Stanley Michael Bailey Hailwood, MBE, GM (2 April 1940 – 23 March 1981) was a British Grand Prix motorcycle road racer. He is regarded by many as one of the greatest racers of all time.
Hailwood was known as “Mike The Bike” because of his natural riding ability on bikes with a range of engine capacities. Later in his career he went on to compete in Formula One and other classes of car racing, becoming one of the few men to compete at Grand Prix level in both motorcycle and car racing.
He died following a road traffic accident in Warwickshire, England. Info from Wiki
Bio by Stephen Latham
MIKE HAILWOOD-BIKES
Although he had two stints racing on four wheels, Stanley Michael Bailey Hailwood had a phenomenal career on bikes. He acquired the nickname ‘Mike the Bike’ but stated “I never had any real ambition. The whole thing with bikes really snowballed achievement-wise. I suppose everyone aspires to do something but I can’t say I’d have done all I have without my father’s backing and enthusiasm. I really don’t think I’d have got there otherwise.” He would record 76 Grand Prix victories, 112 Grand Prix podiums, 14 Isle of Man TT wins and 9 World Championships, including 37 GP wins, 48 Grand Prix podiums, 6 Isle of Man TT wins and 4 World Championships in 500cc. He also had two periods racing on four wheels and entered 50 F1 Grands Prix, starting with an early phase between 1963–1965 and had two podium finishes in 1964. He later returned for a second stint but left F1 after being injured at the 1974 German GP at the Nurburgring.
He was brought up with motorcycles as his father had raced before World War 2 and was a successful motorcycle dealer. At the age of seven he would ride a motorcycle around the grounds of the family home and at thirteen was allowed behind the wheel of his mother’s Jaguar XK120 and drove it home from boarding school; he told how “I couldn’t see over the steering wheel but the old man thought it was all a huge joke, so nobody really objected!”. However, he later rolled an Austin-Healey into a ditch whilst returning from Silverstone (on learner plates) in 1956. Although he attended Pangbourne Nautical College, he left early and worked for a short time in the family business before working at Triumph motorcycles.
His bike racing debut came at Oulton Park in 1957, where he finished eleventh on a borrowed 125cc MV and from this he would go on to win 1958’s British Championship in the 125cc, 250cc and 350cc categories. In 1959, he was racing works 125 and 250 Ducatis and took third at the Isle of Man, Solitude and Assen plus, aged nineteen, became the youngest ever World Championship race winner when he won the Ulster GP at Dundrod. He finished third in the standings and despite missing several races also finished fourth in the 250cc World Championship. 1960 yielded mixed results though 1961 saw a return to form and he won the 250cc World Championship plus also became the first person to win three TT races in a week plus took the 500cc TT on a Norton.
In 1962 he signed for the Italian MV team, run by Count Dominico Agusta, though he and the Count also had a sometimes fractious relationship. He recalled n one occasion “he kept me waiting for hours on end, to sort out money or something. It was all a bit silly really, he did it all for effect. The little accountant guy kept telling me ‘yes, well the Count is very busy at the moment, he’ll see you soon’ but I wasn’t messing around with him and told them that if he didn’t appear and agree my money then I’d tear up my contract there and then. He didn’t appear, so I tore the contract up, threw it over this guy’s desk and went back to my hotel. I suppose it was all a bit silly really, but it wasn’t anything that lasted for long. They came chasing after me, picking bits of the contract up off the floor and sticking it all together again.”
Despite this they formed an extremely productive partnership and he won the 500cc World Championship in 1962, 1963, 1964 and 1965. During preparations for 1964’s US GP he set a new record on an MV 500cc, achieving an average speed of 144.8 mph at Daytona and later went on to win the race. Mike would drive back and forth across Europe to compete in the races so one stipulation was that he should have a fast touring car. “Jim Redman and I both decided that we’d buy Ferraris, we got a brace of 330 GTs they seemed to be cheaper if you bought them by the pair. I tell you, that put me off Ferraris for good. The thing was always falling apart. They could never adjust the carburettors to run properly at any time while I owned the thing and the bloody gear lever came off in my hand three times. That was the last straw. At the same time I’d also got a splendid old Dodge shooting brake I’d bought in the States. It was a tremendous old tool and as solid as a rock. When we raced the MVs in this country they used to deliver them to London Airport with the mechanics and I used to cart them around to the British circuits in this old Dodge.” At 1965’s East German GP at the Sachsenring, Honda’s reigning champion Jim Redman asked Hailwood to trick Yamaha rival Phil Read before the 250 race. “I asked Mike to stroll past us as we lined up for the start of the 250 race. I would call out to him and ask how the track had been in the 500 race and he would shout back the opposite of the truth. He wandered past the front row and said, ‘Be bloody careful, it’s f***ing slippery!’” Redman went on to win the race convincingly. He also entered selected UK events in 1965 with the Tom Kirby Team and won the Hutchinson 100 Production race at Silverstone on a BSA Lightning Clubman, achieving laps of 83mph in the rain.
