The German-born Austrian F1 driver, who was killed in practice before the Italian Grand Prix in 1970, remains the only man to win the world championship posthumously

Regular viewers of BBC’s Pointless will tell you that when a question arises asking the contestants to name a Formula One driver, two answers are normally given – Juan Pablo Montoya and Jochen Rindt. Both were great Formula One drivers of their respective eras and yet now earn maximum points on a quiz show that rewards obscure knowledge. It is enough to make hardened F1 observers shake their heads with disbelief.

While it may be understandable that Montoya’s exploits in the early 2000s have been overlooked, Rindt’s drives in the 1960s and 70s definitely deserve more widespread appreciation, especially given the German-born Austrian is the only posthumous F1 world champion. Scratch below the surface and you unearth a story that cuts to the heart of motor racing. A story of speed, aggression and an unquenchable will to win in the face of life-threatening danger.

Orphaned as an infant when his parents were killed by Allied bombing raids in 1943, a year after his birth in Mainz, Rindt was raised by his grandparents in Graz, Austria. Throughout his youth, Rindt exhibited a passion for speed and the thrill of a race. He twice broke limbs in schoolboy ski races and, when he made his move into motor sport, on mopeds and motorised bikes, he tended either to crash or win. His early years set a trend that was to continue and would shape Rindt into a fierce, fearless racer.

“We Germans fear God and nothing else,” Rindt commented, reciting Otto von Bismarck’s famous line.

It was said that when he was old enough to drive on the roads, he would fling his Volkswagens round the streets, landing him in trouble with the law while his abrasive personality resulted in expulsion from several private schools.

“I was always in trouble at school and once I almost ran down one of the teachers on my motorcycle,” he once said.

“In the end I got thrown out and went to England to learn English. I learned to drive while I was in England but I was too young to get a licence. When I went back home I broke my leg skiing but I decided I was more than capable of driving myself – even though I had one leg in plaster. I actually drove without a licence for 18 months and then got caught the day before I was eligible to collect it.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Austria’s Jochen Rindt, in the Lotus-Ford, on his way to win the 1970 British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch. Photograph: Colorsport/Rex

Some considered him to be intimidating while his abrupt manner and unusual traits (such as using string instead of shoe laces) set Rindt apart from the rest.

“They may do many things but they will not start the German Grand Prix without me,” was the response Ron Dennis says he was given when he went to fetch Rindt just minutes before the race was due to start.

Rindt certainly did not lack that arrogance all top sportsmen need to have.

Similarly, every top sportsman needs a hero. Rindt’s was the German Count Wolfgang von Trips, whose death at Monza in 1961 did nothing to dampen his enthusiasm for motor racing. Von Trips’ crash was one of the most high-profile and horrific of a number of Formula One fatalities in that era. He and his American team-mate Phil Hill entered the Italian Grand Prix knowing that one of them would be the champion at the end of it. On lap two, Von Trips touched wheels with Jim Clark and spun into the crowd at over 100mph before tumbling back on to the track in a flurry of metal. In those days only a waist-high fence separated the crowd and the cars and 14 spectators died as Von Trips’ Ferrari scythed through the watching hordes. Despite the horrific death of his idol, the fire for racing that burned inside Rindt would not be extinguished as he began racing touring cars.

“Nobody knows how long he will live. Because of this fact you have to do as much as you can as fast as you can,” Rindt said. He knew the nature and the risks of the sport he was in.

Despite crashing with alarming regularity and being hospitalised as a result on several occasions, Rindt was forging a reputation as a naturally fast driver.

He personally footed the bill for his first foray into more serious motor racing when, in 1964, he went to England to buy a Formula Two Brabham for £4,000. In just his second F2 race at Crystal Palace, Rindt beat the illustrious Graham Hill with press accounts suggesting that his car had been sideways throughout the race as he flung his vehicle round corners at unimaginable angles.

“Most of the British papers had never heard of me, and next morning one of them said I was a young Australian; they seem to think all racing drivers come from Australia or New Zealand.”

Soon, Rindt was the man to beat in the fiercely competitive F2 series.

His move to Formula One came when he signed a three-year deal with the Cooper team in 1965. The uncompetitive nature of the car meant that Rindt had to battle in F2 to forge his reputation. Alongside the American Masten Gregory, Rindt won the Le Mans 24 Hours race in 1965 in their Ferrari 250LM. Two more years with Cooper and one with the unreliable Brabham in Formula One saw Rindt come to exemplify the perception of what a racing driver should be as he pushed the cars to their limits in an effort to drag every inch of performance out of them.

