Chris Amon dies at the age of 73

Chris Amon became known as the finest Formula 1 driver never to win a World Championship Grand Prix. The label captured his repeated misfortune, but it also risked hiding the reason the missed victories mattered: Amon possessed enough speed to lead Ferrari, take pole positions by large margins and command races against the strongest drivers of his generation.

Amon died in New Zealand on 3 August 2016 at the age of 73. His Formula 1 career had stretched from 1963 to 1976 and included 96 World Championship starts, five pole positions and 11 podium finishes.

Born into a farming family, Amon moved from New Zealand racing to Europe while still a teenager. Reg Parnell gave him his Formula 1 debut in 1963, beginning a career that passed through teams including Ferrari, March, Matra, Tecno, Tyrrell and Ensign.

Le Mans opens the Ferrari door

Amon shared the winning Ford GT40 with fellow New Zealander Bruce McLaren at the 1966 Le Mans 24 Hours. The victory brought him to Ferrari for 1967, where he joined a team rebuilding after internal conflict and the departures of several established drivers.

He became Ferrari’s leading Formula 1 driver through 1968 and 1969. His qualifying speed was exceptional. At Spa in 1968, Amon took pole by 3.7 seconds, an enormous margin even by the standards of the period.

Race victories repeatedly escaped through mechanical failures, strategic problems and incidents beyond his control. He led races for Ferrari and Matra but never reached the finish first in a World Championship round.

A reputation built without the expected result

Amon did win major non-championship Grands Prix, including the 1970 International Trophy and the 1971 Argentine Grand Prix. He also won the 1967 Daytona 24 Hours and Monza 1000 Kilometres with Lorenzo Bandini, showing that his record outside championship Formula 1 was far from empty.

His most celebrated later performance came at the 1972 French Grand Prix at Clermont-Ferrand. Amon took pole for Matra and led before a puncture forced a pit stop. He recovered through the field to finish third, setting the fastest lap while another likely victory disappeared.

The accumulation of such races created the reputation for bad luck. Amon usually treated it with perspective, once observing that he had survived an era that killed many of his contemporaries. Longevity, in that context, was not a minor consolation.

After retiring from international racing, he returned to New Zealand and remained connected to motorsport. His death prompted tributes centred not on the missing victory alone, but on the judgement of team-mates and rivals who had watched the speed directly.

The World Championship record contains no win beside Amon’s name. Five pole positions and hundreds of laps led explain why the absence became one of Formula 1’s most discussed statistics.