Karl Jochen Rindt till date is Formula One's only posthumous world champion. Orphaned when he was only 15 months old, his parents left him a huge fortune to inherit when he turned 18. He used this fortune to buy racing cars. He was raised by his grandparents who kept his German citizenship but Jochen raced with the Austrian flag.
Rindt made his formula 1 debut in 1964 before securing a drive with team cooper for the following year.In 1965,he also won the 24 hours of Le Mans with team mate Masten Gregory in his Ferrari 250LM. He later moved on to team Brabham in 1968 but only found a competitive car in the Lotus when he moved there the following year. This was the period of Colin Chapman and when aerodynamics was still developing. His teammate for his rookie year was Graham hill, a former world champion.
In 1969 at the Spanish Grand prix, Chapman decided to put huge wings on the back of his two Lotuses. The fixtures used to hold these wings weren’t designed to take the loads that the aerodynamic drag would levy on them. Graham Hill’s wing broke but he managed to escape, but Rindt crashed the following lap suffering a broken nose and a fractured jaw. This is when he started to question Chapman’s design. Rindt did not agree to race the car until he could feel that the design was completely safe. One trump card that Jochen had was in the form of his manager, Bernie Ecclestone. Yes, the current boss of F1, then the manager of Rindt negotiated with Chapman to make the car much safer.
For 1970, Chapman designed a car which was safe enough for Jochen to agree to race in while competitive enough for them to win races. Heading into the Grand Prix at Monza that year, Jochen had already secured 5 race wins and Lotus had more than double the points as the second place team of Owner-Driver Jack Brabham. Monza being one of the fastest tracks in the f1 calendar Jochen thought removing the rear wings will give him an advantage on the long straights. On trying it out, his teammate John Miles concluded the car was un-driveable and put his wings back on. But Jochen was adamant and raced without his rear wings.
Coming down the main straight at Monza, Jochen crashed into the barriers and went on to the gravel. He hit them at a very high speed. This was the fatal crash that took his life. But as he’d won 5 races in the season before Monza, he still had the most points at the end of the season and was hence crowned the Formula 1 world champion of 1970, the only posthumous World Champion in F1.
