It is for Scuderia Ferrari that Jacky ICKX competed in the most events… 107 in total -Photo Manfred GIET
DRIVER AND GENTLEMAN: JACKY ICKX, A MOTORSPORT LEGEND, BLOWS OUT 80 CANDLES!
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Just like Baron Pierre de COUBERTIN or the seven-time Motorcycle World Champion, Phil READ, Jacky ICKX is a child of the year nine.
As for his year of birth 1945, which does not make him any younger since he has just crossed the threshold of his 80th anniversary, but without hampering the state of his legendary form which allows him to always have good footing, good eyes, all accompanied by his legendary courtesy and erudition when he talks about the high level motor sport that he practiced during almost 4 decades, during which he would have been “Caesarized” regularly if he had been an actor in the 7th art.
His art, on the other hand, is to have constantly shone in all the disciplines of mechanized sports that he has practiced, trading with two-wheelers in his very beginnings, by distinguishing himself in categories as varied as enduro and trial, even before branching off towards pure speed in 1962 and where supported by the manufacturer SUZUKI on an RM62 50 cm³ single cylinder 2-stroke, freshly entered in the World Championship of pure speed and baptized at the time ”liqueur glass class”, he was refused the start of the Belgian GP at Francorchamps by the FIM (International Motorcyclist Federation) because not yet having the required age limit of 18 years to ride in GP Moto…
A disappointment which did not, however, prevent him from winning three Belgian regional events in Mouscron, Mettet and St-Trond, riding a Kreidler and a Suzuki!
Jacky ICKX at the start of his career in 1970 – Photo Manfred-GIET
As for his debut on four wheels, it was in 1963 that they took place for the man who had fallen into the magic potion from his earliest childhood thanks to his father Jacques, a motor sports journalist as well as his older brother, Pascal, this latest fan of everything related to motor sports!
For his first birthday, his father, who had just written a book on Belgian competitive motorcycles entitled ”EN ALL TERRAIN”, had autographed a copy for him with the words:
“To Jacques Ickx junior, when he is interested in it!” »
A premonitory message given the start of the sensational career that young Jacky would begin… 14 years later!
Jacky ICKX- Ferrari-312B at Francorchamps in 1970 -He was never able to win a GP on the Ardennes circuit- Photo Manfred-GIET
Then moving to four wheels from 1963, the young ICKX, often considered a great youth talent, quickly left his business card in all the entry lists where the name ICKX appeared, anything but a pseudonym!
It will indeed leave its mark in practically all disciplines of motorsport, starting with Hill Climb, Tourism, F3, F2, F1, CAN-AM, Endurance Sport-Protos, Rally and finally Rally- Raid, proof of his eclecticism rarely equaled to this day…
Apart from perhaps Sébastien Loeb who, like Jacky, drives almost all types of cars!
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And what can we say about his track record with results that have opened so many doors for him at the highest level of different disciplines, even if some of them were sometimes barely open, as was the case at one time… near Maranello in Italy, Hethel in England or Abrest in France, with FERRARI, LOTUS and LIGIER, single-seaters that are sometimes capricious and not always up to the reputation of their respective teams.
However, his episodes in single-seaters led him to become the first European Champion in F2 in 1967 at the wheel of a MATRA, before moving to the premier category of F1, thanks to some of his exploits.
His greatest feat of arms will remain forever engraved in all memories, when on a MATRA MS 5 fielded by Ken TYRELL during the German Grand Prix in 1967, or on the very demanding slide of the Nürburgring in Germany, and his winding northern loop, – the famous Nordschleife – where the F2s ran at the same time as the F1s but outside the World Championship classification, from the tests, he made a demonstration which ridiculed the tenors of F1 by achieving the 3th absolute time just behind Jim CLARK and Denis HULME.
And during the GP, while all the F2 cars started 50 meters behind the last F1 cars on the grid, he found himself three laps from the finish… simply 4th overall, only ahead of Denny HULME, Dan GURNEY and Jack BRABHAM, the trio fighting for victory, before having to abandon due to suspension failure, not without having established the absolute lap record at an average of 163.8 km/h which will leave all observers speechless!!!
