03/08/2016
NEWS STORY
A year which has already claimed the lives of so many legends today took another, racing driver Chris Amon.
We say legend because other than his undisputed, enormous talent, as Stirling Moss will forever be remembered as the greatest driver to never win the world championship, so Amon will be remembered as the greatest driver never to win a world championship Grand Prix.
Indeed, the F1 statistics - 96 starts, 11 podiums, 83 points, 5 poles and 3 fastest laps - doesn't begin to scratch the surface of the true story.
The son of a sheep farmer in New Zealand, Amon's career kicked off in his homeland, first with an A40 in hillclimb then progressing to a Cooper, Maserati 250F and finally Bruce McLaren's old Cooper-Climax.
In 1962 he was observed by Reg Parnell, a former racer who had gone into team management and enjoyed success in endurance racing and was, following brief initial disappointment, to enjoy success in F1 guiding such talents as John Surtees. Indeed, having spotted rising star Mike Hailwood, who was to also make a successful transition from two to four wheels, Parnell enjoyed a reputation as a keen scout of talent.
Parnell brought Amon to England where he had a successful test at Goodwood. This was followed by a number of non-championship races and then his debut in the 1963 world championship.
Indicative of his entire career, those first few seasons were a long, hard slog with little reward, not helped by the fact that the equipment at his disposal was generally uncompetitive.
Following the death of Parnell in January 1964, his son Tim took over running of the team and while it was a largely forgettable season, Amon scored his first world championship points when he finished fifth at Zandvoort.
In 1965 Parnell and Amon parted company when an engine deal with BRM meant the team was forced to run the British engine manufacturer's own driver, Richard Attwood. However, Amon was quickly snapped up by a fellow-Kiwi who had just started his own F1 team, Bruce McLaren.
Unfortunately, McLaren never had a second car available so Amon - who was fast gaining a reputation more for his social life than track success - headed to endurance racing.
When Attwood was injured, Amon was called on to replace him and on the Briton's return was retained as second driver, but again with little success.
1966 was a busy year for Amon. While there was little in the way of F1, he continued in endurance racing, Can-Am and also the movie Grand Prix, in which he drove a McLaren disguised as a Yamura while his name and helmet was 'adapted' for star James Garner who became Pete Aron.
1966, of course, also saw Amon win the Le Mans 24-hour race, the youngster sharing a Ford GT40 with Bruce McLaren as Ferrari's domination of the event came to an end.
Earlier in the year, Amon was recruited by Cooper to replace Richie Ginther. Impressed by the youngster, the team opted to retain him for the remainder of the season. However, when John Surtees and Ferrari parted company mid-season and the Briton headed to Cooper, Amon found himself out of a job.
Following his Le Mans win, Amon was invited to Maranello to meet Enzo Ferrari and at the meeting he agreed to partner Lorenzo Bandini and Ludovico Scarfiotti as works Ferrari F1 driver in 1967.
As Fernando Alonso and Sebastian Vettel will readily tell you, when Ferrari is on the up, it is the team to be with. However, there are too many long periods of nothing, when the team is "typically Italian" and cannot get its act together. Indeed, Surtees frustration with the team was the very reason a driver vacancy became available.
Amon spent three seasons with Ferrari, and while there were some successes, most of the time the Kiwi was left frustrated. Indeed, no doubt to Enzo's satisfaction, Amon enjoyed more success with Ferrari's Sports Car team.
Amon left Ferrari at the end of 1969 – ironically just as the Italian team was about to start winning again, and having done the groundwork - to join a new project headed by Max Mosley and Robin Herd, March.
As was to become the norm during his career - other than his legendary bad luck - Amon won the pre-season F1 race at Silverstone, but once the season proper got underway it all fell apart.
Talking of bad luck, Amon disputed this, insisting that though he'd had his fair share of incidents he had lived to tell the tale.
"I'm luckier than Jimmy and Jochen and Bruce and Piers," he told Motor Sport in 2008. "Luckier than my teammates Bandini, Scarfiotti, Siffert and Cevert.
