the Ferrari B2 or by the multiple breakdowns which ruined the chances of its driver while he often dominated his opponents. A victory in Zandvoort in the rain in 1971 and a new triumph on the Ring, his favorite circuit, in 1972 were going to be his ultimate successes in Grand Prix. "At this time with Ferrari, with a motivation on the top and with the quality of the material, I was really at the top of my art. Only a precarious reliability prevented from building a real prize list."
For 1973, the Scuderia decided to build its first monohull frame: conceived by Sandro Colombo and made by the British John Thompson in England, the Ferrari B3 was however going to result in a hard defeat and the divorce in the middle of the season between Ickx and his employer. "We were totally outside the blow with a disastrous car. In Silverstone, we were almost last, what was completely unacceptable and the team decided to make the impasse on several races." His confidence affected by the bad successive results and refusing responsible's role which some people from Maranello wished to make him assume following the mediocre results of cumbersome B3, Jacky should react. He thus asked Teddy Mayer, the director of the McLaren team, if he could have the third McLaren M23 for the German Grand Prix. Knowing his superiority on the Ring, Mayer accepted quite naturally : "I discovered the car on a circuit which was not of the easiest, but I nevertheless made the second time the first day of the practices, before ending 3rd of the race. It was essential that I restore my confidence and that I prove my value to Enzo Ferrari's eyes." This last one so called back the Belgian driver for the return of Ferrari to Monza, but no improvement was made : the point of no return having been reached, both parts parted, definitively this time. "In spite of the crises, there has been never real split between us, explains the one who dedicates an immense respect to the legendary Commendatore. This man especially allowed me to live an extraordinary period of life. Even after this dreadful season 1973, I often returned to Maranello. If he was there, and even without appointment, he always granted me a little of his time, with a lot of kindness and even of affection. Of a perpetual vitality, he was a different man, really largely above the average." Ickx ended the season in Watkins Glen at the wheel of Frank William's Iso-Marlboro, a not competitive car which he succeeded however to place in 7th place. Unique fact in the F1 history, he was the only driver to have driven for Ferrari, McLaren and William during the same season ! Other time, other customs.
Thanks to his performance on the Nurburgring this year, he was anticipated one moment to join McLaren in 1974 by means of Marlboro. Regrettably, the team of Teddy Mayer preferred the Brazilian Emerson Fittipaldi and the dollars of Texaco. He eyed up then towards the team of his old mentor Ken Tyrrell, but places left vacant by the pensioner Jackie Stewart and the unfortunate François Cevert (died during the practices of the USA Grand Prix) were taken by Jody Scheckter and Patric Depailler. It is then that Colin Chapman offered him a place in Lotus beside the brilliant Ronnie Peterson. Winner the previous season of the constructor's title, the British team got ready to align his radical Lotus 76 intended to succeed the victorious 72. By waiting for the arrival of the new Chapman's weapon, Jacky won with an exceptional mastery the Race of Champions, non-championship event competed at Brands Hatch in dantesque conditions. Afterward, he quickly understood that the Lotus 76 would be hardly as high as the hopes placed in it. Forced to go back on the old 72, the team went gradually down with regard to its rivals and only a very rash Peterson - not to say heroic - to tear away three successes. While he had no difficulty in showing himself faster than this last one when they were team members at Ferrari in Sports-Protos, Jacky Ickx was henceforth relegated to the shadow of the Flying Swede. "Ronnie was the driver number one in the team, a status conferred by his talent. As for me, I had to adapt myself to the 72 from which I did not succeed in extracting the last carat." The alliance which promised a lot at its debuts deteriorated as succeeded abandonments and disappointments. With an old and outdate equipment, the situation deteriorated more in 1975, the Belgian being often notably victim of the front wheels shafts fragility of his single-seater, their breaking having turned into serious incidents three times. His motivation took naturally a blow : "It was impossible in these conditions to drive at the limits, he explains, and in July 1975, I broke my contract. Nevertheless during these two seasons, Chapman impressed me a lot because he had the faculty to pull himself out of the most critical situations. We finished the attempts on Saturday in the low and he spent the night to unsettle everything, to modify all the settings. On Sunday, the cars were competitive. Well, almost…"
Falling from bad to worse, Jacky Ickx began the season 1976 with Wolf Williams drawn by the British engineer Harvey Postlethwaite who was later going to officiate with Ferrari. "This car was a masterful failure, remembers the six times winner of Le Mans. During the practices of the Grand Prix of Belgium at Zolder, it went in spin without having made the slightest error! I preferred to not insist." If the talent of the great Belgian champion remained intact, as proved his successes in this time in long-distance races, his will to make bounce his F1 career became blurred. The era of the ascendancy of the talent in pure state faded bit by bit for the benefit of a new generation of Grand Prix drivers, armed with an one-sided approach and with a suitcase full of green banknotes, and capable of handling a steering wheel as well as to satisfy the whims of the powerful sponsors. F1 began its big transmutation, the transmission of the power between the sport and the entertainment making a natural selection which eliminated mercilessly those who refused to comply with the new rules of the game. "In this kind of situation, we tend to cling to his convictions, we believe that, by magic, we are going to recover. Then we agree to drive less good cars and we are fatally more exposed. It is what finally happened to me with Ensign." During three seasons, Jacky Ickx tried bravely to escape the second pack, with diverse fortunes. In Zandvoort in 1976, he brings his modest Ensign in points before giving up near the arrival due to electric problems. But at Watkins Glen, he strikes the rail quite hard during the 14th lap : under the violence of the shock, the car is cut in two whereas its driver succeeds to escape by himself from the disrupted wreck, the feet considerably bruised. "I had a lot of luck to be able to keep my feet after this accident, remembers Jacky, because I suffered multiple fractures and burns." Between 1977 and 1978, he competed for another five races for the Mo Nunn's team, but gave up finally to the adventure, tired of fighting for an anonymous place in the middle of grid.
