My greatest race - Eddie Cheever

Browse pages
Current page

1

Current page

2

Current page

3

Current page

4

Current page

5

Current page

6

Current page

7

Current page

8

Current page

9

Current page

10

Current page

11

Current page

12

Current page

13

Current page

14

Current page

15

Current page

16

Current page

17

Current page

18

Current page

19

Current page

20

Current page

21

Current page

22

Current page

23

Current page

24

Current page

25

Current page

26

Current page

27

Current page

28

Current page

29

Current page

30

Current page

31

Current page

32

Current page

33

Current page

34

Current page

35

Current page

36

Current page

37

Current page

38

Current page

39

Current page

40

Current page

41

Current page

42

Current page

43

Current page

44

Current page

45

Current page

46

Current page

47

Current page

48

Current page

49

Current page

50

Current page

51

Current page

52

Current page

53

Current page

54

Current page

55

Current page

56

Current page

57

Current page

58

Current page

59

Current page

60

Current page

61

Current page

62

Current page

63

Current page

64

Current page

65

Current page

66

Current page

67

Current page

68

Current page

69

Current page

70

Current page

71

Current page

72

Current page

73

Current page

74

Current page

75

Current page

76

Current page

77

Current page

78

Current page

79

Current page

80

Current page

81

Current page

82

Current page

83

Current page

84

Current page

85

Current page

86

Current page

87

Current page

88

Current page

89

Current page

90

Current page

91

Current page

92

Current page

93

Current page

94

Current page

95

Current page

96

Current page

97

Current page

98

Current page

99

Current page

100

Current page

101

Current page

102

Current page

103

Current page

104

Current page

105

Current page

106

Current page

107

Current page

108

Current page

109

Current page

110

Current page

111

Current page

112

Current page

113

Current page

114

Current page

115

Current page

116

Current page

117

Current page

118

Current page

119

Current page

120

Current page

121

Current page

122

Current page

123

Current page

124

Current page

125

Current page

126

Current page

127

Current page

128

Current page

129

Current page

130

Current page

131

Current page

132

Current page

133

Current page

134

Current page

135

Current page

136

Current page

137

Current page

138

Current page

139

Current page

140

Current page

141

Current page

142

Current page

143

Current page

144

Current page

145

Current page

146

Current page

147

Current page

148

Current page

149

Current page

150

Current page

151

Current page

152

Current page

153

Current page

154

Current page

155

Current page

156

Current page

157

Current page

158

Current page

159

Current page

160

Current page

161

Current page

162

Current page

163

Current page

164

Current page

165

Current page

166

Current page

167

Current page

168

Current page

169

Current page

170

Current page

171

Current page

172

Current page

173

Current page

174

Current page

175

Current page

176

Current page

177

Current page

178

Current page

179

Current page

180

Current page

181

Current page

182

Current page

183

Current page

184

Current page

185

Current page

186

Current page

187

Current page

188

Current page

189

Current page

190

Current page

191

Current page

192

Current page

193

Current page

194

Current page

195

Current page

196

Current page

197

Current page

198

Current page

199

Current page

200

Current page

201

Current page

202

Current page

203

Current page

204

Current page

205

Current page

206

Current page

207

Current page

208

Current page

209

Current page

210

Current page

211

Current page

212

Current page

213

Current page

214

Current page

215

Current page

216

Current page

217

Current page

218

Current page

219

Current page

220

Current page

221

Current page

222

Current page

223

Current page

224

Current page

225

Current page

226

Current page

227

Current page

228

Current page

229

Current page

230

German Group 5 saloon car race, Nurburgring, 1976

The most frightening part of beating his hero Ronnie Peterson in an identical car around the old Nurburgring was the subsequent trip with him to the airport.

I’ve had a funny career. I started like gangbusters, and always came very close but never got all I wanted. So to form my own team, do it right, and win the Indy 500 last year was very gratifying. Twenty five years of nightmares gone in three and half hours.

