There is often a misconstrued belief in the world of sport that for an athlete must sacrifice their positive personal traits in order to develop the killer instinct required to be successful in their profession. Well in today’s entry we focus on a man who goes a long way to quashing that belief, a man who combined a laid-back and playboy demeanour was combined with one of the most illustrious racing portfolios of any driver both at Indy and overseas. The man in question: Graham Hill.

Norman Graham Hill was born in north London on February 15, 1929. He claimed he inherited his determination from his mother and his sense of humour from his father, a stock broker. Both qualities were required to endure the deprivations and dangers of life in wartime London, where Hill grew up during the Blitz. Although Hill had been a member of the London rowing club during his youth (thus giving him the inspiration for his iconic helmet design), his introduction into motor racing was comparatively late, only passing his driving test at the age of 24 when, on a whim, he tried a few laps around Brands Hatch in a F3 car and was “immediately bitten by the racing bug,” During the next few years, Hill competed in a couple in a number of junior formula races when in 1956 he met Colin Chapman, then in the early stages of developing his Lotus cars. After persuading Chapman to give him a part-time job (at one pound per day) Hill soon became a full time Lotus employee, and was rewarded with the occasional race.

In 1958 Chapman decided Team Lotus was ready for the big time and Graham Hill became a Formula One driver. However, the Lotus was both slow and unreliable and when little improvement came in 1959, the ever-ambitious Hill switched to BRM for 1960. Despite struggle in the early stages of his tenure with the team, Hill proceeded to haul the outfit up by its bootstraps, leading by example, working hard and deliberately affecting an optimistic outlook that boosted morale and produced ever-improving results. In 1962 he won in Holland, Germany, Italy and South Africa to collect a fully deserved World Championship ahead of fierce rival Jim Clark, before finishing second in the title race on three successive occasions between 1963 and 1965.

The dashing driver with the roguish moustache, naughty wink and quick wit blossomed as a media hero and greatly enjoyed his notoriety. He became famous for such antics as dancing on table tops, enlivening parties by performing bump and grind striptease acts and, once, streaking naked around a swimming pool. He flirted outrageously with women, to the chagrin of his long-suffering wife Bette, mother of their two daughters and a son named Damon who one day would also become a champion. As if the dangers of racing weren’t enough Hill bought a plane and became the carefree, sometimes careless, pilot of ‘Hilarious Airways.’

In 1966 however, Hill and the BRM team endured a season of struggle; regulation changes to incorporate a new 3.0 litre engine Formula had caught the BRM team off-guard, with the team’s subsequent H16 engine proving to be both heavy and unreliable. Rendering the season a write-off by the spring, Hill soon began to be tempted by the prospect of competing at Indianapolis, and after driver Walt Hansgen was fatally killed in a testing accident at Le Mans Hill was approached by team boss John Mecom to drive one of his Red Ball Specials alongside Rodger Ward and Formula One team-mate Jackie Stewart.

Having been hired for the drive on comparatively short notice, Hill struggled to get up to speed early in the month of May, as the circuit racing veteran was forced to adapt to the challenges that came with oval racing, but was able to get himself safely into the race with a 15th placed starting slot, just behind team-mates Stewart and Ward in 11th and 13th respectively, but come race day itself nearly saw his debut at the Brickyard come to an almost immediate end. As the field came down the main-stretch for the start, Billy Foster was among those jockeying for position, and as the green flag fell nearly touched wheels with Gordon Johncock and lost control, collecting 14th other cars in the process including the highly fancied machines of AJ Foyt, Dan Gurney and stock car ace Cale Yarborough. Hill had started just behind Foster on the grid, and as the Canadian driver lost control in front of him Hill was able to barely squeak past and avoid being caught up in the race-stopping melee.

When the race finally restarted over an hour later, Hill and team-mate Jackie Stewart began to slowly work their way through the field, taking advantage of mechanical issues to both Mario Andretti and Lloyd Ruby to both move into the top three by the race’s 75% distance mark. By lap 180 Stewart emerged with a clear lead, but there was doubt about whether Hill or Clark was running second. Clark had spun on two occasions earlier in the race, and the disputed length of recovery from those spins, aided with the similarities between Clark’s machine to that of Al Unser, led to lap-scorers losing count of how many circuits the Scotsman had completed during the race. These grievances would come to the forefront 12 laps later, when despite a near two lap lead over his nearest rivals Stewart suffered an oil-pressure failure that put him out of the race, allowing second place Hill to inherit the lead and eventually claim victory in the race, 41.43 seconds ahead of Clark in second place, the second successive win by a Briton at the Indianapolis 500 and the last by an Englishman until Dan Wheldon in 2005.

Despite having achieved success at the Brickyard, Hill refused to lie on his laurels, and at the end of the season joined forced with old rival Clark to drive the revolutionary Lotus 49 for the 1967 season. After Clark was tragically killed in a Formula Two event at Hockenheim in 1968, Hill was assigned the role of default number one within the outfit, and much as he did with BRM managed to take the demoralised team under his wing, claiming an emotional second World Championship at the final round in Mexico just ahead of former 500 team-mate Jackie Stewart. Despite entering the twilight of his career, Hill achieved a remarkable feat in 1972, when he teamed up with Henri Pescarolo to claim victory at that year’s Le Mans 24 Hours, in the process becoming the first and only man to win Motor Racing’s triple crown of Indy, Le Mans and the Monaco Grand Prix (of which he won on five occasions).

Despite his tragic passing in 1975, Hill remains a beloved and well respected figure in the racing community, both for his playful demeanour off the track but his determination and versatility on it, and acting as extensive proof that in the world of motor sport sometimes nice guys could finish first as opposed to last.

For today’s video we have highlights from the 1966 500.