“Do I ever drive within them?” was Rindt’s response when asked how often he drove beyond his limits.

His driving made for thrilling, exhilarating viewing and he matched the racing driver image off the track as well with his marriage to the Finnish fashion model Nina Lincoln.

“I go racing basically because I like it,” Rindt once explained. “I am now making money out of it, which I am very happy about, but I would never do it just for the money.”

Jochen Rindt pictured on the track ahead of the German Grand Prix at Hockenheim in August 1970. Photograph: dpa/dpa/Corbis

The Team Lotus founder Colin Chapman was the man who handed Rindt his first big chance in Formula One when he signed him to partner the reigning world champion Graham Hill in 1969. Rindt was effectively a replacement for the legendary two-times Formula One world champion Clark, who had died at Hockenheim in 1968. In choosing Rindt, Lotus had appointed the first non-British driver in their history.

It was a mark of the talent he was that Rindt immediately outpaced his illustrious team-mate Hill but the Lotus was unreliable and both cars crashed out at the Spanish GP – leaving Rindt with concussion and a broken jaw when his car ploughed into the wreckage of Hill’s Lotus. Despite the reliability issues Rindt openly criticised, the Lotus car gave him his first F1 win in the US GP at Watkins Glen. He had opened his account in a sport many felt he was set to dominate.

All great sportsmen have a defining moment. For Rindt, it was his 1970 victory in Monaco. He spent the majority of the race in fifth place and, following a string of retirements, was promoted to second. He was a sizeable 15 seconds behind Jack Brabham, who was driving one of his own cars, yet Rindt launched an exhilarating charge in pursuit of the race leader. Smashing lap records time and time again, the pressure he exerted on Brabham caused the leader to crash on the last corner of the final lap as Rindt loomed ever larger in his mirrors. A weeping Rindt accepted the trophy from Prince Rainier and Princess Grace to cap one of the most extraordinary races in Monaco’s history.

Such was the nature of Formula One in that era, tragedy was never far away and the deaths of close friends Bruce McLaren and Piers Courage within 19 days of each other in June 1970 had a profound impact on Rindt. He now also had a daughter and it was claimed that he was considering retirement at the end of the season – something he later rejected. Despite all that was going on around him, one thing remained constant and that was that Rindt never lost his competitive edge. He won four consecutive races – the Dutch GP (where Courage was killed) as well as the French, British and German races.

“Maybe I will not live to reach the age of 40. But, until that time, I will have experienced more things in life than anybody else.

“I plan to go on racing as long as I enjoy it, but I don’t want to feel I am dependent on it. Too many drivers go on racing too long just for the money, and they usually end up getting killed. I want to be able to pull out when I’ve had enough.”

Sadly Rindt did not reach the age of 40 as disaster struck two races after his German triumph. During practice for the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, Rindt’s Lotus inexplicably ploughed into the guard rail at Parabolica. He was not wearing a crotch strap and his seatbelt buckle caused fatal throat injuries.

The tragic irony of the crash was that it had occurred just yards away from where Von Trips had died nine years earlier.

While Von Trips’ points tally was beaten by Phil Hill in 1961, Rindt was not overtaken and was posthumously awarded the 1970 championship.

Courage and Rindt both lost their lives during Formula One races in 1970 and 11 drivers had died during the 1960s. It was an era where racing brought frighteningly real dangers and it is testament to the advancements made in the safety of the sport that Ayrton Senna is the last man to have died during a Formula One race at San Marino in 1994.

While Jules Bianchi continues to fight in hospital following his serious crash at the Japanese Grand Prix last season, such incidents are now rare whereas in Rindt’s era they were almost expected.

While the safety side of the sport in 2015 is far superior to the days when Rindt was racing, it is hard to imagine the cars and the action itself would have appealed to his ferocious character; he was a racer. He lived for speed, to travel as fast as he could.

Modern Formula One has lost that edge. So much of the racing now centres around management of tyres and fuel at the cost of driving the car flat out as fast as you can.

That was not the way Rindt raced and, in so many ways, the sport is poorer for the lack of that most basic principle. Those who witnessed Rindt flinging his car around the track talked of being thrilled and enthralled.

He was a natural talent. His passion for speed and for the thrill of the chase gave him all the ingredients he needed to be arguably the greatest talent of his generation.

The fact that his name adds £250 to the Pointless jackpot, or indeed wins it, is such a shame.