


1974 Spain
1974 Holland
1975 Monaco
1975 Belgium
1975 Sweden
1975 France
1975 United States
1976 Brazil
1976 South Africa
1976 Belgium
1976 Monaco
1976 Great Britain
1977 South Africa
1977 Germany
1977 Holland
1978 Sweden
1978 Italy
1982 USA
1982 Great Britain
1984 South African
1984 France
1984 Great Britain
1984 Austria
1984 Italy
1985 Holland

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 Andreas Nikolaus Lauda was born to a
well-to-do Vienna family on February 22, 1949. His family's social status proved both
nuisance and good fortune. Although he was later to become successful in business on
his own, it was obvious early on that he was not cut to fit the
conventional Lauda mold, much to his family's consternation. He did, however, find a mansion bet sign up offer and
the family connections to be useful when it later became necessary for him
to borrow to support his racing. Lauda became interested in motor racing not from attendance at events
or boyhood idolization of racing heroes, but rather from an innate interest in
automobiles dating to a young age. When he was twelve, visiting relatives were
letting him park their cars. He got hold of, in his early teens, a 1949 Volkswagen
Beetle convertible in which he would ride roughshod over a relative's estate. He
entered his first race, a hill climb, in a Cooper in 1968 taking second in class.
Thereafter, despite his father's insistence that he stay away from racing, he
competed in hill climbs and later Formula Vee. He did his stint hauling a Formula
3 car on a trailer to races around Europe. In the course of this he
scared himself into a certain amount of sanity, and, in 1971, abandoned the
wildness of Formula 3 to take the plunge on his own in Formula 2.
By virtue of his family's
business reputation he was able to secure loans that would not otherwise have been
available. He used these to buy an F2 seat at March for '71 partnering Ronnie Peterson (who was getting paid for his driving), and
the next season an F1/F2 combination. When March fizzled he persuaded Louis Stanley
at BRM to sell him a seat. In the course of all this he ran up debts that would have
balked a small banana republic. Due dates on notes had an unfortunate tendency not to
coincide with the availability of starting money from touring car races. But
his abilities got him noticed. In true fairy tail fashion first Stanley
began paying him, then the call from Ferrari's Luca Montezemolo came before
the financial house of cards collapsed (his devil-may-care approach didn't seem
to worry him at the time, although in his mature years he would say that it had been
crazy).
Hasegawa 1/20 Ferrari 312T2
Highly detailed Hasegawa 1/20 plastic scale model kit of the Ferrari 312T2 Formula One race car.
This model kit depicts the Ferrari 312T2 as it appeared during the 1976 Monaco Grand Prix, in which the 312T2 driven by Andreas Nikolaus "Niki" Lauda won the race. This model kit features: Complete engine details. Removable cowling. Steerable front wheel. Two sets of decal markings (1. 1976 Monaco GP winner Car No.1 Driver: Niki Lauda. 2. 1976 Monaco GP 14th place Car No.2 Driver: Clay Regazzoni.) Buy from Amazon |
He squirmed out of his contract with Stanley, and was off on an often-rocky
ride with Ferrari to two world championships. In 1974, his first year with Prancing Horse, Lauda
scored the first of his 26 F1 victories. He, as well as teammate Clay Regazzoni, with
good cars under them, challenged for the championship. Lauda took it in
his second year with the team in a car that was technically far superior to any
of the competition. He had 5 wins and a huge margin over second place. He called 1975
"the unbelievable year."
The championship that Lauda may wind up being most
remembered for was one that he did not win. It is a curious fact about top level
sporting endeavor that something needs to go wrong before there is a contest
- before there is real competition. Baseball with nothing but
ever-flawless hitting and perfect pitching would be boring not to mention
impossible. Likewise soccer with constant errorless goal keeping or shots that
never miss. Things must go wrong in motor races as well. But racing
involves powerful machines carrying extraordinary levels of kinetic energy.
So when something does go wrong, people can get badly hurt or killed. Niki Lauda
suffered severe injuries in the 1976 German Grand Prix at the old Nurburgring, in the
process setting up what may have been the most dramatic championship that F1 has yet
seen. Lauda had taken a significant
early lead in the points despite having cracked ribs as a result of rolling a tractor
while mowing his Salzburg property. F1's reigning playboy, James Hunt, had
nonetheless adopted a never-say-die attitude, and kept his McLaren barely in touch
even though he had a win at the British GP taken away over an alleged
technical violation.
By the German Grand Prix he was more than 20 down to
the Austrian. After an early stop to change from wets to slicks, just
past Bergwerk, Lauda's Ferrari unexplainably swerved off to the right, impacted
an embankment, bounced back across the track, was collected by Brett Lunger and
caught fire. Several drivers including Lunger, Guy Edwards and a fearless
Arturo Merzario managed to extract Lauda from the burning wreck. Although he
was able to stand after the accident, it soon became evident that his injuries
were grave. Hot, toxic gases had damaged the inside of his lungs and his blood. His
helmet had come partially adrift and he had suffered severe burns to his head. He
lapsed into a coma. For a period of time his life was despaired of. However, he
rallied and, in a show of courage that is difficult to overstate, was back in a
Ferrari cockpit at speed six weeks after the accident (he later revealed that at the
time he was virtually petrified with fear).
