Christopher Arthur Amon (; 20 July 1943 – 3 August 2016) was a New Zealand racing driver and motorsport executive who competed in Formula One from to . Widely regarded as one of the greatest drivers to never win a Formula One Grand Prix, Amon won the 24 Hours of Le Mans in with Ford, as well as the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1967 with Ferrari.
Born and raised in Bulls, Amon learned to drive aged six and initially competed in hillclimbing before progressing to national motor racing competition in 1962. Amon joined Reg Parnell Racing the following year, making his Formula One debut at the . After a non-classified championship finish in his rookie season, Amon scored his maiden points finish with fifth-place at the 1964 Dutch Grand Prix. Following intermittent Grand Prix appearances in , Amon became a test driver for McLaren and moved into sportscar racing. After winning the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans in the Ford GT40 Mk.II alongside Bruce McLaren, Amon was signed by Ferrari for , achieving his maiden podium at the amongst winning the 24 Hours of Daytona; he finished a career-best fifth in the World Drivers' Championship.
After struggling with reliability at Ferrari in and , Amon departed the team in search of Cosworth DFV-powered machinery. He scored several further podiums with March in before a two-year stint with Matra. Amon then made sporadic appearances for Tecno and Tyrrell in his campaign. Amon had founded Chris Amon Racing in 1966—when he entered the in a privateer Brabham BT11—and competed with them at four Grands Prix in , driving the AF101. Amon made further appearances for BRM, Ensign, and Wolf–Williams before retiring at the end of the season.
Amon was renowned for his poor luck in Formula One, losing out on several World Championship Grand Prix victories due to mechanical faults. Across 14 seasons, he achieved five pole positions, three fastest laps, and 11 podiums, with two non-championship wins at the 1970 BRDC International Trophy and the 1971 Argentine Grand Prix. Outside of Formula One, Amon won the Tasman Series in 1969 with Scuderia Veloce. Amon was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire in the 1993 Queen's Birthday Honours, and inducted into the New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame in 1995.
Early life Amon was born in Bulls, New Zealand, and attended Whanganui Collegiate School. He was the only child of wealthy sheep-owners Ngaio and Betty Amon. He learned to drive at the age of six, taught by a farm worker on the family farm. On leaving school, he persuaded his father to buy him an Austin A40 Special, which he entered in some minor local races and hillclimbs along with practice on the family farm. He progressed to a 1.5-litre Cooper and then an old 2.5-litre Maserati 250F, but only began to draw attention when he drove the Cooper-Climax T51 which Bruce McLaren had used to win his maiden Grand Prix.Prankard; Paragraph 1
In 1962, Amon entered the Cooper for the New Zealand winter series, but was hampered by mechanical problems. However, Scuderia Veloce entered him in a similar car, and, in the rain at Lakeside, he performed well. One of the spectators there was the English racing driver Reg Parnell who persuaded Amon to come to England and race for his team. In a test at Goodwood Amon continued to impress and was on the pace in the Goodwood International Trophy and Aintree 200 pre-season races.
Racing career
1960s
1963 For the 1963 Formula One season, the Parnell team were using the year old Lola Mk4A, powered by 1962 specification Climax V8 engines. Amon was teamed with the very experienced Maurice Trintignant for the first race of the season at Monaco and his Grand Prix career started with what was to become typical bad luck: Trintignant's Climax developed a misfire, so he took over Amon's car.
At the 1963 Belgian Grand Prix, Amon was partnered by Lucien Bianchi and started ahead of him from 15th position. After nine laps, however, an oil fire ended his race. He continued to experience mechanical problems at the Dutch, Mexican and German Grands Prix; and after an accident in practice for the Italian Grand Prix left him hanging out of his car's cockpit with three broken ribs, he missed both the Italian and United States rounds.
Amon usually qualified in the midfield and generally outpaced his teammates, who included his good friend Mike Hailwood. His best results of the year were seventh at the French and British Grands Prix. During this time, however, Amon's social life was attracting as much attention as his driving. He was a member of the Ditton Road Flyers, the social set named after the road in London where Amon shared an apartment with his Formula One colleagues Peter Revson, Hailwood and Tony Maggs.
Parnell was nonetheless impressed with Amon's results in what was regarded as less-than-competitive machinery and promoted him to team leader. Parnell died from peritonitis in January 1964 and his son Tim took over the team.
1964 In a series of four pre-season races in Britain and Italy, Amon recorded three fifth places at Snetterton, Silverstone and Syracuse. He failed to qualify for the first F1 race of the season, the Monaco GP, but at the next race, the Dutch GP, he scored his first World Championship points. The rest of his season, however, was blighted by mechanical problems.
1965 Parnell was offered BRM engines for 1965, but only if it ran Richard Attwood as its regular driver. Reluctantly, Parnell agreed and Attwood took Amon's place. Spotting an opportunity, Bruce McLaren quickly signed Amon for his new McLaren team, but when no second McLaren F1 car materialised, Amon could only drive in sports car races.