From 1962 to 1967 he would prove dominant as he won eight world championships plus also took six further Ulster GP victories during that time. Fellow Honda rider Ralph Bryans formed a firm friendship with him and told how “Mike was blindingly quick through the corners and on the throttle very early. His lines were good too-if you put a postage stamp on the road he would run over it every lap. And you knew when he was behind you that he was going to come past; there were no two ways about it.” He recalled riding out to practice at Imatra, with them both riding Honda six-cylinder 250s and “round the back of the circuit there was a triple-apex corner with a vicious camber. I sat up, looked at it, knocked back a gear, went over the first camber and Mike came shooting past, front wheel in the air, across the first camber, down again, dirt flying off the road and across the next camber. I shut off because I thought I was going to witness the biggest accident ever, but he got round. And the bugger did exactly the same thing for the next four laps. I said to him afterwards, ‘Jesus, Mike, that was near the bone.’ He said, ‘I know, I gave myself a fright the first time, but then I realised I could do it.’ So he kept doing it.”
Sadly, funerals were common events and Honda team mate Jim Redman stated “the reality was that one of us died every month during the racing season. Five of us started the 1962 season as the main men for the 350cc world championship. I won it and Mike was second but Gary Hocking, Bob McIntyre and Tom Phillis were dead. Mike said to me, ‘You know we’re on the short list now, don’t you?’ So I said, ‘What do you do, stop?’ And he said, ‘No, make a will!’ I think we had to joke about it.”
During this period he also raced cars though he soon decided to go back to bikes as “it was a very difficult thing to do, racing both bikes and cars at the same time, so I reckoned it would make more sense to get back on to two wheels and stick to it.” Mike spent a lot of time with friend and rival Bill Ivy and on one occasion the two turned up at Snetterton disguised as pot-smoking hippies. At other times they drove around Europe from race to race as though filming a car chase and Mike wrote how “Bill was in his Stingray and I had a Ferrari. We had a fantastic dice from Zurich to Clermont-Ferrand. The cars were steaming wrecks by the time we got there.” On one occasion on the Isle of Man, they were in Ivy’s Ferrari 275 GTB/4 and trying to impress a female admirer. “We went charging down past the Highlander at about 140mph. As we came up to Greeba Castle I said, ‘Bill, you’re going a bit too fast, you’re never going to get round.’ And he said, ‘Oh, we’ll be all right’.” The Ferrari hit the wall and caused major damage while the unfortunate woman ended up dizzy with shock and vomiting by the roadside. At the Belgian GP at Spa 1966, Jim Redman had suffered a career-ending accident and Mike, Bryans and Stuart Graham drove to the hospital in Hailwood’s Ferrari to visit him. The hospital was staffed by nuns and Bryans told how “after they had had seen Jim, we were leaving, when Mike approaches this nurse and says, ‘Excuse me, could I have a shot of streptomycin?’ The nun says, ‘Why do you want a shot of streptomycin?’ Mike says, ‘Because I’m allergic to penicillin.’ And she says, ‘But why do you require an antibiotic?’ And he says, ‘I’ve got a dose of the clap.”
1967 saw a dramatic Senior TT race against Giacomo Agostini, with the pair exchanging lap records on the opening two laps. Mike took the victory at a new lap record which would last another eight years before being broken but Mike later wrote “It wasn’t just the usual matter of trying to win with the RC181. It was trying to stay on the thing, it really was the most frightening experience.” After this victory he went out of his way to cheer up a despondent Agostini; “that evening Mike picked me up from my hotel and took me to the discotheque. He told me, you were the winner today, which was fantastic.” Another great bike racer, Phil Read, said that “Mike was brilliant. To survive and win on that course in three events is quite remarkable. I just felt that he had no fear of dying or getting seriously hurt, so that he raced to the limit and always finished the race. Yes, I feared dying or getting hurt. I was good, but Mike was better. If he hadn’t been around I’d have won a few more world championships.”
Honda pulled out of GP racing for 1968 but paid him not to ride for another team, intent on keeping him as their rider when they returned to competition. However, he did ride Hondas through 1968 and 1969 in selected race meetings without World Championship status including European events in the Temporada Romagnola (Adriatic Season of street-circuits). There were also appearances in selected UK events, competing in 1968’s post-TT race at Mallory Park on a Honda then the following year rode a Seeley in the Mallory Park Race of the Year.