People criticise the Indy Racing League, but we have a lot of young drivers who’ve done all their training on dirt tracks in Kansas and Texas, and believe you me, they know how to get around an oval. Oval racing is a lot about courage and strategy – it’s totally different from what I was trained for. I don’t remember the last time I turned right at a race track. Well, I have turned right, but shortly thereafter I was in a hospital…

I had an amazing time in Formula One, but I’m disappointed I didn’t spend more time enjoying it than I did. Your only thought is, “I have to get in a better car, I have to get in a better car.” It’s all technology driven. I still think you can take an average F1 driver, put him in the best car, and he’ll win the Championship. You could take an exceptional driver and put him in an average car and he’ll be an average racing driver. I always found that extremely frustrating.

I had a lot of seconds and thirds, but they’re nothing. In the scheme of things, you’re branded as someone who didn’t win races. That year I was with Renault, 1983, I could have won four races. My engines, and those used by Elio de Angelis and Nigel Mansell at Lotus, were built by a group of people. Alain Prost’s were built by two people. I had cables come off, distributor belts come off, electrical problems because somebody hadn’t tightened something…

All it takes is one win, and you look at life in a totally different manner. I can say that from experience now, because after winning Indy, every time I sit in a racing car, I’m annoyed if we don’t win. You will dig deeper. It does make a difference.

But I don’t want to talk much about Indy, as I have another race in mind as my greatest. But first, let me put it into context. When I started racing in go-karts, my hero was Ronnie Peterson, the only kart racer who’d been successful in F1. The track I raced at in Rome, the Pista d’Oro, was the track he competed at in the World Championship. So I spent my youth dreaming about being Ronnie. Elio and I used to race all the time. and he’d be Jochen Rindt. By 1976 I was racing for Ron Dennis in Formula Two, aged 18. Not long after I was testing for Ferrari. Life was a joy, because everything was happening so fast. In retrospect it was too much; I should have spent more time in F3 than I did, but I won quickly, and wanted more than I could have, and my father wanted more.

With Ron there was a lot of juggling to turn up to races, but not matter how little money we had, his cars were always the best looking. He was very fussy about making sure things looked right. I learned how to be a racing driver with Ron.

To help us get BMW engines for ’77 I had to race in the German G5 Championship. Jochen Neerpasch set up a junior team, which was myself, Marc Surer and Manfred Winkelhock. BMW was very serious, we all had to go together to St Moritz and train. Then they’d give us these 320s and we’d all go to the Nurburgring for a week and just destroy them, driving around and around. By the time we got to the Nurburgring race, I’d probably done 500 laps.

For that weekend BMW brought in Peterson and Hans Stuck, and they were the senior team. I had never met Ronnie before. He was everything I imagined him to be. He had a beautiful woman and every engineer was hovering around him. As Americans would say, he was a cool guy. So I had a chance to race my hero, and I think most of the racing etiquette I had – I didn’t have much at that age anyway – went out the window. My only interest was to beat Ronnie Peterson. It’s all I cared about.

The 320 race car was great. It had the F2 engine and a lot of downforce, and they were all very equal. On the straights we would be four abreast. Us junior team guys didn’t know what we were doing. Ronnie got stuck in the middle once, and he got hit on both sides. It was great to be around Stuck and Ronnie, but I used every door, every fender, and really tried to give Ronnie a hard time.

There were two races, and after the first one Ronnie came up to me, put his finger in my chest, and said “If you do that again to me, you’re going to be landing in the top of one of those trees.”

Anyway, in the second one he had an accident with Stuck, and his car was in bad shape. On the long straight I was towing behind him and pulled out to pass. I turned and looked at him, as if to say who’s going to lift off now, and he rammed into my door. He wasn’t pleased that I’d been bumping him. I managed to get in front of him at the last chicane, and he hit the back of my car so hard I must have gone 30 yards in front, and almost spun. But I made the chicane, and just finished ahead of him.

Neerpasch found a lot of humour in the fact I had to go back to the airport with Ronnie! I’ve never been so frightened. We hit almost every car, and I don’t think there was one corner that we didn’t go around sideways. Afterwards I got to know him really well. To race on the old Nurburgring was fantastic, and I’m sorry for the drivers of this generation who don’t have that opportunity. When you took off on the big circuit, it was an experience every time, especially to be able to race with somebody like Peterson and watch him go around there, watch the flair that he drove with. It was different days. Racing drivers were pirates then; today racing drivers are corporate monkeys.