"I had several big accidents that could have killed me," he added, "I broke ribs, but I was never badly hurt."
Indeed, in the wake of Clark's death at Hockenheim in 1968, Amon said: "If it can happen to him it can happen to anyone".
And as for those non-championship wins, there were eight in all.
Anyway, a largely unforgettable season with March was followed by two with Matra, at which point fans of a certain age will smile as they recall the banshee wail of the French outfit's V12.
There were moments, especially third in the French outfit's home race, but for the most part unreliability and that legendary bad luck were to prevent Amon showing what he was truly capable of.
A superfast but smooth driver, for various reasons, including being with teams at the wrong time, unreliability and - yes - bad luck, Amon never fulfilled his true potential.
To get things in perspective, one of the best example of that bad luck came at Monza in 1971. Having stunned Ferrari and the tifosi by taking pole in the French Matra, with the fastest pole lap in the history of the sport. Amon looked set to take victory in a race which was to go down in history as having the closest finish in the history of the sport, when 5 cars crossed the finish line covered by just 0.61s. Got that five cars separated by less than a second at the flag.
Anyway, whilst leading, and looking set to take his maiden Grand Prix win, at Monza, in a Matra, Amon pulled off a rip-off. Trouble is, the whole visor came away, leading the Kiwi to finish a distant sixth.
The third of the legendary Kiwi triumvirate that was Bruce McLaren and Denny Hulme, Amon never achieved the world championship title of the latter or the all-round success of the former, though he did enjoy a brief flirtation as a constructor at a time (1974) when everyone thought they could have a go.
Following Matra there were spells at Tecno, Tyrrell, BRM and Ensign, even an outing with Wolf-Williams.
It's said that Niki Lauda's horrendous accident at the Nurburgring in 1976 played a key part in Amon's decision to retire, certainly from F1, but in honesty the writing was on the wall long before.
The Sports Car wins at Le Mans and Daytona, that heady summer of '67 when he scored four podiums in six Grand Prix, his home success in the Tasman Series with the Ferrari Dino, all were sign of his enormous potential, but like so many others, for reasons not of their own making it was not to be fully realised.
Amon eventually headed back to New Zealand to run the family farm, he made the occasional appearance behind the wheel - even taking part in a rally with Murray Walker - and became heavily involved with Toyota New Zealand, for whom he became a consultant.
A whole new generation discovered him courtesy of the TV motoring series Motor Show on which he was a test driver, and he was involved in the design of the Taupo Motorsport Park.
Indeed, close friend Eoin Young penned his biography, the tome even including a brief mention of Pitpass editor Chris Balfe (and his ice cream).
A brief statement issued by his family, reads: "Chris battled cancer in recent years but retained not only a close interest in Formula 1 - and his very wide range of favourite topics - but also his wonderful sense of humour complete with infectious chuckle."
Among the first to pay tribute was Ron Dennis.
"It was with profound sadness that I heard the news this morning that Chris Amon had passed away.
"Chris started 96 Grands Prix but won not one of them - and it is safe to say that he was the greatest racing driver never to have won a race at the very highest level. He nearly won a fair few, but always it seemed that his luck would run out before he saw the chequered flag.
"However, he won at Le Mans, in a mighty 7.0-litre Ford, exactly 50 years ago, his co-driver his friend and fellow Kiwi, Bruce McLaren, whose name still graces the team to which I have devoted my working life.
"I have not met Chris for many years, but, even so, I have extremely fond memories of him, and indeed I would describe him as one of the most likeable men I have met in my long racing career.
"For all those reasons I want to take this opportunity to extend the heartfelt sympathies of all 3300 of us at McLaren to the family and friends of a great New Zealander, a true gentleman, and one of the fastest racing drivers there ever was: the one and only Christopher Arthur Amon.
"May he rest in peace."
No further words are required other than to say that on behalf of its readers, Pitpass offers its sincere condolences to his family.
Christopher Arthur Amon, born 20 July 1943, passed away on 3 August 2016.