Today marks 25 years since the sudden and untimely death of British racing driver and Formula 1 World Champion James Hunt.
One of the last of a breed of adrenaline-fuelled ‘playboy’ racing drivers, Hunt exhibited a rare natural talent for speed on the track and also lived his life off it at full throttle. The 1976 Grand Prix season, which he ultimately won, is remembered as one of the greatest ever for his intense rivalry with Austrian driver Niki Lauda.
Born on August 29th, 1947, in Belmont, Surrey, into a relatively well-off family, Hunt was a natural athlete who excelled at several sports. While at school he played cricket, football, squash and tennis, all to a high level, including competing at Junior Wimbledon. He also demonstrated qualities which would mark his later life, such as being extremely competitive, often rebellious and sometimes quick-tempered.
He first learned to drive on a tractor at a farm in Wales during a family holiday and passed his driving test just a week after his 17th birthday, later saying that that was when his life really began. Soon afterwards he got his first taste of motor racing when his tennis doubles partner, whose brother raced Minis, took him along to watch a race.
Hunt became obsessed and soon began racing Minis himself, displaying a natural flair, a love of speed and an apparent fearlessness which gave him an edge over most of his rivals. Graduating to Formula Ford, he set a new lap record at the Brands Hatch short circuit and began to get himself noticed by established racing teams.
By 1969 he had won commercial sponsorship and was racing in Formula Three, where he continued to hone his skills. He also experienced the frustrations of mechanical failures while racing for the STP-March team, while his apparent recklessness and occasional crashes earned him a new nickname – “Hunt the Shunt”. In truth it was unwarranted, as he crashed no more often than his fellow drivers, but the rhyming nickname stuck.
It was after joining the Hesketh team in 1973 that his career really took off. Fronted by English aristocrat and motorsport enthusiast Lord Hesketh, the team was derided by rivals as party-loving amateurs attracted by the glamour of Formula One. Hunt was a kindred spirit and natural addition to the outfit, but he soon began to prove the team’s detractors wrong with some spectacular driving on the track. The Hesketh team’s seemingly devil-may-care approach and ‘underdog’ status also earned it a growing following among British racing fans.
Ultimately it was a lack of funds which ended Hesketh’s ambitions and led to Hunt joining McLaren for the 1976 season, one of the most dramatic and controversial ever. A deep rivalry had developed between Hunt and reigning world champion Niki Lauda, who was in many ways his polar opposite. While Hunt was cast as the carefree playboy, Lauda was the dedicated professional driver, systematic, methodical and calculating, although the two men were friends off the track as well as rivals on it.
After Lauda sustained near fatal injuries in a spectacular crash and fire in the German Grand Prix, Hunt mounted a late charge to close the gap in the championship. Despite his horrific injuries, Lauda missed just two races before returning to the track, desperate to defend his world title. A series of accidents and controversial disqualifications on technical issues took the points battle for the title right to the final race in Japan, which was marked by torrential rain.
Lauda, unable to blink and clear his eyes due to his facial burns, retired early in the race, which was dominated by Hunt until he suffered a puncture. Despite a delayed pitstop, he fought his way back to third place to claim the championship title by a single point.
His new status as F1 world champion didn’t change him. He often turned up at formal gala functions in T-shirt, jeans and bare feet and was frequently featured in the tabloid press for his hard-partying lifestyle, dating a string of glamorous women, marrying and later divorcing twice, smoking and drinking heavily and even indulging in recreational drugs.
Over the next two-and-a-half seasons Hunt was frustrated by regular mechanical problems and repeated forced retirements which meant he failed to recapture his earlier success and gradually lost his enthusiasm for the sport. Retiring from racing in the middle of the 1979 season, he began a new 13-year career as a BBC race commentator alongside Murray Walker, earning a reputation for tactical knowledge, technical insight, a dry sense of humour and outspoken criticism of drivers who failed to earn his respect.
Hunt’s sudden and unexpected death at the age of just 45 shocked and stunned the world of motorsport and his army of fans. He died in his sleep on June 15th, 1993, after suffering a massive heart attack. Perhaps the most telling tribute came from his biggest rival, Niki Lauda, who said Hunt was one of the very few people he liked, one of a smaller number he respected, and the only one he ever envied. “When I heard he’d died age 45 of a heart attack, I wasn’t surprised,” said Lauda. “I was just sad.”