1963 Mexican Grand Prix

 1963 Mexican Grand Prix

Racing data
9th of 10 races of the 1963 Automobile World Championship
Surname:	II Gran Premio de Mexico
Date:	October 27, 1963
Place:	Mexico City , Mexico
Course:	Magdalena Mixhuca
Length:	325 km in 65 laps of 5 km
Weather:	cloudy, dry
Pole position
Driver:	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax
Time:	1: 58.8 min
Fastest lap
Driver:	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax
Time:	1: 58.1 min
Podium
First:	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax
Second:	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax
Third:	Richie Ginther	BRM

The 1963 Mexican Grand Prix took place on October 27, 1963 at the Magdalena Mixhuca near Mexico City and was the ninth race of the 1963 World Automobile Championship .

Reports

background

Winner Jim Clark scores the third Grand Slam of the season

last race by Jim Hall (picture from 2013)

For the second time after 1962, the Mexican Grand Prix was held, the first time as part of the World Automobile Championship. Jim Clark and Trevor Taylor shared the victory in the previous race on a Lotus . The Mexican Grand Prix became an integral part of the racing calendar in the following years, but there were several interruptions from longer periods in which the Grand Prix was not held. The racetrack was called Magdalena Mixhuca, but was later renamed after the two brothers Ricardo Rodríguez and Pedro Rodríguez . Ricardo Rodríguez died in the race last year from a training accident. Pedro Rodríguez finished the season with Lotus and moved to Ferrari the following year .

Several teams ended the season after the Mexican Grand Prix and did not register for the South African Grand Prix, which took place two months later . British Racing Partnership qualified one last time, with Jim Hall driving his last race in the automobile world championship. For the team followed by two more releases in 1964. With Reg Parnell Racing were Masten Gregory , Hap Sharp and Chris Amon reported. Amon was also in the following season with the team, Sharp joined the Rob Walker Racing Team , Gregory returned after a year in 1965 to Scuderia Centro Sud back. Also Automobili Turismo e Sport finished the season, Phil Hill then moved to Cooper , Giancarlo Baghetti denied in the next few years, only individual race for other teams. Frank Dochnal was only registered for a Grand Prix in the context of the Automobile World Championship, he drove a private Cooper T51 .

Moisés Solana made her debut at Scuderia Centro Sud and drove a BRM P57 . The special thing about this race participation was his starting number 13, which no other driver had before in the automobile world championship. This number has generally not been given since 1926 because it was viewed as unlucky and some fatal accidents in the prewar period have been linked to it. Until the 2014 Formula 1 season, Solana remained the only driver with this starting number who qualified for a race before Pastor Maldonado set 13 as his permanent starting number.

In the drivers' standings, Clark was unassailable in front of Richie Ginther and Graham Hill and John Surtees with the same points . The constructors' championship had already been decided in favor of Lotus, with the team leading ahead of BRM and Ferrari.

training

Clark dominated the training and was the fastest with over a second advantage. It was his sixth pole position of the season. John Surtees finished second, a tenth of a second ahead of Graham Hill. With Dan Gurney on Brabham , four different constructors were on the first four starting positions.

In the midfield, Richie Ginther was fifth, Lorenzo Bandini in a Ferrari qualified seventh between the two Cooper. With Jo Bonnier and Jo Siffert , two drivers followed with customer vehicles. The first ten were completed by Jack Brabham . Cars by the designers Lola Cars , ATS and Porsche qualified in the back field. Dochnal qualified, but damaged the car in an accident and therefore did not take part in the race.

run

Clark took the lead after the start and then dominated the race. Already in the first laps of the race he built a lead of more than eight seconds over the competition. Gurney improved from fourth on the grid to second ahead of Surtees, who had handling problems with his Ferrari early on in the race. On lap 19 he pitted to have the suspension repaired. He let the engine die and had to be pushed to continue the race. This unauthorized assistance by his mechanics was punished by the race management with disqualification. This was the only disqualification in Surtee's career.