His tiredness to regain prestige in F1 did not decreased however at all his passion for the race, as shows by his brilliant success in endurance races while the curtain fell gradually on his career in Grand Prix. If he was often against a certain laborious routine associated in single-seater (notably as regards the private practices sessions, nevertheless rare in the time), Jacky delighted on the other hand in the physical effort inherent to the long distance races which obliged him to draw from his ultimate resources. Complete athlete, he maintained his physical condition for the simple pleasure to seek the limits from it, from a cycle ride in mountain to a jogging in forest. His racer's reputation, or rather of long-distance sprinter, was forged from the beginning by his international career in 1967 when he was recruited by legendary John Wyer to drive the fabulous Ford GT40 of the British manager. Unexpected and heroic winner in Le Mans 1969, he pursued afterward his harvest with Ferrari, notably winning in 1972 six races of the World championship, most with Mario Andretti, the other brilliant champion of the eclecticism. In 1976 began the great adventure with Porsche, the binomial Ickx-Mass making the victories in the World championship of the constructors at the wheel of their prodigious 935. The Belgian driver also won, for the 3rd time, the 24 hours of Le Mans with a 936 shared with the Dutchman Gijs Van Lennep, then did it again the year after at the end of a memorable personal exploit. Gone onboard of the Barth-Haywood's car after the retirement of his own racing car, and handicaped by a delay of several lap behind the leading Renault, he began during the night, in the rain, an extraordinary ascent. Subjected to a ceaseless pressure, the Renault of Jabouille and Bell capitulated, leaving the free way (in spite of a dying engine running only on five cylinders) to the victorious Porsche and to the birth of one of the most beautiful legends of Le Mans. "I certainly never drove so well in my life, he tells. It was a divine state of grace ! An absolutely incredible experience which I never lived afterward."
During winter 1979, Jacky Ickx received an offer to compete for the prestigious series Can-Am in the United States, of which to satisfy for the last time his eternal spirit of adventurer by going to meet cars, circuits and opponents which he did not know. The perfect prelude, as a matter of fact, to a retirement deserved well of which he thought at this moment. Circumstances were however going to decide on it otherwise : "At the beginning of the year, my program with Porsche was reduced to the minimum. I did not have either a seat in Grand Prix. In brief, I had time. So I accepted Carl Haas's invitation to drive his Lola in Can-Am, considering this momentary exile, not as a bend in my career, but rather as a way of ending it in a context which was unknown me. I did not want to end in the routine." The wish of our man was effectively going to be fulfillled, but not in the expected way. Because in June, Guy Ligier asked Jacky to replace Patrick Depailler, injured in an accident of hang-glider. The irony of fate offered him finally this competitive place in F1 which he had vainly tried to find since 1974 by disposing of his talent in the seat of second zone's cars. Nevertheless, Jacky will have all the difficulties to tame the Ligier JS11 victorious at the beginning of the season with Jacques Laffite and Patrick Depailler. The era of the ground effect was ongoing in F1 and for a driver having had no preliminary experience of the constraints - technical and physical - connected to this new aerodynamic exploitation, the adaptation turned out difficult. A situation aggravated by the decline of the team Ligier at the time of the arrival of the Belgian driver and an intern tendency to privilege the preparation Laffite's car so this one could preserves a chance to take the title. Furthermore, the alternation of the program Can-Am with Grand Prix pulled ceaseless crossings of the Atlantic Ocean and hard time shifts. "It is bearable for some months, says Jacky, but not more. I made it, with difficulty with Ligier, splendidly with Haas." On October 7th, 1979, at Watkins Glen, Jacky Ickx made his reverence, twelve years after his debuts in Monza at the wheel of the Cooper Maserati. A the age of 34 only - younger than Michael Schumacher today - he closed definitively the chapter of single-seater after an ultimate experience which clears up his consciousness. "It was the revelation which I needed, he admits. I understood that I had no more my place in Grand Prix. That I was not enough motivated any more to fetch the 3 or 4/10th of second separating me from my team mate. I had made my time, it was necessary to me to turn the page."What he hurried to do immediately, guided by his fatalist sense of the existence and the desire to forge ahead always. To the disappointments of F1 substituted themselves the tremendous enjoyments of Rothmans period with Porsche, crowned by a plethora of success and a double title of world champion in Enduranc (1982/1983) together with his old friends Derek Bell and Jochen Mass. Dashing almost in the fun on the tracks of Paris-Dakar in 1981 together with his friend Claude Brasseur, he nevertheless got acquainted there with a discipline and a continent of an extraordinary wealth. Transcended by his experiment of Africa, where the concept of precariousness of the life takes its most extreme sense, Jacky discovered a ground of exile there, perfect cradle of the fundamental values.
