Peter Gethin

Peter Gethin

Nation:	United Kingdom
Automobile world championship
First start:	1970 Dutch Grand Prix
Last start:	1974 British Grand Prix
Constructors
1970  McLaren  • 1971  McLaren , BRM  • 1972–1973  BRM  • 1974  Lola
statistics
World Cup balance:	World Cup ninth ( 1971 )
Starts Victories Poles SR 30th 1 - -
World Cup points :	11
Podiums :	1
Leadership laps :	5 over 17.250 km

Peter Kenneth Gethin (born February 21, 1940 in Ewell , Surrey , England , † December 5, 2011 in Goodwood ) was a British automobile racing driver . He started in Formula 1 from 1970 to 1974 .

Life

Peter Gethin grew up in his native Ewell near Epsom and took an early interest in motorsport. Gethin's father, Ken, was a jockey , but the son couldn't get used to equestrianism . The young Gethin did an automotive apprenticeship and became a car salesman. In Brands Hatch he finally attended a racing driver's school. His career began with British club races before he won the European Formula 5000 Championship in 1969 and 1970 and also achieved some notable successes in Formula 3 and Formula 2 .

Shortly after the fatal accident of Bruce McLaren , who had an accident during test drives with the CanAm -McLaren in Goodwood, Gethin came to the racing team of the same name as a substitute driver and made his Formula 1 debut at the 1970 Dutch Grand Prix in Zandvoort . Both in this Grand Prix and in the following races, Gethin could not convince; only at the 1970 Canadian Grand Prix he achieved a world championship point. After the German Grand Prix in 1971 , he left McLaren.

Immediately afterwards, Gethin signed a contract with BRM. Here he started as a substitute driver for the Mexican Pedro Rodríguez , who had a fatal accident during a run of the European Interseries at the Norisring . In his first outing for his new team, the Austrian Grand Prix in 1971 , Gethin only came in tenth.

Peter Gethin during training for the German GP in 1971

At the next race, the 1971 Italian Grand Prix , however, he achieved a sensation. Gethin, who started in eleventh place, took his first and only Grand Prix victory in a memorable race. In a dramatic slipstream battle on the last lap before the Parabolica corner , he overtook François Cevert , Mike Hailwood and Ronnie Peterson , who braked, and won the race by a hundredth of a second ahead of the Swede. Within six tenths of a second, behind Peterson, Cevert, Hailwood and New Zealander Howden Ganley shot across the finish line. This was the closest finish in Formula 1 history.

Gethin could not build on this achievement in the course of his further career. He drove (one run) for BRM in 1972 and 1973, but apart from one other World Championship point (Italy 1972), he had numerous failures. After a guest appearance in 1974 in the Graham Hill racing team ( Great Britain Grand Prix ) sponsored by the cigarette manufacturer Embassy , Peter Gethin's Formula 1 career was over.

After briefly appearing in the CanAm series in the late 1970s , Gethin became the manager of aspiring Italian Beppe Gabbiani . In the mid-1980s he headed the Toleman F1 team before establishing his own Peter Gethin Racing team in Formula 3000 for a few years . Until his death, the ex-F1 driver organized racing driver courses at a high level, which took place at the Goodwood Motor Circuit near Chichester in southern England.

Gethin died after a long illness at the age of 71. He was married and had a son.

statistics

Peter Gethin drove a total of 30 Grand Prix races for McLaren , BRM and Lola during his Formula 1 time from 1970 to 1974 . At the 1972 French Grand Prix in Clermont-Ferrand , he could not start due to a training accident. His best training result was fifth on the grid at the 1972 Monaco Grand Prix . Gethin achieved a total of 11 World Championship points: Mont-Tremblant 1970 (6th place, 1 point), Monza 1971 (victory, 9 points) and Monza 1972 (6th place, 1 point). He made his three lead laps in the Monza race of 1971.

In 1973 Peter Gethin won the Race of Champions at Brands Hatch, which was not part of the world championship, with his Formula 5000 Chevron B24 against various Formula 1 cars and in 1974 the Tasman Series in Australia and New Zealand.

Grand Prix victories

• 1971 Italian Grand Prix ( Monza ) 

Individual results in the sports car world championship

season	team	race car	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	11	12	13	14th	15th	16	17th	18th	19th	20th
1964	Freeze racing	Diva GT	DAY	SEB	TAR	MON	SPA	CON	ONLY	ROS	LEM	REI	FRE	CCE	RTT	SIM	ONLY	MON	TDF	BRI	BRI	PAR
									DNF
1966	Chris Barber	Lotus Elan	DAY	SEB	MON	TAR	SPA	ONLY	LEM	MUG	CCE	HOK	SIM	ONLY	ZEL
								DNF
1967	Opert Racing Cuthbert	Chevron B4 Ford GT40	DAY	SEB	MON	SPA	TAR	ONLY	LEM	HOK	MUG	BRH	CCE	ZEL	OVI	ONLY
			DNF									12
1974	Chevron Cars Team Gunston	Chevron B23 Chevron B26	MON	SPA	ONLY	IMO	LEM	ZEL	WAT	LEC	BRH	KYA
					15th						4th	DNF

Quote

"Who is so stupid and wins a Grand Prix with an average of 150 mph?"

- Interview with the winners after the 1971 Italian Grand Prix

literature

• BF Hoffmann: The big ABC of Formula 1. The drivers, racing teams and circuits of Formula 1 from the beginning until today. From Graf Berghe von Trips and Juan-Manuel Fangio to Emerson Fittipaldi and Ayrton Senna to Alain Prost and Michael Schumacher. Lexikon-Imprint-Verlag, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89602-291-1 .

Web links

Commons : Peter Gethin  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Peter Gethin in the GP-Encyclopedia (English)
• Peter Gethin at Racing Sports Cars

Individual evidence

1. ^ Peter Gethin, winner of the 1971 Italian Grand Prix, dies aged 71
2. ^ The Guardian . Retrieved August 19, 2020.
3. ↑ Motorsportmagazin.com . Retrieved August 19, 2020.
4. ^ Heinz Prüller : Grand Prix Story 71 and the men who lived it. Verlag ORAC et al., Vienna et al. 1971.