This six weeks covered 2 races and saw Hunt draw
close. The Brands Hatch win was given back to him on appeal, and he won at Zandvoort.
Lauda's return to competition at Monza produced an amazing 4th place and
3 points. Hunt scored wins in both North American races, while Lauda had
to settle for no points at Canada by virtue of suspension problems, and a third
at Watkins Glen. This impressive run pulled Hunt to within 3 points of Lauda with
only Fuji left on the calendar. The race started in a monumental downpour, and after
2 laps Lauda abandoned saying it was crazy to drive in such conditions. He was
probably correct, but he was probably also still affected by his Nurburgring
accident. In the event, the rain soon slacked, and Hunt finished third despite a late
tire change, collecting 4 points to take the title.
Hunt by no means backed into his championship. He won 8 races
to Lauda's 4 (in 1976 wins were worth 9 points; with wins now worth 10 points we
may not see a championship season like 1976 again), and 6 of the last 9. When he
suffered setbacks he always bounced back. When opportunity presented itself he rose,
in true championship fashion, fully to the occasion. He would be have been the last
to admit it (he seemed to be proud of his uninhibited life style), but he displayed
the better qualities of the British competitive spirit - a consistent tenacity and
persistence in the face of difficult odds. Lauda had placed himself in an awkward
and stressful situation: still leading the championship while suffering
the physical and mental effects of a very bad accident. He could easily
have (and perhaps should have) sat out the balance of the season. But he
faced up squarely to his handicaps in clinging to his lead, and
displayed admirable sanity under enormous pressure at Fuji.
In 1977 Lauda cruised to his second championship
despite winning only 3 races, then promptly dropped Ferrari at Canada. The parting
was not amicable, although Lauda was later to recant much of his criticism of
the team (and eventually serve it as a sort of minister without portfolio). He
was apparently an example of that rare individual who was not over-awed by Enzo
Ferrari. He claims to have regularly simply shown himself into The Drake's inner
sanctum when he wanted a word with him. And he was not cowed when those words became
heated as tended to be the case following Fuji.
For 1978 Lauda took up with
Bernie Ecclestone and Gordon Murray at Brabham. It was not the success that might
have been expected from the trio. The Alfa 12-cylinder was not up to the task.
Ecclestone was busy running the money end of F1. The only real accomplishment of note
during Lauda's 2 seasons with Brabham was the infamous Fan Car. Lotus
was starting to make great strides with ground effects, the aim of which was to
reduce the air pressure under the car thereby increasing tire grip and cornering
speed. In an exercise in loophole exploitation that probably made Colin Chapman green with envy, Brabham repositioned the radiators
at the rear of the car and cooled them with a big fan instead of with rammed air
as was normal with side-mounted radiators. Of course, they contrived to see to it
that the fan just happened to also suck air out from under the car increasing its
downforce. Lauda and John Watson employed all of the sandbagging skills they could
muster in an effort to hide the fact that the car was unbeatable. It won once, in
1978 at Anderstorp with Lauda at the wheel. It never won again because it never
competed again, having been promptly banned as being contrary to some rule or
other. At Canada in 1979, exactly 2 years after kissing off
Ferrari, Lauda suddenly decided in the middle of practice that he no longer wanted
to race, and promptly retired then and there from F1. For 2 seasons he devoted
himself to his airline business and to TV commentary.

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Lauda returned to F1 in 1982 for, by his own
admission, financial reasons. The fledgling airline that he had started (he loved
flying so why not an airline; to Niki Lauda it made perfect sense) had fallen
on hard times. He signed up with Ron Dennis and McLaren to partner John Watson
for plenty of money (albeit, on only a 4 race contract to start with) and the promise
of a competitive ride. Lauda's comeback got tangled up in the great FISA -
FOCA war. One of the more prominent skirmishes in this ugly affair occurred at the
1982 South African GP. Lauda wound up in the middle of a labor fracas before he
had even turned a Goodyear in anger. The so-called Super License for F1
drivers had been introduced by FISA in an effort to keep marginal talents out
of the cockpit. Owner members of FOCA (with the apparent connivance of FISA),
however, had taken advantage of the licensing process to try and bind drivers to
their teams. Most drivers, including Lauda with his shrewd eye for all matters
fiscal, saw through this ruse and refused to sign. At South Africa they were
threatened by FISA with being banned from the race for lack of licenses. Lauda and
Didier Pironi, head of the Grand Prix Drivers Association, organized a resistance
movement, and got most of the drivers to lock themselves together in a hotel meeting
room over night while Pironi negotiated with FISA major-domo Jean-Marie
Balestre. Balestre made concessions prior to the weekend having to be
completely written off, and Lauda went on to place 4th in his first
race back.
