Andretti’s hook-up with Colin Chapman and Team Lotus at Long Beach in 1977 was a godsend to both. (Unfortunately, in the race he DNF’ed as his Lotus more or less fell apart.)į or three years Andretti raced sporadically and inconclusively, for Lotus, Ferrari and March, achieving his first F1 victory in his first race for Ferrari in the 1971 South African Grand Prix. Actually, he had never driven at the Glen before. Oh, sure, they said: it’s his home track. By the time he memorably won the at the Brickyard for Andy Granatelli in a backup car in 1969, Andretti had already dabbled in F1, making his debut for Lotus at the end of 1968 - qualifying on pole for the season-ending United States Grand Prix at Watkins Glen. At Indianapolis in 1965 (where he finished third in a race memorably won by Jim Clark in a Lotus) Andretti was promised a future Formula One drive by Team Lotus boss Colin Chapman. By the early 1960s he was racing with success in sprint and stock car events, graduating to USAC Champ cars in 1964.
at age 15, Andretti was already interested in racing and with his twin brother, Aldo, started competing at local dirt ovals. An immigrant from Italy who arrived in the U.S. M ario Andretti was a rarity, an American who not only captured the Formula One World Championship but enjoyed considerable success on both sides of the Atlantic in a career spanning more than three decades.
0 kommentar(er)
