David Hobbs

David Hobbs was an apprentice at Jaguar when he first competed with a Morris Oxford in May 1959. From that day until his last race in 1990, he drove everything from Formula 1 to saloons and was especially successful racing in America.

Varied racing career includes Grand Prix debut

He starred in British club racing during the early 1960s with a Lotus Elite. The works car he shared with Frank Gardner won the 1300cc class at the 1962 Le Mans 24 Hours when eighth overall. Formula Junior and F2 followed in successive seasons although 1965 was disrupted by breaking his jaw in a road accident. Hobbs then finished third on his Formula 1 debut at Syracuse in 1966 with Reg Parnell’s Lotus 33-Climax. He drove sports cars such as the mighty Lola T70 and Bernard White’s Ferrari 250LM at the time.

White acquired a Ford GT40 for that winter’s Springbok series during which Hobbs and Mike Hailwood won at Bulawayo and Pietermaritzburg. It was White who gave Hobbs his Grand Prix debut in the 1967 British GP. His old BRM P261 was eighth that day and ninth in Canada, and he was also 10th in the German GP in a Formula 2 Lola T100-BMW.

A winner in sports cars

He was drafted into the Honda team for the following year’s Italian GP but F1 opportunities were few and far between. Regular employment during 1968 was with John Wyer’s Gulf-sponsored Ford GT40 in the International Championship for Makes. The highlight was the Monza 1000Kms when Hobbs and regular co-driver Paul Hawkins won after Jacky Ickx’s sister car retired. He also won the non-championship Kyalami Nine Hours with Ickx and the team’s Mirage M1-Ford prototype.

Another season with Wyer‘s GT40 included third in the 1969 Le Mans 24 Hours – his best result from 20 appearances in the race. Having spent much of the 1960s seemingly on the verge of real international success, his career gathered momentum in America that year.

North America success and final F1 starts

His 1969 Formula A campaign only came about when plans for actor James Garner to race a works Surtees TS5-Chevrolet fell through. Hobbs made a late start as a consequence but won four times and only lost the title to Tony Adamowicz by a single point.

He switched to Carl Hogan’s McLaren M10B-Chevy to win the 1971 championship in the last season before it was renamed Formula 5000. Hobbs crashed a Penske Racing Lola-Ford on his Indianapolis 500 debut that year and finished 10th in the United States GP with a Penske-White McLaren M19A-Ford when substituting for Mark Donohue.

The best of his four Indy 500 starts was when Hobbs qualified Roy Woods’ Carling Black Label McLaren M16D-Offenhauser on the outside of row three before finishing fifth in 1974. He also made two final GP starts that year when replacing the injured Hailwood in Austria and Italy. His Yardley McLaren M23-Ford finished seventh and ninth respectively.

Hobbs was an 11-time winner in North America’s IMSA Championship and finished fourth in the 1977 standings with a McLaren-run BMW 320i. He spearheaded that programme before switching to John Fitzpatrick Racing and Porsche in 1982.

He was a top-four finisher at Le Mans for three of the next four years and was third in the race once more in 1984. Hobbs also added the 1983 Trans-Am title to his varied c.v. after his DeAtley Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro won four times. Fifth with a Joest Porsche 962C in the 1988 Le Mans 24 Hours, he retired from racing in 1990.

That only accentuated his profile in America for he became the voice of F1 on American television.