Certainly, there was throughout his course the missed occasions and the moments of misfortune - these inescapable allies of the glorious uncertainty of the sport - without which many things had undoubtedly been different, but for a man who does not like to look towards the past, too occupied by living the present time, the regrets and the resentment are only useless complaints. "It is true that I missed this famous world title in Formula 1, he throws, And then, what about would I complain? It is the life. I always reacted so, it is my philosophy. It is necessary to understand that I have no slightest bitterness as for my failures, not the slightest sadness as for the objectives which I did not reach. I estimate to have lived infinitely more privileged moments, infinitely more enjoyments, than I hoped. But most of all, I am here to speak about it. I think again about those whom I was went alongside, to the friends whom I lost during this period, some unmistakably better than me, and whom had not the same luck." A joy of living which has an equal only in the gratitude that he feels towards all those today who worked through time at his cause :: "I regret not having known how to show, over the moment, my gratitude to all these individuals who allowed me to race. The successes, the prize list and the sports career are not built in solo. Whether it is from the stands or in paddocks, I had the great chance to be well supported and well surrounded. "
In his speech, Jacky Ickx often calls upon the providence which stayed up his driver's fate, even if this one knew the lot of misfortunes and adversity. To tell the truth, the chance had only rarely the leading part. A the time when he exercised his talent in F1 in front of opponents of exception such as Stewart, Rindt or Fittipaldi, he showed himself regularly their equal and even dominated each of them when his equipment was good enough. The chance intervened in no way to allow him to lead with an impressive address the rainy days, no more than when he spun in solo on these immense judges that were the old curcuits of Spa and Nürburgring. No, much more than the fate, it is above all the blooming of the natural talent and stylist's qualities that allowed him to occupy the height of the field. And to distil then this invaluable talent according to his will to force an exploit or a victory, and beyond, write the legend.
Article published in F1i magazine of August 2004.
Photos Thierry Borremans and Archives Galeron
Written by Phillip van Osten F1 Magazine
Published on 2004-10-11 - Read 3463 times
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Your comments
Un seigneur ( Written by Bruno vagnotti on 2004-11-09 )
Oui, un Seigneur, avec un grand "S" non seulement dans le coockpit de ses monoplaces ou Sport, mais aussi dans les stands et en dehors de ceux ci. J'ai suivi toute sa carrière, et même après avoir quitter Ferrari, il est resté parmis mes favoris, même quand il s'attaquait à une voiture frappée du Cheval Cabré.
J'ai eu la chance de l'approcher à l'arrivée du GP de Monaco 1971 (à l'époque c'était possible) et j'en garde un souvenir impérissable.
Aujourd'hui je lui dit merci pour tout ce qu'il m'a apporté à moi et au Sport Automobile.
Merci Jacky.
. . . Bruno |
D'accod ( Written by barre on 2005-03-20 )
Article tres interesant qui raconte bien la vie de Jacky Ickx,et deux points important de sa carriere:
- pilote a la fois polyvanent (protos, F1...)
- et pas toujours de bon choix dans les ecuries en F1
Cordialement
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Assumer la polyvalence..... ( Written by Laurent on 2007-08-05 )
Ces 40 dernières années les pilotes qui ont été Champions du Monde de F1 avaient fait porter tous leurs efforts sur la F1 pendant au moins quelques saisons.
Même Mario Andretti qui est l'un des seuls à pouvoir rivaliser avec Jacky Ickwx en terme d'écclectisme avait fait le choix en 1976 de se concentrer sur la F1 pour tirer de l'ornière Lotus et empocher le Championnant du Monde 1978.
Nul doute que Jacky Ickx en était capable, mais il n'aimait peut-être pas assez la F1 pour ne vivre que par elle pendant quelques saisons. |
Certaines idées reçues ont la peau dure ( Written by Laurent on 2007-08-05 )
Et l'article de Phillip est d'autant plus interessant que j'ai dû ( et bien d'autres supporters de Jacky Ickx aussi sans doute...) contredire souvent des interlocuteurs qui affirmaient de façon péremptoire que Jacky Ickx était un grand pilote d'endurance, mais pas de F1.
On conduit beaucoup plus avec sa tête en endurance qu'en F1 me disait-on, la F1 c'est très dangereux et Jacky Ickx n' est pas assez fou pour risquer de se tuer...
Une poursuite infernale comme celle de 1970 dans le Stadium d'hockenheim avec Jochen Rindt, montre bien que quand il le fallait Jacky Ickx, protégé par une adresse hors du commun, ne craignait rien ni personne.
Même chose lors de l'édition du Mans 1977 où nous avons vu simultanément pendant la nuit le meilleur pilote d'endurance et de vitesse de tous les temps.
Merci Phillip d'avoir rétabli cetaines vérités .....historickx
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