And it didn't take long for him to
reacquaint himself with winning. At Long Beach he won in only his third race since
returning. He also won at Brands Hatch that season. '83 was a no win year while the
TAG Turbo was shaken down, but '84 ended with Lauda back at the top of
F1. Although he won the '84 championship by a mere 1/2 pt., he seemed to
have the measure of his usually faster rival and new teammate, Alain Prost, for most of the season. As quick as Prost was
and as good a politician as he was, he met his match in the imposing personalities of
Lauda and later Ayrton Senna. Lauda was seldom faster than
the best of his rivals. He disliked risks that he considered unnecessary. He was not
noted for redoubling his efforts when things weren't going well. He was not one for
making selfless sacrifices for the good of the team (though he would do so
for the good of Lauda). He did often have good cars, but he also often
had talented teammates who had the same cars - Regazzoni, Reutemann and Prost.
One might wonder how it was that he was so successful. Lauda had the sort of
self-confidence usually reserved for megalomaniacs, minus the psychosis. All three of
his championships probably came about as much because he willed them into existence
as for any other reason.
An important part of his successful mental approach
to competition apparently was for him to be as unsparingly honest and straight
with himself as he was with others. In the late '70s a PR visit between the then
World Champion driver and Muhammad Ali was arranged. Lauda came away from it
scratching his head, not because of the hype the boxer surrounded himself with (which
Lauda understood to sometimes be part of a super star's marketing) but because Ali
appeared to believe it. This was not a delusion under which Lauda would ever
fall.
Another part was sheer smarts. Lauda, though a poor
student as a youngster, is obviously possessed of superior intelligence in a branch
of sport where that is saying a great deal indeed. This served him well off the
track as well as on. He and collaborators have produced 4 very informative books on
racing and his career (which, by the way, thoroughly dispel the notion that he was
nothing but a cold-hearted machine). He mastered English quickly (and, per force,
Italian while he was with Ferrari), and thus had a language other than German in
which to deliver the patented Lauda interviews. These were dispensed with a
combination of succinctness, authority and deadly aim that rivaled the Almighty
handing down the Ten Commandments on Sinai.
A good example occurred after he had retired
from racing for the second time. One of his Lauda Air 767s suffered an uncommanded
thrust reverser deployment after departing Bangkok and plunged into the jungle
snuffing out a couple of hundred or so lives. Lauda rushed from Austria to
the crash site buried deep in the Thai rain forest. The story has it
that, plowing around through aircraft pieces, bodies and undergrowth,
he single-handedly discovered the mechanical evidence pointing to the
faulty reversers. Whether this is actually true or not, he was
certainly instrumental in turning up information useful in determining the cause
of the accident. He went straight to England where he could test the theory in a
767 simulator, then immediately held a press conference at which, with typical Lauda
clarity and economy of words, he stated (not "suggested" or
"inferred") that he knew the cause of the crash, and that it was not Lauda
Air's fault, but rather a problem with the Boeing aircraft type. The official
investigation culminating a year or so later arrived at the same conclusion. This
ruthless straightforwardness had served him well in innumerable interviews during his
racing career. While Hakkinen shows that he brooks no stupid questions by hemming and
hawing, looking at the floor and replaying answers over and over, Lauda showed the
same thing by simply providing a (emphasis here) few quick, clever, perfect
words.
Lauda did not hang around long after taking his
third championship. His second and final departure from F1, at Adelaide in 1985, was
typical of his whole approach to racing and to life - quick, with no frills and
no glance over the shoulder. One moment he was flying his McLaren down the long
straight. The next his front brakes had failed him and he was skittering into the
runoff area and up against the wall. The next after that he was out of his car
disappearing behind the barrier without a look back and with the next flight out on his
mind.
Many of Lauda's actions may appear to have been
somewhat precipitous. But he likely is not so much impulsive as pathologically
decisive. His extreme dislike of wishy-washiness probably explains such things as
his abrupt abandonment of Ferrari in '77, his equally abrupt retirement
from Brabham and F1 in '79, and his thumbing his nose at monopolistic
Austrian Airlines by founding his own airline. He is unsympathetic to lack
of punctuality. By his own admission those around him, including his
family, often had to arrange their lives to suit his needs.
He was vigilant
and not the least bit sentimental when it came to making money from racing, to
the point of insisting on handsome payment for autograph sessions. These and other
personal traits chafed some egos along the way. In his Ferrari days Lauda, the very
antithesis of the Italian persona, never captured the love of the tifosi the way
that Gilles Villeneuve, or even Mansell did. Yet he became
a bona fide legend in his own time. Certainly part of this was due to his Nurburgring
accident. But primarily it was a result of the unique impact that his personality
and skills had on the sport. There may have been a few better than him,
but there have never been any like him.
People who worry about paying their car payment or Titlemax title loan on time may find Lauda's actions hard to understand, especially if they think race car drivers are overpaid. Whatever his monetary motivations, there's no denying his skill behind the wheel.


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