After his earlier stint during the early sixties, he moved back into four wheeled racing and contested F5000 with a Lola T142 then continued in cars until 1974. 1970 also saw him with the BSA team, riding a Rocket 3 at the Daytona 200. though the bike failed due to overheating. On his return with the team for the following year’s event, despite qualifying on the front row and leading the race, his bike again broke down. After racing for three seasons in cars with Surtees, he was with McLaren in 1974 but a crash at the German GP at the Nurburgring shattered his ankle so badly that he never raced a car again.
Mike then spent some time in New Zealand where he ran a boat business but eventually returned to England then in 1978 he returned to contest the Isle of Man TT. With people questioning how competitive he would be after a long absence, he took a hugely popular victory and won by an amazing two minutes on the Ducati. Outside a hotel in Douglas, a large poster that read ‘Hailwood chooses Castrol’ was changed by someone to ‘God chooses Castrol’. Pat Slinn, who maintained his Ducati during the comeback recalled “Mike was the master at winding people up. We were in the pitlane with (Yamaha mechanic) Nobby Clark and Mike had just done a couple of very quick laps on the Yamaha 500, riding around with Mick Grant. Mick said, ‘I nearly got past you here and I wanted to come past there but I thought I’d better not.’ Then Mike turned to Nobby and said, ‘That reminds me, can you check it out, I think the bloody thing was only running on three.’ I thought that was absolutely amazing.” Celebrating after the victory, Slinn recalled “We had a wonderful party in a little restaurant in Douglas and saw the sun come up. Mike certainly knew how to let his hair down. He was very, very fast and people adored him because he was a nice guy. He was the last of a breed.”
He followed the victory a year later with a win on a Suzuki in the 500cc race plus had a second place result on the same bike in the Classic. He was awarded the Segrave Trophy in 1979 in recognition of his Isle of Man exploits in the Senior and Classic TTs.
Then he retired permanently and set up a motorcycle dealership in Birmingham but tragically, less than two years later, he was killed after being the innocent victim of a road accident. He was driving his Rover to get fish and chips with his children David and Michelle when a truck made an illegal U-turn in front of them. David survived but Michelle was killed instantly and Mike was mortally injured and passed away two days later. Pall bearers at his funeral included James Hunt, John Surtees and Giacomo Agostini and Mike was buried alongside Michelle in the churchyard of St Mary Magdalene in the Warwickshire village of Tanworth-in-Arden.
F1 commentator Murray Walker regarded him as the “greatest motorcycle rider who ever lived. Motorsport had lost a friend and one of the greatest people who has ever lived in it.” Dennis Jenkinson said of him ‘Mike the Bike may be dead but he will not be missed, for he will never go from our thoughts, wherever there is a racing motorcycle Mike will be there. For motorcycle and car racing enthusiasts Mike Hailwood will always be there.” In 1981, part of the TT course was re-named Hailwood’s Height and in 1984, Pauline Hailwood opened the Mike Hailwood Centre, a multi-purpose building located at the TT Grandstand. Run by the Mike Hailwood Foundation (an Isle of Man-based charity)and staffed by volunteers, it would serve as a refreshment outlet during TT and Manx GP motorcycle race periods plus promote the races and support new competitors. The FIM named him a Grand Prix Legend in 2000 plus he was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 2000 and the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2001.
MIKE HAILWOOD-CARS
Born on the 2nd April 1940, Stanley Michael Bailey Hailwood raced bikes and cars and his phenomenal career on two wheels saw him acquire the nickname ‘Mike the Bike.’ He competed in several categories on four wheels, including Formula Junior, F2, F5000, F1 and sports cars and entered 50 Grands Prix but his F1 career ended after being injured at 1974’s German GP.
His father had raced bikes and was a successful motorcycle dealer and at the age of seven Mike would ride one around the grounds of the family home. When he was thirteen he was allowed behind the wheel of his mother’s Jaguar XK120 and drove it home from boarding school, relating how “I couldn’t see over the steering wheel but the old man thought it was all a huge joke, so nobody really objected!”. However, in 1956 he rolled an Austin-Healey into a ditch whilst returning from Silverstone (on learner plates). He attended Pangbourne Nautical College but left early and worked for a short time in the family business before working at Triumph motorcycles.
