1962 Grand Prix of South Africa

 1962 Grand Prix of South Africa

Racing data
9th of 9 races of the 1962 World Automobile Championship
Surname:	IX South African Grand Prix
Date:	December 29, 1962
Place:	East London , South Africa
Course:	Prince George Circuit
Length:	321.44 km in 82 laps of 3.92 km
Weather:	sunny, dry, windy
Spectator:	~ 90000
Pole position
Driver:	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax
Time:	1: 29.3 min
Fastest lap
Driver:	Jim Clark (Round 3)	Lotus Climax
Time:	1: 31.0 min
Podium
First:	Graham Hill	BRM
Second:	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax
Third:	Tony Maggs	Cooper-Climax

The 1962 South African Grand Prix took place on December 29, 1962 on the Prince George Circuit near East London and was the last race of the 1962 World Automobile Championship .

Reports

background

World Champion 1962 - Graham Hill

In 1962 the South African Grand Prix was part of the automobile world championship for the first time and marked the end of the season for two years. Since Ferrari and Porsche had already withdrawn from the season, there were only eight drivers left from four works teams and eight teams with private vehicles. A total of 17 cars were registered. In addition to two BRM P57s for Graham Hill and Richie Ginther, BRM also used a car from last year for the South African driver Bruce Johnstone , who contested his only race in the automobile world championship. BRM, Lotus and Cooper did not change their driver pairings and continued to drive with them in the following season. Even Jack Brabham still competed for his own team Brabham , however, began in 1963 two cars.

In the teams with private vehicles, the Bowmaker Racing Team took part in a race for the last time, as the main sponsor withdrew. John Surtees then switched to Ferrari, while Roy Salvadori's career ended in early 1963 after a serious accident at the 1963 24 Hours of Le Mans . He became a team manager at Cooper a few years later. Several African drivers were registered for the Grand Prix, all of whom competed in their only race of the season. Ernie Pieterse , Doug Serrurier , Neville Lederle and John Love made their debut, but it was the only race for Mike Harris . Pieterse, Lederle, Love and Harris drove old Lotus and Cooper, Serrurier had reported his own car, the LDS Mk2 from the designer LDS .

Both world championships were still open. Jim Clark had to win to get the driver's title, Graham Hill was world champion in all other possible cases. The same situation existed with the constructors, Lotus needed a victory, otherwise BRM would have become constructors world champion. With Clark, a former winner took part in the race; Lotus, Porsche and Cooper had previously each been successful with the designers. Between the US Grand Prix and the South African Grand Prix, there were three Grand Prix not counting towards the World Automobile Championship. Clark and his teammate Trevor Taylor won the first Mexican Grand Prix together , Clark won the Rand Grand Prix and Taylor won the Natal Grand Prix .

training

The two title contenders, Clark and Graham Hill, fought again for pole position and for the third time in a row, Clark was the fastest. In 1962, Clark reached pole position six times in nine races of the season, making him the most successful driver in the training sessions. Graham Hill was in second place 0.3 seconds behind Clark's time. The Brabham BT3 from Brabham was very competitive, qualified in third place and thus achieved the best starting position for his team to date. However, the time gap on Graham Hill was already more than a second. Drivers with private cars followed in fourth and fifth with Innes Ireland and Surtees, the best Cooper driver was Maggs in sixth place. Behind him, Ginther qualified on BRM ahead of Bruce McLaren on Cooper. Taylor and Nederle completed the first ten. Johnstone also qualified for the race, despite not completing a timed lap in practice.

run

Clark won the start and gained a lead over Graham Hill on the first laps of the race. In this constellation, Clark was on the way to his first world championship and Lotus was before winning the first two titles. Behind Clark and Graham Hill, the two Cooper drivers McLaren and Maggs fought with Surtees for third place. However, Surtees retired on lap 26 with an engine failure, so the three-way battle was decided in favor of the Cooper drivers. Taylor had previously parked his car with a defective transmission. The race was then mainly determined by failures, there were only a few changes in position in the midfield. Harris, Serrurier and Salvadori retired with different problems. For Salvadori, the season ended without a finish because he had failed in every race in which he had participated.

Clark increased his lead on Graham Hill to 13 seconds during the race, but on lap 59 smoke came from the rear of his Lotus. He then continued the race for three more laps, but then parked his vehicle in the pits. The cause of the failure was an oil leak. Clark said after the race that he had just lapped Brabham and was going to look for him in the rearview mirror. Then he saw the smoke coming out of the engine. Graham Hill took the lead and then won superiorly. Graham Hill was the world champion of the 1962 automobile world championship. This was his first title, another followed in 1968 . Alfred Owen, team principal and owner of BRM, was the first to congratulate Graham Hill at the finish. At the beginning of the season, he threatened to withdraw the team from the automobile world championship if no successes were achieved. BRM then won both the driver's title and the constructor's title. But both remained the only titles in the history of the designer. After the race, Graham Hill said that he would have preferred to fight Clark on track for the title rather than benefit from his failure. As runner-up world champion in 1962, Clark was among the top drivers, in 1963 he dominated the entire season with Lotus and won his first title. The duel between him and Graham Hill continued in the following years.

McLaren crossed the finish line in second place, 50 seconds behind Graham Hill, and finished third in the drivers' championship. His team-mate Maggs crossed the finish line just behind him and achieved a podium finish in the home race. Brabham finished fourth, just like in the US Grand Prix, Ireland finished fifth and Lederle came in sixth. Ginther missed the points in seventh place, he was ahead of Love, Johnstone, Pieterse and Beaufort.

