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OBSCURE F1 A-Z: JACKY ICKX


Photo Credit: grandprixweekly.com

In this 26 part series of posts I will be going through the alphabet and for each letter, a profile piece on an obscure driver - some you may have heard of before some you may never knew even sat in an F1 car let alone raced one. I have chosen a driver for each letter choosing them based on their surnames.

Jacky Ickx - the hardest name to spell in F1 history. The Belgian national raced in Formula One for 13 years, 1966 - 1979. In that time Ickx raced for nine different teams including Cooper, Ferrari, McLaren, Brabham, Williams, Lotus, Wolf-Williams, Ensign and Ligier. In his time Ickx was teammates with some very famous racing names including Jochen Rindt, Jack Brabham and Denny Hulme.

Photo Credit: ESPN

Ickx made his F1 debut at the 1966 German Grand Prix where he failed to finish after an accident on lap 16 - in the same race on lap 25 British driver John Taylor was involved in a fatal accident.

Ickx's first win came just two years later at the 1968 French Grand Prix in a dominant win where he managed to cross the line almost two minutes clear of second place John Surtees (Honda) - at this time Ickx was now racing for Ferrari. In the same race on lap 16 French driver and Surtees' teammate at Honda Jo Schlesser was killed. His eighth and final win came at the 1972 German Grand Prix the venue in which Ickx had made his debut seven years earlier. In a race that only lasted a total of 14 laps Ickx once again dominated in his Ferrari finishing 48 seconds clear of his teammate Clay Regazzoni in second.

Ickx made his final F1 appearance at the 1979 US Grand Prix where he retired after just two laps after spinning off in his Ligier-Ford.

Photo Credit: FormulaRapida

In his illustrious career Ickx achieved;

14 Fastest Laps

13 Pole Postions

181 Career Points

25 Podiums &

8 Wins

A driver which purely from those statistics should have more than likely have won a Championship with the machinery he was given unfortunately it was never meant to be for Ickx in Formula One.

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