His bike racing debut came in 1957 while his first venture in cars came in 1961 at Silverstone in a Lotus-Climax, though it was wet and he spun into a barrier. He moved into FJunior at the end of the following year and results in 1963 included third with a Brabham BT6 at Aintree, behind Denny Hulme and David Prophet. For that year’s British GP at Silverstone he had been entered in a Lola but after a run in the car earlier in the week he switched to a Lotus for the race. He qualified the Parnell car seventeenth and finished eighth, having run in company with Jo Siffert for much of the race. He retired the Lola Mk4 at Solitude though further outings with the car in September produced tenth in the Italian GP and seventh in the non-championship Gold Cup at Oulton Park.
After Reg Parnell died, he bought a share in the team and raced BRM powered Lotus 25s but the season was blighted by engine, transmission and chassis failures and during a race at Enna he spun into a lake. At the opening round at Monaco, despite hitting a wall and damaging the car during qualifying, the mechanics were able to repair it and after qualifying sixteenth he went on to finish sixth and record a first Championship point. There were only three finishes in the other races, with eighth place in the French, Austrian and US races and retirements in the others plus he missed Spa due to illness. In non-championship races he took fifth at Goodwood’s News of the World Trophy, sixth at Silverstone’s International Trophy, seventh at Syracuse and ninth at Solitude plus was third in a Libre race at Mallory Park in a Brabham. Mike recalled “When Reg died I bought a share in the team for 1964 from Tim and we used those ex-works Lotus 25s fitted with BRM V8 motors. That was an utter and complete disaster. For some reason we never managed to make those engines work installed in the Lotus chassis.”
Fellow racer Brian Hart had competed in FJunior and F2 and described his first encounter with him, at Snetterton, where “it was cold and windy and here was this larger than life character obviously out to enjoy himself. He was quite good-although this was really a club race-but didn’t seem to be taking things very seriously. He had a sense of balance that was entirely natural on a bike and he was able to transfer some of that into driving cars. The problem back then was that he didn’t have a clue about cars technically. Bikes were simple, he just got on and rode them quick. Cars had to be set up with lots of variables. Mike didn’t understand them.”
During this period he was a member of the ‘Ditton Road Flyers’, named after the Surbiton road where a group that comprised Mike, Chris Amon, Peter Revson, Bruce Abernethy and other motor racing personalities lived. Revson said that “Mike was the hottest thing on two wheels in Europe—he’d won world motorcycle championships seven times” and spoke of his frustrations (and slight jealousy) at the happy-go-lucky approach to racing of Amon and Hailwood. The group’s partying caused numerous complaints from the neighbours and, with Mike’s huge sense of fun, Amon stated “it was dangerous to race but, believe me, to have Mike Hailwood going round all over the house by night was much more risky. Certainly, we had a good time with Mike.”
Continuing with the Lotus, 1965 started with several non championship races though his best result was ninth at Silverstone’s International Trophy. There was only one GP entry but his Monaco race ended on lap eleven due to gearbox problems and he returned to bikes, stating “it was a very difficult thing to do, racing both bikes and cars at the same time, so I reckoned it would make more sense to get back on to two wheels and stick to it.” Richard Attwood was his team mate at Monaco and said “for me, F1 was an opportunity. But for Mike, it was a disaster. He was probably too busy to test properly and perhaps didn’t give it a fair go. When I’d gone to the team’s Hounslow base to see if I fitted the car, I noticed that its steering wheel was labelled ‘steering wheel’. And there was a note saying ‘gear lever’ with a big arrow pointing to the gear lever. Mike! Taking the Mickey straight away. He was very flippant, in a defensive way. But I concentrated on my own thing and so was only vaguely aware that he was struggling. After qualifying he realised that I had more ability than he’d given me credit for and we ended up having the most fantastic weekend. We saw the dawn come up and were blood brothers by the end. He proved much later how quick he could be in a car. Stunning on occasions. I think he might have been faster than Surtees, certainly on a par.”
His hectic race schedule was described later by his wife Pauline, who told how “There was one motorcycle race in Holland and after racing he leapt off the bike, skipped the garland, jumped into a light aircraft and flew to France for a car race, then flew somewhere else for another bike race the next day.” Describing the transition from bikes to cars, he felt “far more in control of a bike than I ever do in a racing car. The most difficult thing I found was to change gear with my hand… stirring rather than just going up or down all the time (with my foot). I never knew which gear I was in, or which I was going into next, which was quite frightening. “A car weaves, its wheels wobble, and around the corners you never know where it’s going to go. You turn the wheel and it understeers, sometimes. You put your foot down and it starts sliding. It’s against all my principles having ridden bikes since I was seven. I get tense when you’re supposed to relax and drive your way out of a slide. It’ll take a couple of years to get used to it.”
