Matra et Alpine
01-06-2008, 03:31 PM
Friday, 04, January, 2008
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Former Formula 1 driver Jimmy Stewart, elder brother of three-time world champion Sir Jackie, has died at the age of 76.
Better known for his sportscar exploits with the Ecurie Ecosse team, Jimmy contested only one grand prix – the 1953 British event at Silverstone – although he also took part in a number of non-championship races.
He retired from motorsport in 1955 after two serious accidents, first at Le Mans and then at the Nurburgring.
He was Sir Jackie Stewart's older brother and was the man responsible for getting Jackie interested in racing. The two grew up in Dumbarton where their father Bob was a Jaguar dealer.
Sharing his name with the celebrated Hollywood star, who became famous after Stewart was born, made life difficult but in later years that paled into insignificance as Jackie won three World Championships.
Jimmy started racing in a Healey Silverstone on local hillclimb events in 1951 and 1952 and did sufficiently well to be picked up by David Murray's Ecurie Ecosse team, racing Jaguar C-Types and XK120s in the years that followed. This opened up the possibility of an opportunity in single-seaters as well with a Formula 2 Connaught and an F1 Cooper-Bristol. It was driving the latter car that Stewart made his F1 debut at the British Grand Prix in 1953 after a number of non-championship races. He qualified 15th in a field of 29 and ran as high as sixth before spinning off after 79 of the 90 laps. That would be his only F1 start as the following year as he continued to build his reputation he was signed up to race for Aston Martin in the Le Mans 24 Hours but crashed the DB3S coupe, was thrown out of the car, and ended with a badly broken arm. He returned to action the following year, still with Ecurie Ecosse but during the Nurburgring 1000 he crashed through one of the trackside hedges and was trapped under the car for 10 minutes before help arrived. He injured the same arm again and decided that it was time to stop racing.
Jimmy was to play a role later when Ken Tyrrell was looking for a new driver for his Formula 3 team and had been told to look at Jackie Stewart. Tyrrell rang Jimmy and asked if the youngster was serious about his racing.
Jimmy Stewart
Last Updated: 11:46pm GMT 04/01/2008
Jimmy Stewart, who died on Thursday aged 76, was a racing driver of the old, mainly amateur, school, and encouraged his younger brother Jackie, later the winner of three Formula One World Championship titles, to get into racing.
He did so despite their mother Jeannie's threatening to kick Jackie out of the house if he followed in the footsteps of his brother and their father, "Old Boab" Stewart, who had been a wild, competitive motorcycle rider in his day.
She had come close to a nervous breakdown during Jimmy's races, and Jackie began racing under the pseudonym AN Other. Even after his world titles his mother preferred to ignore his success, and until the day she died never once acknowledged his achievements.
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It was Jimmy, long retired but at the time still reticent on account of their mother's misgivings, who got Jackie his first break. Ken Tyrrell was looking for a young driver for his new F-3 team, and called Jimmy to ask whether his younger brother was serious about racing.
"Serious?" Jimmy replied. "Try stopping him." (In his first test laps, Jackie proceeded to outpace the established driver Bruce McLaren. )
Jimmy Stewart was one of the biggest names in world motorsport in the early 1950s. Comparisons with his brother tend to focus on the fact that Jimmy competed in only one Formula One Grand Prix - the British, in 1953.
Driving a Cooper-Bristol for the Écurie Ecosse (Scottish Stable) team, he was in sixth place, heading for a points finish, when he spun off the track in the wet at Copse Corner. When critics claimed that he was too fast for his own good, Stewart declared that he was too fast for the car.
It was in the big sports cars that Stewart found his métier, notably in his works Aston Martin DB3S coupé at the Le Mans 24-hour race of 1954.
There was no live television coverage, and it took more than a day for the results to filter back home - and to Jeannie Stewart. Perhaps it was just as well. Stewart lost control at the wheel and was lucky to come out alive with only a broken arm.
The Écurie Ecosse team believed it was the Aston, not JRS, as Stewart was known, which caused the big shunt. They put him in one of their D-Type Jaguars and pointed him in the direction of the chequered flag in the gruelling 1,000km race at the lethal Nürburgring track in Germany in 1954.
The D-Type was arguably the best model Jaguar ever built for competition or the road; it was also liveried in a deep, metallic and mesmeric blue with white trimmings to reflect the Scottish flag. But it was not fast enough for Stewart and failed to keep up with him round one particular corner. He sheared a roadside hedge, flipping the car over and puncturing the D-Type's petrol tank.
