American World Champions

Two American drivers have worn the title, "World Driving Champion" — Phil Hill and Mario Andretti:

Phil Hill was born in Miami, Florida in 1927, but was raised in California in the middle of the sports car culture of the Forties and Fifties. With the help of a Ferrari dealer, he began racing Ferraris, and in 1956, earned a spot on the works Ferrari sports car team.

He joined the most famous team in Formula One in 1958 and became the first American to win a World Championship Grand Prix at Monza in 1960, taking advantage of a boycott by the British teams to score pole and fastest lap, as well.

With the introduction of the new 1.5-liter formula in 1961, Ferrari came to the fore with the best prepared engine in the field, mounted in the rear as Cooper had pioneered. Hill and teammate Wolfgang von Trips waged a tight battle for the Championship until the next to last round at Monza, where von Trips was killed in an accident that also claimed the lives of thirteen spectators. With the title in hand, Enzo Ferrari decided the team would not participate in the season's last race in Watkins Glen, New York, and Hill received his hero's welcome as the new Champion while riding in the pre-race parade.

Veteran F1 journalist Nigel Roebuck said about Hill, "It is doubtful that anyone more intelligent ever climbed into a race car." Speedvision's Chuck Dressing wrote, "Phil Hill's '61 record [winning LeMans and the 12 Hours of Sebring as well as the WDC] is extraordinary by any standard...showing speed, consistency and intelligence that will never be equalled, let alone surpassed. He was America's first World Champion and, perhaps, the most modest man in the half-century history of the World Driving Championship to wear the crown."

Phil Hill's Championship Season: Race by Race

Mario Andretti was born in Montona, Italy in 1940 and moved to America with his family in 1955. A three-time Champ Car National Champion in the Sixties, Andretti made his first Formula One start from the pole in front of the home crowd at Watkins Glen in 1968.

Splitting his time and effort among several different series in the early Seventies, Andretti earned his first Grand Prix win in a Ferrari at the 1971 South African GP. He finally set his focus on Formula One in 1975, and began a historic relationship with Colin Chapman's Lotus team the following year.

Four wins in 1977, including the USGP-West at Long Beach, California, and six more in 1978 in the dominant and revolutionary "ground effects" Lotus, took Andretti to the pinnacle of the sport. In a tragic and ironic coincidence, reminiscent of Hill's wrenching experience, in the 1978 Italian GP at Monza, Andretti not only clinched the Driver's Championship, but also lost teammate Ronnie Peterson in a fiery accident at the start.

Many people still consider Mario Andretti to be the finest all-around driver ever, and the Associated Press named him "Driver of the Century."

Mario Andretti's Championship Season: Race by Race

Tim Considine's book has the full story of American GP Drivers and Teams.
Buy it here!

American GP Winners

GP Points by Americans

GP Appearances by Americans