There were a number of sports car outings over the following three seasons, starting with 1966’s Daytona 24 Hours in a Ferrari 250 LM alongside Innes Ireland and George Drummond though they did not finish. Races in South Africa in a Ford GT40 alongside David Hobbs brought victory at Roy Hesketh plus driving solo he won the GP Rhodesia at Kumalo. In 1967 he was fourth in a Ferrari 250 LM at Kyalami then at the end of year he and Ed Nelson had third place finishes in a Ford GT40 at the 9 Hours Kyalami and the 3 Hour Roy Hesketh. Further outings in 1968 saw retirements at Daytona in a Ford GT40 with Ed Nelson and at Kyalami alongside Malcolm Guthrie in a Frank Williams entered GT40. However in three races in Guthrie’s Mirage M1 the pair took a win and third place finishes at Lourenco Marques and Roy Hesketh and he and Hobbs were second at Cape Town. Teamed with Hobbs for JW Automotive in 1969, they were fifth at Brands Hatch with a GT40 and seventh at Spa in a Mirage M2 though the team entered two GT40s at Le Mans, for Mike/Hobbs and Jacky Ickx/Jackie Oliver. It was the last year they used the traditional ‘Le Mans’ start but Ickx famously staged his own protest by walking to his car and took his time doing up his belts. Unfortunately, on the opening lap, privateer John Woolfe’s car flipped but he was not yet strapped in properly and was killed when the car broke up. The race was one of the most exciting in the event’s history and Ickx/Oliver took the win ahead of the Herrmann/Larrousse Porsche and Mike and Hobbs finished third, with Mike driving well and keeping the Matra of Beltoise/Courage at bay. Hobbs said Mike “was just brilliant. He danced unbelievably well. Played clarinet, guitar, drums and piano. A fantastic water-skier. Had a girl in every port. He was quite remarkable so I was full of enthusiasm when he became my co-driver in a Gulf GT40 for 1969. We would have won at Le Mans but for Yorke. We were a lap ahead when our brake pedal went to the floor. Yorke immediately ordered a pad-change. I shouted, ‘No, it’s more than that!’ He ignored me. Sure enough, I almost ran over the poor marshal at the end of the pit lane and we lost more time with another stop after a slow lap. A balance weight had chafed through the caliper’s bridge pipe.” In a solo drive in Hawkins Team Gunston’s Ferrari 330 P4 he won the Bourgogne Trophy at Magny-Cours though retired a Mirage M1 at Norisring. He had shared drives in the M1 with Peter Gethin and M.Guthrie in South Africa plus contested the GP Japan at Fuji with Hideo Oishi in Kurosawa Racing’s McLaren M12 though they retired due to cooling pump issues on lap one.
Returning to single seaters with a Lola T142 in the Guards F5000 Championship he was second at the Rothmans Dublin GP, third at Zandvoort and fifth in the non-championship Oulton Park Gold Cup then had two second place finishes in September, to Trevor Taylor, at Snetterton and Hockenheim. In his final races he spun off at Oulton Park but the following week took victory at Brands Hatch and finished third in the championship to Peter Gethin and Trevor Taylor. He liked the series’ easy going atmosphere as it was said he never felt at ease in the GP world, feeling the other drivers looked down on him, and Jackie Stewart said Mike felt more comfortable with the mechanics than the drivers.
Mike had been running Jaguars as personal transport and had a 35-gallon tank added to one, telling how he “used to top up for free at race meetings and this allowed me to drive right across Europe without refuelling. When I got to the next race I’d just fill up again and come back! They were absolutely no trouble at all, which is more than I can say for the first E-type owned. I bought one of the first 60 pre-production roadsters…it was absolutely appalling. In the rain it was just like driving a swimming pool. I didn’t touch Jaguars for a while after that.” He also had several Chevrolet-engined Iso Grifo coupes as road cars, despite the fact “they didn’t handle terribly well but they were very fast and they were very easy indeed to maintain. But I wrote them both off in the end. On one occasion I was going through the desert on my way up to Lourenco Marques—I’d got Pete Gethin with me actually—and I collided with a cow at about 100 m.p.h. How we walked out of that one I’m not really sure. The other one I rolled through a wall on the way to a party after a meeting at Mallory Park. I cut my face badly in that one, but I remember insisting that we went off to the party and spent the rest of the evening wandering round with blood pouring from my face, turning my vodka and lemonade into what looked like a Bloody Mary!” Peter Gethin recalled the accident, telling how “we were in South Africa, can’t remember quite when, but we were in Mike’s Iso Grifo driving from Bulawayo to Cape Town. Now, I’d been on the back of a bike with Mike and it felt safer than sitting in your favourite armchair. He was so smooth and confidence inspiring. It wasn’t quite the same in a car. We were absolutely steaming along in the Iso, well over 100mph. In the distance I saw an ox begin to wander towards the road. Mike didn’t see it. Anyway, we hit this bloody animal with a colossal impact. I had ducked under the dashboard but Mike was knocked out by the windscreen. There was ox everywhere, including, to my horror, a horn embedded in the back of my seat. The car went up in flames. Some Afrikaans turned up but refused to speak English. We ended up in some dreadful out of the way hospital.” He would later run Citroens as road cars despite originally intended buying a Mercedes SLC. However, when he and bike racer Jim Redman entered the showroom “rather casually dressed, I don’t think the salesman took us very seriously. He was a bit of an Eton type and didn’t really want to know.” The pair went to a nearby Citroen dealer “where their attitude couldn’t have been more different” and word of this reached Mercedes in Germany, who were greatly displeased at their dealer’s treatment of the pair.