At the French GP, Amon rejoined Parnell to stand in for an injured Attwood. Amon also competed in a Formula Two race in Stuttgart and won. He returned to Germany for the German GP as second Parnell driver, but mechanical failure again forced an early retirement. His last drive before Attwood's return, a non-championship race in Enna, Sicily, also ended in retirement.
1966 During 1966, Amon continued to race for McLaren in Can-Am. He was intended to drive the second McLaren M2B but difficulties with engine supply meant that the team never made the intended expansion to two cars. (James Garner's character Pete Aron's helmet and car livery in the film Grand Prix were modelled on Amon driving a McLaren, which caused the movie makers to have to encourage other cars to be painted in the 'Yamura' colours and other drivers (Bruce McLaren included) to wear Amon-style helmets.)
However, an opportunity arose to drive for the Cooper F1 team after Richie Ginther left them for Honda. Amon drove for Cooper at the French GP and was scheduled to drive for them for the rest of the season, until the more successful John Surtees left Scuderia Ferrari to join Cooper and Amon found himself dropped.
Amon made one other F1 appearance during the year, driving a Brabham BT11 powered by an old 2-litre BRM engine at the Italian GP under the banner of "Chris Amon Racing". He failed to qualify.
Amon did however, score his biggest success to date when he partnered Bruce McLaren in a 7-litre Ford GT40 Mark II and Ken Miles to Ford's dead-heat "photo-finish" after Miles was instructed to slow down despite leading at the Le Mans 24-hour race, spearheading a formation finish. He subsequently received an invitation to meet Enzo Ferrari at the Ferrari home in Maranello, where he signed to race for Ferrari in 1967 alongside Lorenzo Bandini, Mike Parkes and Ludovico Scarfiotti.
1967 Amon's first year with Ferrari did not begin auspiciously. En route to Brands Hatch for the pre-season Formula One Race of Champions, he crashed his road car and, following race practice, had to withdraw. Tragedy then struck the Ferrari team when Bandini died following a crash during the 1967 Monaco Grand Prix, Mike Parkes broke both his legs at the Belgian Grand Prix and, in the aftermath, Ludovico Scarfiotti went into temporary retirement. Amon, therefore, became Ferrari's only driver for the rest of the season, until joined by Jonathan Williams for the final race in Mexico. Amon scored his first podium in his first official outing for the Scuderia in Monaco and at the end of 1967 had achieved four third places finishing fifth in the Drivers' Championship, in what was going to be the most successful season of his career.
Amon's Ferrari contract also included sports car racing and he began 1967 by winning the Daytona 24 Hours and 1000km Monza events with Bandini in the 4-litre Ferrari 330-P4. He finished the year partnering Jackie Stewart to a second place at the BOAC 500, thereby clinching the manufacturer's world championship for Ferrari by one point over Porsche.
1968
1968 was the year aerodynamics first played a significant role in F1 car design and Amon worked with engineer Mauro Forghieri to place aerofoils on the Ferrari 312.
In January 1968, Amon had returned home to New Zealand and Australia to compete in the 1968 Tasman Series which was used by many of the top Formula One drivers as a warm up series to the World Championship. For the 1968 series Ferrari decided to use the 2.4 engines with a new Dino 166 F2 chassis rather than a downsized 3-litre V12. Using the 246T Amon won the first two rounds of the Tasman Series, including the 1968 New Zealand Grand Prix, before narrowly losing the series to the Lotus-Ford of Jim Clark. The Dino 246 Tasmania was better handling than Clark's Lotus 49T which was still wingless and a difficult proposition. Impressed by Amon's driving in the NZ rounds, Ferrari dispatched a new four-valve version of the 2.4 V6 for the Australian rounds and this gave another 15 hp,E. Young. Forza Amon. Harper Collins NZ, Auckland (2003) p209-10 but with lesser reliability which, combined with the fact Clark was the best driver in the world at the time, cost Amon the series, although in the final round at Sandown Park he duelled wheel to wheel with Clark before being pipped at the line.E. Young. Forza Amon (2003) p205-10 & M. Hughes. Remembering Chris Among ,Motorsport 3-8-2016
After the first race of the F1 season in South Africa, Amon achieved pole positions in three of the following four races (at the Spanish, Belgian and Dutch Grands Prix) but ever-present mechanical problems meant he secured only a single Championship point from them. Throughout the rest of the season he never qualified lower than fifth place and nearly scored victories at the British and Canadian rounds and he suffered a 100 mph crash in Italy which demolished his car. In Britain, he duelled to the line with Jo Siffert's Lotus 49B and in Canada he dominated the race despite a malfunctioning clutch. Seventeen laps from the finish, however, his car's transmission failed and a distraught Amon had to be consoled by Jacky Ickx. From at least ten promising starts that season he was only able to finish five races and score ten Championship points. His best finish was second place to Siffert's Lotus-Cosworth at the British Grand Prix.
Outside F1, Amon was runner-up in the Formula Two race at Zolder, Belgium, testing the Dino 166 F2. He also came third in that year's BRDC International Trophy.
1969