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In the latest episode F1 icon In the series, 1996 F1 champion Damon Hill talks about his late father Graham Hill, five-time Monaco Grand Prix winner, two-time F1 World Champion and the only man in history to win motorsport’s Triple Crown. I’ll tell you.
I think there were two Graham Hill’s. The other day I was talking to some of his mechanics from the original BRM, and one of them told me a story about how my father was very nervous. And I think if you talk to some of the journalists, they’ll say the same thing.
He became quite impatient and negative when he didn’t have time to see you at work. But outside of work, he was sociable and a giving person.
He was the life of the party, had a great sense of humor and made people laugh, but was also professional. I mean, he wasn’t a clown, but he wasn’t afraid to do absurd things.
Who was he as a father? He tried to be strict, but I think he let himself down by his own example. Although he professed to be diligent and hard-working, and everything else he professed to be, he was so eager to play pranks that whenever we read his school reports, we It brought me to tears. But he didn’t mean it that way. We took it too seriously.
But there was a lot of love there. He was someone who would do anything for you. I will, but it’s always for a good reason.
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Damon sits on his father’s lap in a 1961 photo taken by a London Evening Standard photographer.
I was exposed to his world from birth – and of course I don’t remember much about it – but at my christening there were Stirling Moss, Bruce McLaren, Tony Brooks, Joe -Bonia, there was “Tuffy” von Trips. I forgot everyone except my father.
I think one of the things that sticks out to me is when my dad won the Indianapolis 500. I was only two years old when his father made him F1 world champion in 1962 and of course I don’t remember any of that.
Read more: Graham Hill inducted into F1 Hall of Fame
I remember the commotion when he won Indy in 1966 and the commotion that came with it. Because when he came back, his mother had removed all the bunts. There was a party in the backyard and a photo of me pushing Jim Clark with a toy plastic tractor (see below). Then Jackie Stewart used to come over and stay at our house. And he said that I was keeping him up all night and bothering him.
To be honest, the last time I remember watching my dad’s Grand Prix on TV was in 1969. It was in black and white when his father won his last Grand Prix in Monaco. And I remember that I was playing in the garden with some friends and her mother came out and said, “Come on, your dad is going to win the Monaco Grand Prix!” So I got to go in and watch him go around the last few corners and wave to the crowd.
Young Damon helps his father push Jim Clark on the top tractor
It was weird being at school. When talking to other children, they will say, “What is your father doing?”
And they say, “Oh, I don’t know, but I think he’s an accountant,” or something like that. So it was a little weird because I don’t know if anyone would be annoyed by this. One thing I remember is that the teachers knew very well what kind of person my father was. But you realize that you don’t have any special status. It’s just that I recognize that I’m involved in a world in which I have a special position. Extraordinary.
Read more: Damon Hill inducted into F1 Hall of Fame
Motorsport is not a career path taught in school. Anyway, that’s definitely not the case. So when I was leaving school, I remember the principal saying to me, “You know what? He said, “I don’t want you to waste your education on auto racing.”
I like physics, and car racing is just physics, so I thought it was a bit disappointing for the principal to say something like that. But it seems I wasted my education in auto racing. anyway…
Graham Hill with daughter Bridget and son Damon, 1965
I think it would be very easy to choose my father’s greatest accomplishment. He won Monaco five times, but that is not possible without special talent.
Perhaps he felt he had to work harder because he didn’t think he had any natural talent. He was determined and persistent. I think that’s the perfect word to describe him. He just didn’t give up.
Read more: Monaco’s top 8 masters – and the principality’s biggest victory
In 1993, when I was racing Williams in Monaco, Ayrton Senna beat my father’s race. [Monaco wins] “If my dad were here, I think he would be happy to congratulate me on breaking my record, because it’s been standing for so long.”
And since then, he remains the only man to win Indy, Le Mans and the F1 World Championship. Unique differentiation.
Damon believes his father was the first to congratulate Ayrton Senna on breaking the Monaco record
I remember that day, November 29, 1975.
Sadly, I was with my sister and we were watching breaking news on TV. They didn’t say any names, but I knew it was my father.
He was supposed to fly back from Paul Ricard that night on his own plane. And he did not succeed. It was cold and foggy and somehow something went wrong, so he hit some high ground, hit a tree, and then his plane crashed. That was it.
It was quite a shock for everyone. He had just retired from racing and everyone expected him to live long and run the team, so it came as a huge shock to him. And it didn’t happen.
So the lesson learned is that you can’t count unhatched chickens. You can’t really expect life to go the way you want it to just because you want it to.
Pack as much as you can because you never know what’s around the corner.
“Once I stopped racing, they all came back to roost.”
We weren’t given any help with that because there was no such thing as grief counseling back then. I’m sure your grief counselor was a priest, but they wouldn’t have been around much longer.
I had to struggle to understand what happened as a teenager, as my mother lost her husband and our entire living situation changed. And in many cases, it wasn’t talked about. It didn’t really go into detail, but when I recently stopped racing, it all came home to roost and I felt like I had to tell someone how I was feeling.
Read more: MR MONACO – How Graham Hill mastered the streets of Monte Carlo
And I think I had a lot of pent-up anger and sadness, because sadness turns into anger in a way. I also felt very nervous that something was going to happen, but that’s kind of a legacy.
Now we have the opportunity to talk to people and there are many professionals who can help you talk privately about your feelings. Unfortunately, many people do this publicly, exposing themselves to unkind people who don’t have the same qualifications or empathy to give advice. Or they’re just cruel.
So my advice is not to open up to anyone. You need to talk to a professional or someone you feel comfortable with. Today we have a better understanding of what it means to be human. We are bags of emotions. We are bags full of memories. We are bags of unresolved and unexplained experiences that need explanation.
And when you receive an explanation, it’s incredibly lightening that energy, releasing that feeling of being trapped or tied down to something, and allowing you to let it go.
I have great affection for him.
He feels like everything I see and everything I remember of him, so I think his legacy is consistent with his personality.
I think he was a real person and I think he was an inspiration to a lot of people with his attitude towards life, the way he conducted himself and his courage as a racing driver. Like Jackie, he lost many friends. It was a tough time for him to race.
In those days, it was quite a feat to keep a smile on your face while riding in a race car.
Damon Hill drives father Graham’s legendary Lotus 49
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