A further F5000 season in 1970 brought victories with a Lola T190 at Silverstone’s GKN Vanwall Trophy and at Salzburg. Further results included second place at Snetterton, Brands Hatch and Mallory Park, third at Zolder and Brands Hatch, fourth at Thruxton and Anderstorp, fifth and eleventh at Oulton Park plus seventh at Silverstone’s non-championship International Trophy. In sports cars in South Africa he and Paddy Driver were sixth at Cape Town in an Alfa Romeo T333/2 and drives in a Lola T210 saw sixteenth at Roy Hesketh and he and Hobbs were fifteenth at Kyalami. At Le Mans, JW Automotive entered two 4.9-litre-powered 917s for Pedro Rodriguez/ Leo Kinnunen and Jo Siffert/ Brian Redman and a 4.5-litre car for Mike/David Hobbs. During the race, they were in third place but during his stint Mike chose not to pit for full wet tyres as heavy rain arrived and continued with intermediates. Unfortunately, on lap 49 he lost control in the Dunlop Curve and slid into the stricken Alfa T33/3 of Carlo Facetti, which had crashed shortly before. They were out of the race and he trudged back to the pits with the unenviable task of facing team principal John Wyer. John Horsman, the team’s chief engineer, told how “He came in for a scheduled fuel stop (from third place after three hours) and it started spotting with rain. Asked if he wanted intermediates fitted, Mike declined. The heavens opened two or three minutes later. We had the jacks and tyres ready but he went sailing past.” Hobbs recalled “I started the race again and it was a nice sunny evening. We were doing alright, we were up to fifth or sixth in no time at all, and I gave the car to Mike. It started to rain and in that he was absolutely the demon, he was up to third and flashing along at a great rate of knots, but he was unfortunate enough to run into a car that had crashed at the Dunlop Curve…The next thing they were hoisting our car over the guardrail on a crane. That was the end of that. John Wyer is reputed to have said “Don’t call us, we’ll call you.” During this period he was also involved in the filming of the ‘Le Mans’ movie and spent time with Steve McQueen and Derek Bell on the movie set. Pauline Hailwood recalled “he was doing some of the driving in the film and Dave (Hobbs) has a photograph of the two of them. You can see they were talking about racing lines because Steve McQueen is gesturing as if how to take a corner.”
In 1971, John Surtees signed him to drive the TS8 in the Rothman’s F5000 Championship and he finished second in the series. Results included second at Mallory Park and Thruxton, third at Mondello Park, fifth at the non-championship International Trophy at Silverstone plus victories at Silverstone, Mallory Park (twice) and the final round at Oulton Park. It seemed a fitting combination with their bike racing involvements though the two men were totally differing characters, with Pauline stating “Mike and John were like chalk and cheese. John was very much down-to-business. If Mike was able to make John relax and enjoy himself a bit he would take it as a great compliment.” Surtees himself said that “Mike was a natural rider. But when he came to cars he wasn’t getting the best out of himself relative to their set-up. He had no knowledge yet wouldn’t ask for help. It was me who had to approach him: ‘You need to drive for another motorcyclist who understands what you’re feeling.” A late season return to Grands Prix with a Surtees TS9 saw races in Italy and America, where he was fourth and fifteenth. However the Monza race produced a memorable finish, with five drivers separated by six-tenths at the chequered flag and he was in the group that sprinted for the line, finishing fourth behind Peter Gethin’s BRM, Ronnie Peterson’s March and François Cevert’s Tyrrell. He retired due to a collision with Ronnie Peterson at the non-championship Brands Hatch Victory Race though any results were meaningless due to the event being marred by Jo Siffert’s fatal accident. In sports cars he and Dave Charlton were second in a Lola T210 at Goldfield while drives with Team Gunston’s Chevron B19 produced second at Cape Town with Brian Redman, victory at Bulawayo and nineteenth at Roy Hesketh with Paddy Driver plus third at Kyalami with P.Driver and Howden Ganley.