Stewart lay unattended for 10 minutes, trying to wriggle out of the car, before help arrived and he got a lift back to the pits for medical treatment - i.e. a glass of champagne. He reckoned his previously-broken arm, which took the brunt of the crash, had saved his life.
(After a similar accident which nearly killed him in the Formula One Grand Prix at Spa in 1966, Jackie Stewart became an advocate for safety in the sport, a campaign that sealed his knighthood.)
James Robert Stewart was born at the hamlet of Milton, outside Dumbarton, on March 6 1931. Although expected to work in his father Bob's well-known Jaguar dealership and garage at Dumbuck, next door to his home (as Jackie eventually would do as a mechanic), Jimmy had other ideas.
He was allowed to drive the new Jaguars delivered to his father's garage along the winding, narrow roads alongside Loch Lomond, down to Arrochar, and up to Oban. The new Jags were so well "run in" before they were delivered to their owners that they usually needed an oil change.
Bob Stewart bought his son a C-Type Jag - registration number KSF 181 - which he drove at Charterhall, Thruxton, Snetterton and other racing circuits.
In the early 1950s Jimmy Stewart was drafted for compulsory national service in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME).
It turned out that his commanding officer was a motor racing buff, so Stewart ended up racing at weekends while his fellow soldiers were peeling spuds. He also cut a dash zipping between Dumbarton and Helensburgh in one of the first E-Type Jags - bright red, with the registration SSN 1.
In the years after Jackie Stewart's success, life was difficult for Jimmy. He had a spell selling cars at his father's old garage and later at dealers in Glasgow and the west of Scotland. Over those years the two brothers became somewhat estranged.
It was only when Jimmy admitted that he was an alcoholic, around 1997, that things changed. Though always immaculately dressed, usually in a blazer with the badge of whatever organisation he was entitled to represent - such as the British Racing Drivers' Club - Jimmy Stewart had begun to closet himself at home with a bottle.
When he eventually admitted his problem, his younger brother supported him, and financed him through the Priory Clinic in Glasgow and thereafter.
Jimmy's drinking meant he could not drive. When he got sober, Jackie bought him a car and Jimmy became a familiar sight driving along the banks of the Gare Loch from his new flat at Rhu, through Helensburgh, to the Priory Clinic in Glasgow for his AA meetings.
The two brothers had never been so close and Sir Jackie, who had cut short a Christmas holiday cruise, was with him when he died.
http://www.itv-f1.com/ImageLibrary/45991_1.jpg
Former Formula 1 driver Jimmy Stewart, elder brother of three-time world champion Sir Jackie, has died at the age of 76.
Better known for his sportscar exploits with the Ecurie Ecosse team, Jimmy contested only one grand prix – the 1953 British event at Silverstone – although he also took part in a number of non-championship races.
He retired from motorsport in 1955 after two serious accidents, first at Le Mans and then at the Nurburgring.
He was Sir Jackie Stewart's older brother and was the man responsible for getting Jackie interested in racing. The two grew up in Dumbarton where their father Bob was a Jaguar dealer.
Sharing his name with the celebrated Hollywood star, who became famous after Stewart was born, made life difficult but in later years that paled into insignificance as Jackie won three World Championships.
Jimmy started racing in a Healey Silverstone on local hillclimb events in 1951 and 1952 and did sufficiently well to be picked up by David Murray's Ecurie Ecosse team, racing Jaguar C-Types and XK120s in the years that followed. This opened up the possibility of an opportunity in single-seaters as well with a Formula 2 Connaught and an F1 Cooper-Bristol. It was driving the latter car that Stewart made his F1 debut at the British Grand Prix in 1953 after a number of non-championship races. He qualified 15th in a field of 29 and ran as high as sixth before spinning off after 79 of the 90 laps. That would be his only F1 start as the following year as he continued to build his reputation he was signed up to race for Aston Martin in the Le Mans 24 Hours but crashed the DB3S coupe, was thrown out of the car, and ended with a badly broken arm. He returned to action the following year, still with Ecurie Ecosse but during the Nurburgring 1000 he crashed through one of the trackside hedges and was trapped under the car for 10 minutes before help arrived. He injured the same arm again and decided that it was time to stop racing.
Jimmy was to play a role later when Ken Tyrrell was looking for a new driver for his Formula 3 team and had been told to look at Jackie Stewart. Tyrrell rang Jimmy and asked if the youngster was serious about his racing.
Jimmy Stewart
Last Updated: 11:46pm GMT 04/01/2008
Jimmy Stewart, who died on Thursday aged 76, was a racing driver of the old, mainly amateur, school, and encouraged his younger brother Jackie, later the winner of three Formula One World Championship titles, to get into racing.