A feat which would naturally quickly propel him into F1 a month later at COOPER for two Grands Prix in a T81B alongside the Austrian Jochen RINDT and where entry into the Italian GP at Monza, the temple of speed, Jacky will finish 6th by marking his all 1is point at the World Championship.
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His next chapters in F1, between 1968 and 1979, successively at FERARI (61 GP), BRABHAM (12 GP), LOTUS (25 GP), ENSIGN (9 GP), WOLF-WILLIAMS (9 GP), Mc LAREN (1 GP). ), WILLIAMS (1 GP) and LIGIER (8 GP), unfortunately did not always live up to his ambitions and reflect his intrinsic qualities…
And this because even if he finished twice as vice-world champion in 1969 and 1970, with the little bit of luck that he sometimes lacked and without his obstinacy in seeking individual victories rather than titles, the current list of 34 names crowned World Champions would undoubtedly lengthen from his.
With speed and precision always in focus, all the challenges that Jacky ICKX has set for himself in the long range of mechanized sports disciplines in which he has been involved have all been mostly transformed into successes.
We will indeed remember his six victories in CAN/AM across the Atlantic in 1979 on a LOLA-CHEVROLET of the Carl HAAS Team, with the title on the line or his two victories in long-term endurance events, par excellence like the ROAD MARATHON, contested for 84 hours in 1966 in the green hell of the Nürburgring, winning Division 2 with Gilbert STAPELAERE on a FORD CORTINA LOTUS or the flagship of Rally Raids, the PARIS-DAKAR, which he won in 1983 associated with the French actor Claude BRASSEUR on a MERCEDES 280GE.
JACKY-ICKX-sur-la-Matra-Simca-Manfred-GIET.
And in endurance aboard GT or Sport Protos, behind the wheels of FORD GT 40, MIRAGE1, 2, 3, GR7 and GR8, FERRARI 250 LM, 512S and 312 PB, ALFA ROMEO 33TT12, MATRA-SIMCA MS 670C , or PORSCHE 935, 936, 956 or 962, Jacky, he reigned supreme between 1966 and 1985 in this endurance discipline, winning a whopping 48 victories, including 6 times the 24 Hours of LE MANS (plus once in 1991 as a consultant for the Japanese manufacturer MAZDA), during a journey of 143 contested events which earned him the title of best world endurance driver in 2004.
All this at a time when electronic aids were non-existent, which did not prevent him from winning two Endurance World Champion ”Drivers” titles in 1982 and 1983, a distinction established in 1981!
And as he likes to point out, at that time… we were fighting for a handful of seconds to freeze the places on the starting grids, where today the gladiators of modern times are spaced out by hundredths or thousandths of a second. to determine the order of departures while emphasizing the fact that each era has known or knows its charm.
Jacky-ICKX- Mr Le-Mans for many years-Manfred-GIET
During his long career, all disciplines combined, Jacky ICKX has competed in 573 races, apart from a slew of demonstrations on historic vehicles, and completed tons of KM in competition mode, including exclusively 27,367 KM in 114 F1 GPs alone. , with a total loot in all competitions of… 163 victories!
To which are added to his impressive record 84 Poles as well as 77 best laps and in which ultimately only a crown in F1 is missing as the Holy Grail!
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Just like other uncrowned Champions, such as Stirling MOSS or Didier PIRONI, the one who wanted to become a gardener as a child, this did not stop him from collecting cups and laurels, now stored in display cases or boxes and as he likes to point out.
From now on, Jacky ICKX tries to give back what he can to all those who helped him give meaning to his life during his long career, during which he believes he has always come out well even from the worst situations probably under the benevolent protection of guardian angels who wished him well at a time when motorsport was never safe from tragedy…
The Ickx clan with Jacky-Larissa-Vanina-Joy-Romain-et-Vincent-and-a-friend-of-the-Manfred-GIET Family
Because the one who has distinguished himself with so much success in practically all disciplines of motorsport, who has lived for more than three decades permanently on the wheel hats and who rarely expresses himself in the first person, except to confirm without shame that despite everything… he remains a miracle!
Happy birthday Jacky and may your current form stay with you for a long time!
Manfred GOES
Photos : Publiracing Agency
Jacky-Ickx posing next to the 1968 Ferrari 312-V12 on which he won his first GP – Photo Manfred-GIET