His F2 campaign in 1972 with a TS10 brought him success and he took a heat win at Enna-Pergusa plus victories at Mantorp Park and Salzburgring, second place at the Osterreichring plus second (and lap records) at Crystal Palace and Rouen. Journalist Nigel Roebuck was in the paddock at Rouen and recalled seeing “Mike’s Citroen Maserati parked under a tree in the paddock. Steamed up windows and a pair of feet pressed against the windscreen. Hailwood was in it alone and just waking up. Turns out that he’d sneaked into town to meet some girls and had got back very late and the worse for wear. He didn’t dare go to the hotel for fear of waking Surtees. I brought him a black coffee to sober him up and he came second in the race.” However, Surtees stated that “Mike used to get terribly wound up before a race so there wasn’t much point in sending him to bed early. He’d never have slept anyway. But I had an extremely high regard for him and a lot of confidence in him. The others had to take him seriously when he started doing it properly.” He would secure the Championship at Hockenheim with another second place result. He contested a full GP season but unfortunately suffered reliability problems with the TS9B and only finished five of the ten races. At Kyalami, he had passed Fittipaldi and was challenging Stewart for the lead but the rear suspension failed while at Monza he was leading when his airbox flew off and he finished second to Fittipaldi. His best finishes included second in Canada, fourth in Italy and France and sixth in Britain and in non championship races at Brands Hatch he was second in the Race of Champions and ninth in the John Player Challenge Trophy. He also contested a Brazilian F2 mini-series plus outings in the Tasman F5000 series produced second at the Lady Wigram Trophy and the New Zealands GP, third at Levin, fourth in the Australian GP, fifth at Warwick Farm and sixth at Surfers Paradise and he was second in the championship.
In sports cars in 1973 there were a number of drives with a Gulf Mirage M6 and he was fourth and fifth at Zeltweg and Watkins Glen with John Watson, fifth at Dijon with Vern Schuppan and he and Derek Bell won at Spa. Contesting F2 with a TS15 he was second in the Radio Luxembourg Trophy at Mallory Park and eighteenth at Enna-Pergusa. In F1 he faced even worse reliability issues with the TS14A and it was said he used to place a paperback into his overalls so that he would have something to read when his car broke down. He retired in nine races, and his only finishes saw eighth at Monaco, fourteenth in Germany, tenth in Austria, seventh in Italy then ninth in Canada. However, an accident during the South African race saw an incredible act of bravery by Mike. On the third lap an accident put four cars out of the race but Clay Regazzoni’s BRM hit the Surtees and both cars caught fire. Pauline Hailwood recalled “there was an accident with Dave Charlton and Mike caught the tail-end of it and clipped the back of Charlton’s car. Regazzoni’s car then crashed into Mike’s and burst into flames. Clay was unconscious so Mike leapt out and managed to get in-despite the flames-and unfasten Clay’s seatbelt. He was trying to haul him out but then he caught fire on his feet and his hands, so he ran across the track and rolled on the ground to put the fire on himself out before running back in to get Clay out…Mike came into the pits stony faced. We were staying with an old bike racing pal called Paddy Driver. Mike just took me to the bike we were using and we went back to Paddy’s.” It was only the following morning when she saw the newspapers that she discovered what he had done and Jackie Stewart stated “That’s the symbol of a brave man, of a great man. That’s typical of Mike Hailwood.” He was awarded the ‘Prix Rouge et Blanc Joseph Siffert’ in honour of his bravery plus later received the George Cross, Britain’s highest civilian award for valour. He also received a gold Heuer Carrera watch, gifted by Jack Heuer himself, and its inscription read ‘To Mike Hailwood for a successful 1973 Jack Heuer.’ In 2019, the watch came to auction and sold for £56,312.
At the end of the season he left the team but Surtees recalled “that was one of the saddest things..That only came about because we had a sponsor come to us to sponsor us in a way that we’d never had before. This offer would have allowed us to make a lot of developments but there was one condition: their markets meant they had to have a German driver. They had a German company and also one in Brazil so they wanted Jochen Mass and José Carlos Pace. It brought my team to an end. Fortunately Rob Walker stepped in and arranged something for Mike with McLaren, so that was good.’ Looking back on this period, Mike reflected “I really should have won two or three races in the F1 car. In 1972 I’d got Stewart measured up at Kyalami—there was no way I wasn’t going to win that one, and then the front suspension broke. I was also leading the International Trophy from Fittipaldi until a faulty radiator cap let all the water boil away. I lost my airbox at Monza in 1972 when I reckon I’d got the legs on Fittipaldi and that lost me a few hundred revs on the straight. And, of course, I lost the Race of Champions in 1973 when the suspension broke on the TS14.”
His switch to McLaren in F1 started well, with top ten finishes in seven of the first nine races with the Yardley McLaren M23, including third in South Africa, fourth in Argentina, Zandvoort and the non-championship Race of Champions plus fifth in Brazil. He was also competing in sports cars alongside Derek Bell with a Mirage GR7 and they were second at Spa plus fourth at Monza, Zeltweg and Le Mans. Bell remembers him fondly, “I had some great times with Mike. I remember at Le Mans, I’d hand the car to him and he always said: “I’ll let it quit by early dinner, in time for a glass of wine.” And then he’d turn in, saying “third gear was playing up.” The pair would spend time spent driving in Mike’s Citroën SM and he told how they “cruised around Europe in it. He’d always have music playing-he loved music and would always drive to really heavy rock with his fingers tapping on the steering wheel.” Unfortunately his F1 career was ended at the German GP in August when he sustained serious injuries in a crash and hit the barriers. He was trapped in the car with very badly damaged legs and feet and had to be cut out and taken to hospital. Howden Ganley also crashed in a Maki during Friday’s practice and his injuries led to his retirement from F1. He told how “both my legs and one ankle were broken but the real damage was to my feet because all the little bones were fragmented. In the race Mike Hailwood had his big shunt, so we both ended up in the Krankenhaus. This is when I learned to appreciate Big Lou. He got a helicopter to land outside the hospital, flew Mike and me to Cologne, persuaded British Airways to take two stretchers on a scheduled flight, met us at Heathrow, got us to St Thomas’ Hospital and laid on the great Mr Urquart-the surgeon who’d looked after Stirling Moss and John Surtees after their big accidents.” Pauline recalled how Mike “had quite a few operations and lots of rehabilitation. The spirit was willing but the body wasn’t up to it. There were plenty of sad moments and it took him a long time to readjust. He suffered withdrawal symptoms.” Guy Edwards was also receiving treatment at the same rehabilitation centre and recalled “my arm was totally encased in plaster and his leg was totally encased in plaster. They were working on us day-in, day-out, and it was a great place but the food wasn’t so good and Mike said he couldn’t take any more of it. But what could we do? He said: “Hang on a minute, you can press the accelerator and I’ll steer the wheel!”
John Surtees felt Mike had not yet got to his peak in an F1 car as “it wasn’t so much that he was getting quicker, but his understanding of the whole business of car racing was so much greater than it had been when he started out. He coped a lot better with all the pressures and that made him more competitive on the track.” McLaren director Phil Kerr said the team, and 1974’s sponsors Yardley, enjoyed racing with him and “it really was one of the most enjoyable associations the team ever had.” Although he never competed in F1 again he raced a Holden GTS with Phil Kerr in the Benson and Hedges 1000km at Pukekohe, in 1977 had an outing in a Lotus 18 in Historics at Amaroo Park and the following year drove a BMW South Africa 530i at the Wynn’s 1000 Kyalami with Paddy Driver and finished eighth.
He was the subject of ‘This Is Your Life’ TV episode in 1976 when he was surprised by Eamonn Andrews plus spent some time in New Zealand where he ran a boat business but eventually moved back to England. In 1978 he returned to the Isle of Man TT and won on the Ducati and in the following year set up a motorcycle dealership in partnership with former racer Rodney Gould.
Tragically, less than two years later, on the 21 March 1981, he was driving his Rover to get fish and chips with his children when a truck made an illegal U-turn in front of them. The car hit it broadside and Michelle was killed instantly, with Mike and David taken to hospital, but though David sustained relatively minor injuries Mike died two days later. He was buried alongside his daughter in the churchyard of St Mary Magdalene with John Surtees, Luigi Taveri, James Hunt, Richard Attwood, David Hobbs, Geoff Duke and Giacomo Agostini as pall bearers. A black gravestone records the names and age of the two, the nine-year-old Michelle and Mike, aged 40, plus has the poignant inscriptions ”Too good in life to be forgotten in death” while his daughter’s read “A bud on earth, a flower in heaven.” F1 commentator Murray Walker paid tribute to him, declaring “motorsport had lost a friend and one of the greatest people who has ever lived in it’ while Dennis Jenkinson stated ‘Mike the Bike may be dead but he will not be missed, for he will never go from our thoughts, wherever there is a racing motorcycle Mike will be there. For motorcycle and car racing enthusiasts Mike Hailwood will always be there.’