James Hunt

James Hunt was born in Belmont, England on the 29th of August 1947. He will probably be best remembered for loving booze, drugs and women to the excess. He was also very boisterous and outspoken.

He made his own way in to racing making money to buy a mini and then a formula ford car and it was while he was racing these that he got himself noticed.

Hunt entered formula 1 in 1973 after Bubbles Horsley decided that with the pair of them they would try F1 as Hesketh. Such was the success, that James was awarded the Malcolm Campbell trophy for best performance by a British driver in a British car.

His first F1 win was in 1974 in the Silverstone International trophy and he had three more podiums in the same year. In 1975 he scored his first and Hesketh's only Grand Prix victory and came fourth in the World Championship.

In 1976 he moved to McLaren and won the World Championship with seven victories but in 1973 he only managed three wins because McLaren were not technologically advanced enough to be fiercely competitive.

In 1978 he scored his last points with his one and only podium finish of the season and after seven races in 1979 Hunt retired as he had lost the will to race. The year after he took up commentating alongside Murray Walker and continued the partnership until 1993 when he suffered a massive heart attack.