With Tony Maggs , Baghetti, Trevor Taylor and Bruce McLaren, four drivers with engine damage retired in the course of the race. In the case of Gregory, Rodríguez and Phil Hill, suspension damage was the reason for failure, while Amon and Bandini also retired with technical defects. No Ferrari and also no ATS reached the goal. For the Lotus works team, only Clark remained in the race, who extended his lead over the competition to over a minute. Due to the numerous failures of the opponents, Brabham improved to second place after starting from tenth on the grid. He also benefited from the fact that Graham Hill had transmission problems and Gurney fell behind with a faulty fuel supply.

Clark won the race with superiority and, in addition to taking pole position, also achieved the fastest race lap. Since he also led all rounds, he scored the third Grand Slam of the season. Only Alberto Ascari succeeded in doing this in 1952 . It was Clark's sixth win of the season, setting the record for Ascari and Juan Manuel Fangio . Due to the cancellation rules, Clark achieved the maximum possible number of points of 54 points in the drivers 'championship with these six victories, and Lotus had also achieved the maximum number of points in the constructors' championship. Brabham finished second and achieved his only podium of the season. Most recently he was among the top three at the 1960 Portuguese Grand Prix . Ginther finished third and stayed in second place in the drivers' standings, his lead over teammate Graham Hill, who finished fourth in the race, was four points. Bonnier received points for fifth, Gurney for sixth.

Registration list

team	No.	driver	chassis	engine	tires
Owen Racing Organization	01	Graham Hill	BRM P57	BRM 1.5 V8	D.
	02	Richie Ginther
Cooper Car Company	03	Bruce McLaren	Cooper T66	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	04th	Tony Maggs
Brabham Racing Organization	05	Jack Brabham	Brabham BT7	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	06th	Dan Gurney
Team Lotus	08th	Jim Clark	Lotus 25	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	09	Trevor Taylor
	10	Pedro Rodríguez
Rob Walker Racing Team	11	Jo Bonnier	Cooper T66	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
Ecurie Maarsbergen	12	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche 718	Porsche 1.5 B4	D.
Scuderia Centro Sud	13	Moises Solana	BRM P57	BRM 1.5 V8	D.
Siffert Racing Team	14th	Jo Siffert	Lotus 24	BRM 1.5 V8	D.
British Racing Partnership	16	Jim Hall	Lotus 24	BRM 1.5 V8	D.
Reg Parnell Racing	17th	Masts Gregory	Lola Mk4A	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	18th	Rodger Ward	Lotus 24	BRM 1.5 V8
	22nd	Hap Sharp
Frank Dochnal	20th	Frank Dochnal	Cooper T53	Climax 1.5 L4	D.
Scuderia Ferrari SpA SEFAC	23	John Surtees	Ferrari 156 Aero	Ferrari 1.5 V6	D.
	24	Lorenzo Bandini
ATS	25th	Phil Hill	ATS 100	ATS 1.5 V8	D.
	26th	Giancarlo Baghetti

Classifications

Starting grid

Item	driver	constructor	time	Ø speed	begin
01	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax	1: 58.8	151.52 km / h	01
02	John Surtees	Ferrari	2: 00.5	149.38 km / h	02
03	Graham Hill	BRM	2: 00.6	149.25 km / h	03
04th	Dan Gurney	Brabham-Climax	2: 01.6	148.03 km / h	04th
05	Richie Ginther	BRM	2: 01.8	147.78 km / h	05
06th	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax	2: 02.3	147.18 km / h	06th
07th	Lorenzo Bandini	Ferrari	2: 02.4	147.06 km / h	07th
08th	Jo Bonnier	Cooper-Climax	2: 02.6	146.82 km / h	08th
09	Jo Siffert	Lotus BRM	2: 03.3	145.99 km / h	09
10	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax	2: 03.6	145.63 km / h	10
11	Moises Solana	BRM	2: 04.1	145.04 km / h	11
12	Trevor Taylor	Lotus Climax	2: 04.9	144.12 km / h	12
13	Tony Maggs	Cooper-Climax	2: 05.2	143.77 km / h	13
14th	Masts Gregory	Lola-Climax	2: 05.5	143.43 km / h	14th
15th	Jim Hall	Lotus BRM	2: 06.1	142.74 km / h	15th
16	Hap Sharp	Lotus BRM	2: 07.7	140.96 km / h	16
17th	Phil Hill	ATS	2: 13.6	134.73 km / h	17th
18th	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche	2: 14.1	134.23 km / h	18th
19th	Chris Amon	Lotus BRM	2: 14.7	133.63 km / h	19th
20th	Pedro Rodríguez	Lotus Climax	2: 15.3	133.04 km / h	20th
21st	Giancarlo Baghetti	ATS	2: 22.3	126.49 km / h	21st
22nd	Frank Dochnal	Cooper-Climax	no time		-

run

Item	driver	constructor	Round	Stops	time	begin	Fastest lap	Failure reason
01	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax	65	0	2: 09: 52.1	01	1: 58.1
02	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax	65	0	+1: 41.1	10
03	Richie Ginther	BRM	65	0	+1: 54.7	05
04th	Graham Hill	BRM	64	0	+ 1 lap	03
05	Jo Bonnier	Cooper-Climax	62	1	+ 3 rounds	08th
06th	Dan Gurney	Brabham-Climax	62	0	+ 3 rounds	04th
07th	Hap Sharp	Lotus BRM	61	0	+ 4 rounds	16
08th	Jim Hall	Lotus BRM	61	0	+ 4 rounds	15th
09	Jo Siffert	Lotus BRM	59	0	+ 6 rounds	09
10	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche	58	0	+ 7 rounds	18th
11	Moises Solana	BRM	57	0	+ 8 rounds	11
-	John Surtees	Ferrari	19th	1	DSQ	02		were pushed
-	Phil Hill	ATS	40	0	DNF	17th		suspension
-	Lorenzo Bandini	Ferrari	35	0	DNF	07th		ignition
-	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax	29	0	DNF	06th		Engine failure
-	Pedro Rodríguez	Lotus Climax	26th	0	DNF	20th		suspension
-	Masts Gregory	Lola-Climax	23	0	DNF	14th		suspension
-	Trevor Taylor	Lotus Climax	19th	0	DNF	12		Engine failure
-	Giancarlo Baghetti	ATS	10	0	DNF	21st		Engine failure
-	Chris Amon	Lotus BRM	08th	0	DNF	19th		transmission
-	Tony Maggs	Cooper-Climax	07th	0	DNF	13		Engine failure
-	Frank Dochnal	Cooper-Climax	00	0	DNS			Training accident

World Cup stands after the race

The first six of the race got 9, 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 points. Only the six best results from ten races counted. In the constructors' championship, only the points of the best placed driver on a team counted.

Driver ranking

Item driver constructor Points 01  Jim Clark Lotus Climax 54 (64) 02  Richie Ginther BRM 29 (34) 03  Graham Hill BRM 25th 04th  John Surtees Ferrari 22nd 05  Bruce McLaren Cooper-Climax 14th 06th  Jack Brabham Brabham-Climax 14th 07th  Dan Gurney Brabham-Climax 13 08th  Tony Maggs Cooper-Climax 9 09  Innes Ireland BRP-BRM 6th

Item driver constructor Points 10  Jo Bonnier Cooper-Climax 5 11  Lorenzo Bandini BRM / Ferrari 4th 12  Gerhard Mitter Porsche 3 13  Jim Hall Lotus BRM 3 14th  Carel Godin de Beaufort Porsche 2 15th  Jo Siffert Lotus BRM 1 16  Trevor Taylor Lotus Climax 1 17th  Ludovico Scarfiotti Ferrari 1

Constructors' championship

Item constructor Points 01  Lotus Climax 54 (65) 02  BRM 36 (41) 03  Ferrari 24 04th  Brabham-Climax 24 05  Cooper-Climax 23 06th  BRP-BRM 6th 07th  Porsche 5

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Why there is no number 13 in Formula 1. Joe Saward, December 1, 2009, accessed on March 17, 2015 (English). 

Web links

• Results at motorsportarchiv.de
• Photos at f1-facts.com
• Grand Prix Results: Mexican GP, ​​1963 at grandprix.com
• Clark takes the flag on Mexico's debut at espnf1.com