Graham Hill: The Racer, the Man – Formula One Racing

Awaiting the start of the Italian Grand Prix

Editor’s Note: The following is a guest post from Steve Graubart of Artspock.

Graham Hill is the only race car driver to have won a Formula One championship, the Indianapolis 500 and the 24 Hours at Lemans.  The legacy of this British racer is rich, and extends way beyond S-curves and straightaways.

He came from humble North London beginnings.  While freelancing as an auto mechanic, Hill bartered services to drive customer cars.  A chance meeting with Colin Chapman landed him a mechanics job at Formula One Team Lotus.  After much cajoling, Chapman finally let him race.  Hill drove Lotus from 1958 to 1960, but grew steadily irritated by repeated mechanical failures.   He left to join the fledgling British Racing Motors team (BRM).

He won his first world championship in 1962, then rejoined Lotus in 1967 to form a super team with two-time world champion Jim Clark.  Hill claimed the world title again in 1968.

Five victories at Monaco brought hoards of adoring fans.  On race day, well-wishers packed Monte Carlo streets and apartment balconies, waving handkerchiefs.

Hill relished success and the trappings that came with it.  His fun loving spirit provoked bales of laughter.  At a charity dinner, with strippers the evening’s featured entertainment, Graham suddenly took off his trousers and went running toward a woman at the head of his table.  He tripped and ended up with a long goblet stem embedded in his calf.  Who better to rush him to the hospital than the “Flying Scot,” future three-time Formula One champion Jackie Stewart.

Jackie, Jimmy and Graham

At the racetrack, however, Graham was grimly serious. He could be hard on team mechanics, demanding and short-tempered.  On race day, no one could go near him.

“The chief qualities of a racing driver are concentration, determination and anticipation,” Hill said. “Time is of the essence, and I’m very short of essence.”

Formula One has always been dangerous.  Its early years were particularly treacherous.   In wet conditions at the 1966 Belgium Grand Prix, Jackie Stewart careened out of control, ending up sideways in a ditch.   Hill stopped his car, clamored out and went to the aid of his friend.  It took twenty-five minutes for Hill and a crew member to extract the petrol-soaked Stewart from the car.

In a 2008 BBC retrospective, “Driven”, Stewart recalls the incident.  â€œGraham saw me from inside his car; he looked down and saw me down in this drop-off area.  He could have continued, but didn’t.  He came to help me.  In those days we were using high-octane aviation fuel that is very corrosive. It was burning my skin off.”

Stewart elaborated further. “So Graham took all my clothes off.  Literally, I was lying naked in the back of a farm truck.  Nuns arrived and found me naked in the back of this truck.  You can imagine what the nuns were thinking: poor injured racing driver being taken advantage of by devilish looking racing driver with the swept-back hair and mustache.”

Hill entered the Indianapolis 500 for the first time in 1966 and received the checkered flag.  His wife Bette wanted to join him in Indianapolis, but Graham thought it best that she stay home. He was upset that toilets inside track loos had no doors, and angrily reported it to track officials.  Doors were installed the next day.

Graham, Jim and Jackie often socialized away from racing, enjoying a day out pheasant shooting, golfing, boating or flying.  Airplanes were a keen passion of all three.  Hill had taken a portion of his Indy winnings to purchase a twin-engine private plane.

Sadly, in April 1968, Jim Clark was killed in a race at Hockenheim Germany.  As there were no skid marks, the circumstances of the accident remained mysterious, though some believe a slow leak may have critically decompressed a tire in a tight turn.   Team Lotus was shattered.   If it could happen to Jimmy, it could happen to any of them.  Intent on bolstering team morale, Graham entered the Spanish Grand Prix a month after his friend’s death.  He won.

On November 29, 1975, Hill and five members of his own Embassy Hill team were killed when his Piper Aztec clipped trees at Hertfordshire golf course on approach to Elstree airport in foggy conditions.  Bette, two daughters and young son Damon were left to carry on.

Damon Hill, driving for Team Williams, was crowned Formula One world champion in 1996.