Mike Hawthorn:
John Michael Hawthorn (April 10, 1929 - January 22, 1959) was a racing driver, born in Mexborough, Yorkshire, England, and educated at Ardingly College, West Sussex.
[edit] Biography
Hawthorn made his Formula One debut at the 1952 Belgian Grand Prix, finishing an impressive 4th place. He would later win his first Grand Prix, at only the 9th attempt, when he won the 1953 French Grand Prix at Reims.
In 1955, Hawthorn was the winner of the 24 hours of Le Mans race, despite being involved in the terrible crash that killed 82 spectators.
He was the winner of the 1958 Formula One Championship. With only one win that year against four wins of Stirling Moss, he benefited greatly from the gentlemanliness of Moss as shown at the Portuguese Grand Prix of Porto. Hawthorn was disqualified for pushing his car, against the rules, on the way to a second place finish. Moss interceded on Hawthorn's behalf and the decision was ultimately reversed. Those second place points at Porto contributed to Hawthorn winning the championship with a season total just one point more than that of Moss. After winning the title, Hawthorn immediately announced his retirement from Formula One.
A matter of only months later, on January 22, 1959, Hawthorn died in an automobile accident on the A3 Guildford bypass. He was driving his British Racing Green highly tuned Jaguar 3.4-litre sedan (now known as the 3.4 Mark 1 etc). What happened that day is still a mystery, suggested causes being driver error, mechanical failure, or blackout. The crash has been ascribed to combination of high speed, bad weather, competitiveness and impulsiveness. Rob Walker's 300 SL Mercedes was ahead of him. Perhaps Hawthorn pushed his car to pass Walker's. Hawthorn's Jaguar, nicknamed "the Merceater" was heavily modified for high power and speed. "No Kraut car could overtake or outaccelerate" Hawthorn's Jaguar (these are the words in his biography Challenge Me The Race) - a close relation had been killed in the war, hence his dislike of Germans.
There is now evidence that Hawthorn had recently become subject to blackouts that might well have caused the accident.[2]
In Farnham, the town where he lived up to the time of his death, there is a street named Mike Hawthorn Drive (off Dogflud Way). It was also in this town that Hawthorn ran The Tourist Trophy Garage. Jaguars, Rileys, Fiats and Ferraris were serviced and sold from there.
[edit] Complete World Championship Results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position)
* Indicates Shared Drive
[edit] Hawthorn Memorial Trophy
The Hawthorn Memorial Trophy has been awarded to the most successful British or Commonwealth F1 driver every year since 1959.[3]
[edit] References
- ^ a b Up until 1990, not all points scored by a driver contributed to their final World Championship tally (see list of pointscoring systems for more information). Numbers without parentheses are Championship points; numbers in parentheses are total points scored.
- ^ [1]
- ^ "Button receives Hawthorn Trophy", racecar.com (2007-07-08). Retrieved on 16 July 2007.
[edit] External links
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