ANDREA DE ADAMICH

1968 SOUTH AFRICAN GP Started 7th | Result Retired

The bespectacled 26-year-old from Trieste had won the 1966 European Touring Car title with Alfa Romeo and made his F1 debut for Ferrari in the non-championship 1967 Spanish GP before heading to Kyalami for his first points-paying grand prix on New Year’s Day in 1968.

The new boy was part of a three-car team from Maranello, and was assigned a 312 that was 36lb heavier than the machines prepped for Chris Amon and the exciting young Jacky Ickx. The heat in practice forced teams into some on-the-spot solutions, with Autosport describing the misfiring Ferraris as having “flexible piping rigged up to direct cooling air on the fuel metering pumps, and the Ferrari mechanics had made an outrigger oil cooler on the left hand side of Ickx’s car”. The Belgian tried all three cars in practice, but neither he nor Amon could match the hugely impressive de Adamich, who qualified seventh, 0.2 seconds quicker than eighth-placed Amon and 1.3s clear of Ickx in 11th.

The race was less to write home about. Ludovico Scarfiotti had just crashed his Coopermaserati and sustained burns from the escaping oil and water when de Adamich lost control on the oil at Clubhouse Bend and hit the barriers, damaging his suspension and forcing him to walk back to the pits.

De Adamich never drove another world championship GP for Ferrari, and in fact his next start was not until 1970 with Mclaren. His final F1 race, with Brabham, ended with injuries when he was caught in the pile-up at the 1973 British GP at Silverstone, but he enjoyed plenty of success with Alfa in his parallel sportscar career.