Red Bull Motorsports
F1
6 highly unconventional ways to win
You don’t have to be first to win a race, do you?
It used to be said that to finish first, first you had to finish. Not any more. Audi driver Laurens Vanthoor made history by becoming the first driver to win a race and a title on his roof, following an enormous airborne crash at the Macau FIA GT World Cup. That brought out the red flags – which meant that Vanthoor was declared the winner, as he was the last person to lead a lap. But this sort of thing isn’t an entirely new situation: here are six more highly unusual wins.
Vittorio Brambilla: 1975 Austrian Grand Prix
Brambilla was nicknamed ‘The Monza Gorilla’
© Rainer W. Schlegelmilch/Getty Images
The fact that Brambilla was nicknamed The Monza Gorilla gives you a clue about his driving style. His one and only grand prix win (and podium) came at a soaking-wet Austrian Grand Prix in 1975, which turned into carnage. Brambilla, driving a March, powered his way past race leader James Hunt – whose engine had lapsed onto seven cylinders – as the rain fell harder. On lap 29 of a planned 54, the organisers decided enough was enough and stopped the race. Just in the nick of time, as Brambilla spun when he took the flag and crossed the line sideways before hitting the barriers. Moral of the story: never get carried away by the occasion.
Paul Stewart: British Formula 3 Snetterton 1989
Paul is the son of the legendary Jackie Stewart
© Pascal Rondeau/Getty Images
Paul is the son of the legendary Jackie Stewart, and he too enjoyed his own ‘Brambilla moment’ at a British Formula 3 round in Snetterton in 1989. The final bend, Russell, is a notoriously tricky one and Stewart lost it coming out of there and ended up going backwards across the finish line. Just moments before, Mika Häkkinen had a big crash at a corner known as the ‘bombhole’, bringing out the red flags. As a result, Stewart was declared the winner.
Michael Schumacher: 1998 British Grand Prix
Schumacher sticks to the rules
© Michael Cooper/Allsport
Brilliant lateral thinking or a cynical manipulation of the rules? You decide. The facts are that Michael Schumacher was handed a stop-and-go penalty close to the finish for overtaking under yellow flags much earlier in the chaotic race. The rules stated that he had to serve the penalty within three laps of the notification and Ferrari duly complied with this. The twist, however, was that they brought him in on the very last lap – which meant that by the time he got to the Ferrari garage he had crossed the finish line (in the pits) and won the race. All the time while sticking to the letter of the law, and serving his stop-and-go penalty on the final race lap.
Jochen Rindt: 1970 Formula One World Championship
Jochen Rindt won the 1970 F1 1 while dead
© Rainer W. Schlegelmilch/Getty Images
The brilliant Jochen Rindt won the 1970 Formula 1 World Championship while dead: a record that has thankfully never been repeated. The Austrian dominated the 1970 F1 season in his Lotus, right up to Monza: four races before the end of the year. Bidding for his sixth win of the year he crashed out with a brake problem and hit a poorly installed Armco barrier at the Parabolica in practice, which killed him. Such was his points lead that none of his rivals could catch up, and Rindt ended the year with a five-point lead over Jacky Ickx in the final standings.
Sébastien Loeb: 2006 World Rally Championship
Loeb won while sitting at home on his sofa
© Bernard Wis/Paris Match via Getty Images
The official story was that Seb Loeb had fallen off his mountain bike while training after the Cyprus Rally. Many years later, Loeb wryly admitted that it was just possible a trials bike might have been involved instead… In any case, the effect was the same: the Frenchman broke his arm badly and was ruled out of the final four rallies of the year. Ford’s Marcus Grönholm failed to make up the points deficit that he needed to win, so a bemused Loeb ended up claiming the championship – by just one point – while sitting at home on his sofa, watching the title-deciding Rally Australia on TV.
Juan Manuel Fangio: 1956 Italian Grand Prix
Fangio damaged the steering on his Ferrari
© GP Library/UIG via Getty Images
Fangio is probably the only man to win a world championship by finishing second in a grand prix using a different car to the one that he started it in. The Argentinian legend was on course to win his fourth title in Italy, but then damaged the steering on his Ferrari and nursed it back to the pits. As his mechanics frantically tried to repair the car, Fangio saw the title slipping through his fingers. But then his team-mate Peter Collins – who was also in contention for the title – came in and voluntarily handed his Ferrari over to Fangio, who went on to score the points he needed to claim the championship. Can you think of a driver in today's F1 landscape who would do that?