Registration list

team	No.	driver	chassis	engine	tires
Team Lotus	01	Jim Clark	Lotus 25	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	02	Trevor Taylor
Owen Racing Organization	03	Graham Hill	BRM P57	BRM 1.5 V8	D.
	04th	Richie Ginther
	05	Bruce Johnstone	BRM P48 / 57
Bowmaker Racing Team	06th	John Surtees	Lola Mk4	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	07th	Roy Salvadori
Cooper Car Company	08th	Bruce McLaren	Cooper T60	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
	09	Tony Maggs
Brabham Racing Organization	10	Jack Brabham	Brabham BT3	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
UDT Laystall Racing Team	11	Innes Ireland	Lotus 24	Climax 1.5 V8	D.
Ernie Pieterse	14th	Ernie Pieterse	Lotus 21	Climax 1.5 L4	D.
Ecurie Maarsbergen	15th	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche 718	Porsche 1.5 B4	D.
John Love	18th	John Love	Cooper T55	Climax 1.5 L4	D.
Neville Lederle	20th	Neville Lederle	Lotus 21	Climax 1.5 L4	D.
Otelle Nucci	21st	Doug Serrurier	LDS Mk2	Alfa Romeo 1.5 L4	D.
Mike Harris	22nd	Mike Harris	Cooper T53	Alfa Romeo 1.5 L4	D.

Classifications

Starting grid

Item	driver	constructor	time	Ø speed	begin
01	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax	1: 29.3	158.03 km / h	01
02	Graham Hill	BRM	1: 29.6	157.50 km / h	02
03	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax	1: 31.0	155.08 km / h	03
04th	Innes Ireland	Lotus Climax	1: 31.0	155.08 km / h	04th
05	John Surtees	Lola-Climax	1: 31.5	154.23 km / h	05
06th	Tony Maggs	Cooper-Climax	1: 31.7	153.89 km / h	06th
07th	Richie Ginther	BRM	1: 31.7	153.89 km / h	07th
08th	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax	1: 31.7	153.89 km / h	08th
09	Trevor Taylor	Lotus Climax	1: 32.7	153.23 km / h	09
10	Neville Lederle	Lotus Climax	1: 33.6	150.77 km / h	10
11	Roy Salvadori	Lola-Climax	1: 35.4	147.92 km / h	11
12	John Love	Cooper-Climax	1: 36.4	146.39 km / h	12
13	Ernie Pieterse	Lotus Climax	1: 36.8	145.79 km / h	13
14th	Doug Serrurier	LDS-Alfa Romeo	1: 36.8	145.79 km / h	14th
15th	Mike Harris	Cooper-Alfa Romeo	1: 39.1	142.40 km / h	15th
16	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche	1: 39.2	142.26 km / h	16
17th	Bruce Johnstone	BRM	no time		17th

run

Item	driver	constructor	Round	Stops	time	begin	Fastest lap	Failure reason
01	Graham Hill	BRM	82		2: 08: 03.3	02	1: 32.0
02	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax	82		+ 49.8	08th	1: 32.3
03	Tony Maggs	Cooper-Climax	82		+ 50.3	06th	1: 32.4
04th	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax	82		+ 53.8	03	1: 31.8
05	Innes Ireland	Lotus Climax	81		+ 1 lap	04th	1: 33.6
06th	Neville Lederle	Lotus Climax	78		+ 4 rounds	10	1: 35.8
07th	Richie Ginther	BRM	78		+ 4 rounds	07th	1: 33.4
08th	John Love	Cooper-Climax	78		+ 4 rounds	12	1: 37.1
09	Bruce Johnstone	BRM	76		+ 6 rounds	17th	1: 36.5
10	Ernie Pieterse	Lotus Climax	71		+ 11 rounds	13	1: 38.0
11	Carel Godin de Beaufort	Porsche	70		+ 12 rounds	16	1: 40.7
-	Jim Clark	Lotus Climax	62		DNF	01	1: 31.0	Oil leak
-	Doug Serrurier	LDS-Alfa Romeo	62		DNF	14th	1: 38.6	cooler
-	Roy Salvadori	Lola-Climax	56		DNF	11	1: 34.9	Loss of fuel
-	Mike Harris	Cooper-Alfa Romeo	31		DNF	15th	1: 40.0	Wheel bearings
-	John Surtees	Lola-Climax	26th		DNF	05	1: 33.0	Engine failure
-	Trevor Taylor	Lotus Climax	11		DNS	09	1: 32.9	transmission

World Cup stands after the race

The first six of the race got 9, 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 points. Only the five best results from nine 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  Graham Hill BRM 42 (52) 02  Jim Clark Lotus Climax 30th 03  Bruce McLaren Cooper-Climax 27 (32) 04th  John Surtees Lola-Climax 19th 05  Dan Gurney Porsche 15th 06th  Phil Hill Ferrari 14th 07th  Tony Maggs Cooper-Climax 13 08th  Richie Ginther BRM 10 09  Jack Brabham Lotus-Climax / Brabham 9 10  Trevor Taylor Lotus Climax 6th

Item driver constructor Points 11  Giancarlo Baghetti Ferrari 5 12  Lorenzo Bandini Ferrari 4th 13  Ricardo Rodríguez Ferrari 4th 14th  Willy Mairesse Ferrari 3 15th  Jo Bonnier Porsche 3 16  Innes Ireland Lotus Climax 2 17th  Carel Godin de Beaufort Porsche 2 18th  Masts Gregory Lotus BRM 1 19th  Neville Lederle Lotus Climax 1

Constructors' championship

Item constructor Points 01  BRM 42 (56) 02  lotus 36 (38) 03  cooper 29 (37) 04th  Lola 19th 05  Porsche 18 (19) 06th  Ferrari 18th 07th  Brabham 6th

Web links

• Results at motorsportarchiv.de
• Photos at f1-facts.com
• Grand Prix Results: South African GP, ​​1962 at grandprix.com
• Clark retirment hands Hill the title at espnf1.com