Jackie Stewart on his way to victory in the second heat of the Rand Grand Prix aboard a works Lotus 33 Climax. Kyalami, December 12, 1964.
Stewart’s first drive of a Grand Prix car had been organised by Jim Clark during the 1964 British Grand Prix weekend at Brands Hatch on the July 11 weekend.
Dominant in one of Ken Tyrrell’s Cooper T72 BMCs that F3 season, Clark convinced Colin Chapman to give the young charger a few laps in Clark’s Lotus 33 Climax at the end of practice. The marshalls were asked to stay in situ for an extra 20 minutes to allow the test to take place. Using Jim’s car and his settings: pedals, seat etc, off went The Other Scot down the pitlane to complete only a few laps before the engine failed.
Despite the short session, JYS impressed, a week later Jackie had the first of a half-dozen meetings in a works-Ron Harris Racing Lotus 32 Cosworth SCA F2 car at Clermont Ferrand. The opportunity arose as a result of Peter Arundell’s misfortune.
Arundell was badly injured during the Reims F2 GP on July 5. In a slipstreaming group, he got onto the rough at the kink on the straight, corrected, but lost a bit of speed and was hit by Richie Ginther’s Lola T55 Cosworth SCA. Peter parted company with his car in mid-air, breaking an arm, thigh and collarbone and was comatose for a fortnight. At that time he was in joint third place in the F1 World Championship standings with Ginther, behind Clark and Graham Hill. Arundell eventually returned to F1 with Team Lotus in 1966, a tough place to be at the time: see here for a great summary of Peter’s career: https://www.f1forgottendrivers.com/drivers/peter-arundell/
Meanwhile, Jackie Stewart was immediately on the pace at Clermont, placing second behind Denny Hulme’s winning Brabham BT10 Cosworth SCA. Jackie then won at Snetterton, was second at Montlhery and third at Oulton Park.
So when Clark sustained a back injury at Cortina d’Ampezzo during a snowball fight at a Ford Cortina marketing event, it was an easy call for Chapman to engage Stewart to replace him in South Africa. Lotus had contracted to provide two cars to contest the Rand Grand Prix and touring car support races at Kyalami that weekend.
Stewart initially thought that he should make his GP debut with BRM, to whom he was contracted for 1965, but “I telephoned Ken Tyrrell and asked his advice. He said ‘don’t be such a stick in the mud, you’ve got to get out and drive the thing sometime’ and pointed out that this Formula 1 scamper would calm my nerves rather than taking my first appearance in a full-scale Grand Epreuve. I think from that aspect I couldn’t have done better than drive at Kyalami and perhaps I wouldn’t have done it if someone hadn’t kicked me in the backside and told me to get on with it,” he told the F1 Grand Prix Drivers Club.
Chapman cleared the drive with BRM’s Tony Rudd and Stewart promptly qualified on pole in a brand new Lotus 33 Climax (R10). The field included his teammate Mike Spence, his soon to be teammate at BRM, Graham Hill in a Willment entered Brabham BT11 BRM, Bob Anderson’s BT11 Climax and two Brabham BT10 Lotus-Ford twin-cams raced by Paul Hawkins and David Prophet. There was a swag of competent locals too including John Love, Piet de Klerk and Sam Tingle.
Jackie’s Lotus broke a driveshaft on the line of the first heat – causing maximum chaos behind – but the Team Lotus mechanics, ever competent, had the car ready for the second heat which Stewart won from Hill. Graham won the Rand GP overall from Hawkins and Anderson. Mike Spence was second in the first heat but had a rose-joint fail after only one lap in the second.
See here: https://www.f1grandprixdriversclub.com/jackie-stewart-fifty-years-ago/ and here: https://velocetoday.com/jackie-stewarts-first-f1-drive/
Credits…
F1Grand Prix Drivers Club, VeloceToday.com, Robert Young, Peter Tempest, MotorSport Images, f1forgottendrivers.com
Tailpiece…
Paul Hawkins raced John Willment’s Brabham and Ford Galaxie that weekend, getting the better of Stewart’s Lotus Cortina in the touring car support races. Look at the size of that thing…
Finito…
primotipo... 