He did so despite their mother Jeannie's threatening to kick Jackie out of the house if he followed in the footsteps of his brother and their father, "Old Boab" Stewart, who had been a wild, competitive motorcycle rider in his day.
She had come close to a nervous breakdown during Jimmy's races, and Jackie began racing under the pseudonym AN Other. Even after his world titles his mother preferred to ignore his success, and until the day she died never once acknowledged his achievements.
advertisement
It was Jimmy, long retired but at the time still reticent on account of their mother's misgivings, who got Jackie his first break. Ken Tyrrell was looking for a young driver for his new F-3 team, and called Jimmy to ask whether his younger brother was serious about racing.
"Serious?" Jimmy replied. "Try stopping him." (In his first test laps, Jackie proceeded to outpace the established driver Bruce McLaren. )
Jimmy Stewart was one of the biggest names in world motorsport in the early 1950s. Comparisons with his brother tend to focus on the fact that Jimmy competed in only one Formula One Grand Prix - the British, in 1953.
Driving a Cooper-Bristol for the Écurie Ecosse (Scottish Stable) team, he was in sixth place, heading for a points finish, when he spun off the track in the wet at Copse Corner. When critics claimed that he was too fast for his own good, Stewart declared that he was too fast for the car.
It was in the big sports cars that Stewart found his métier, notably in his works Aston Martin DB3S coupé at the Le Mans 24-hour race of 1954.
There was no live television coverage, and it took more than a day for the results to filter back home - and to Jeannie Stewart. Perhaps it was just as well. Stewart lost control at the wheel and was lucky to come out alive with only a broken arm.
The Écurie Ecosse team believed it was the Aston, not JRS, as Stewart was known, which caused the big shunt. They put him in one of their D-Type Jaguars and pointed him in the direction of the chequered flag in the gruelling 1,000km race at the lethal Nürburgring track in Germany in 1954.
The D-Type was arguably the best model Jaguar ever built for competition or the road; it was also liveried in a deep, metallic and mesmeric blue with white trimmings to reflect the Scottish flag. But it was not fast enough for Stewart and failed to keep up with him round one particular corner. He sheared a roadside hedge, flipping the car over and puncturing the D-Type's petrol tank.
Stewart lay unattended for 10 minutes, trying to wriggle out of the car, before help arrived and he got a lift back to the pits for medical treatment - i.e. a glass of champagne. He reckoned his previously-broken arm, which took the brunt of the crash, had saved his life.
(After a similar accident which nearly killed him in the Formula One Grand Prix at Spa in 1966, Jackie Stewart became an advocate for safety in the sport, a campaign that sealed his knighthood.)
James Robert Stewart was born at the hamlet of Milton, outside Dumbarton, on March 6 1931. Although expected to work in his father Bob's well-known Jaguar dealership and garage at Dumbuck, next door to his home (as Jackie eventually would do as a mechanic), Jimmy had other ideas.
He was allowed to drive the new Jaguars delivered to his father's garage along the winding, narrow roads alongside Loch Lomond, down to Arrochar, and up to Oban. The new Jags were so well "run in" before they were delivered to their owners that they usually needed an oil change.
Bob Stewart bought his son a C-Type Jag - registration number KSF 181 - which he drove at Charterhall, Thruxton, Snetterton and other racing circuits.
In the early 1950s Jimmy Stewart was drafted for compulsory national service in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME).
It turned out that his commanding officer was a motor racing buff, so Stewart ended up racing at weekends while his fellow soldiers were peeling spuds. He also cut a dash zipping between Dumbarton and Helensburgh in one of the first E-Type Jags - bright red, with the registration SSN 1.
In the years after Jackie Stewart's success, life was difficult for Jimmy. He had a spell selling cars at his father's old garage and later at dealers in Glasgow and the west of Scotland. Over those years the two brothers became somewhat estranged.
It was only when Jimmy admitted that he was an alcoholic, around 1997, that things changed. Though always immaculately dressed, usually in a blazer with the badge of whatever organisation he was entitled to represent - such as the British Racing Drivers' Club - Jimmy Stewart had begun to closet himself at home with a bottle.
When he eventually admitted his problem, his younger brother supported him, and financed him through the Priory Clinic in Glasgow and thereafter.
Jimmy's drinking meant he could not drive. When he got sober, Jackie bought him a car and Jimmy became a familiar sight driving along the banks of the Gare Loch from his new flat at Rhu, through Helensburgh, to the Priory Clinic in Glasgow for his AA meetings.
The two brothers had never been so close and Sir Jackie, who had cut short a Christmas holiday cruise, was with him when he died.