Emerson Fittipaldi: The Brazilian Formula One Wonder
On December 12th, 1946, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Emerson Fittipaldi was born to Wilson Fittipaldi, a well known motorsport columnist and radio analyst. Considering their father’s occupation, it was no surprise that Emerson and older sibling Wilson Junior developed a passion for motorsports at a fairly young age. However, the elder Fittipaldi was not too enthusiastic about providing the funding when his sons decided to embark on a foray into race driving itself. Yet their father’s reluctance was not to be a hindrance, since the Fittipaldi brothers became fairly flourishing businessmen while they were still teenagers. Their establishment, which commenced with a steering wheel Emerson had prepared for his mother’s vehicle, evolved into a blossoming custom car component trade. Soon the Fittipaldis were manufacturing karts, which both raced at regional competitions, and at the age of 18, Emerson landed himself the Brazilian kart championship title aged 18. In 1967, Emerson steered one of the Fittipaldi engineered Formula Vee single-seaters to land himself the Brazilian championship title.
Encouraged by his racing results so far, Emerson pulled out of university, where he was studying to be a mechanical engineer, and decided to test his mettle at the international arena. Fittipaldi landed in England in 1969, companionless and unfamiliar with the native language. Undaunted by the many difficulties he faced in the foreign land, he purchased a Formula Ford and instantly proved himself to be a victor. An advance to Formula Three reaped comparable success and a payback in the shape of a Formula Two race drive with Lotus for the 1970 season. Rising up the Formula Two ranks fairly swiftly, Emerson’s stay at Lotus was prolonged by boss Colin Chapman for the next couple of seasons. Making his initiation into Formula One at the 1970 British Grand Prix, Fittipaldi then made waves at the German event, where he stormed to the fourth position and followed this up with another solid performance in Austria. Then came the ill-omened Italian event at Monza where Lotus front-man, the Austrian Jochen Rindt, died in an accident during the practice run. The door was now open for Fittipaldi’s elevation to the permanent seat at Lotus’ Formula One drive.
Determined to milk the most of the opportunity, Fittipaldi stormed to victory at the following event in the United States, giving the grieving Lotus team a reason to celebrate and ensuring that the 1970 World Championship title went to the now dead Rindt. In 1971, Fittipaldi’s advancement was hindered somewhat by an off track car accident that left him seriously wounded. However, he made up for the lost time the following year in great fashion by remarkably winning each and every championship race in his state-of-the-art Lotus 72 to be crowned the 1972 Formula One World Champion aged just 25 - the least aged champion in the history of the sport.
In 1973, the Brazilian was somewhat caught off guard to discover that Ronnie Peterson, his new partner at Lotus, had more pace. Although outclassed by Peterson on many occasions, Fittipaldi’s experience paid off and he ended second behind Jackie Stewart in the aggregate championship standings, just ahead of his teammate.
In 1974, Fittipaldi gladly welcomed an invitation from McLaren to join their squad for the 1974 run. The Brazilian raced his McLaren M23 to victories at the Brazilian, Canadian and Belgian events to take his second World Championship title. His 1975 run was only a little less fruitful, and he ended second behind Ferrari’s Niki Lauda in the overall championship standings. The Brazilian then took the Formula One world by complete surprise by announcing his exit from McLaren to join ranks with the freshly wrought Brazilian team Copersucar to team up alongside his brother, Wilson Junior. It was a career-destroying move and the despairing uncompetitive Copersucar squad, later renamed as Fittipaldi Automotive in 1980, crashed out of the sport after several uncompetitive seasons in 1982. Emerson then returned back to Brazil to oversee the family entrepreneurial ventures, and later embarked on a successful career in IndyCar racing in America.
Tags: