HONDA NOT QUITE UNBEATABLE
1966 MOTOR SHOW 200, BRANDS HATCH
2Brabham-hondas in the hands of Jack Brabham and Denny Hulme had dominated the final season of 1000cc F2 in 1966. The last chance to beat the combination came at Brands Hatch at the end of October and a great field assembled for the Motor Show 200, though Hulme was in the United States, so Brabham gave his car to Chris Irwin.
Heat one, for the works cars, contained all the stars, but Brabham was at the back after missing practice. He still shot through to second behind Jochen Rindt's Brabham-cosworth within five laps and settled for that, ahead of the Lotus of Jim Clark. Irwin was fifth behind Jean-pierre Beltoise.
Rindt had the notoriously steep pole position for the final and Brabham led from the off.
Rindt stuck to him, with Clark hanging on as the top three drew away.
After attacking all the way, Rindt's moment came on lap 26 of 40. They came up to lap Chris Lambert, whose gear lever broke. As Lambert ran wide he delayed Brabham, and Rindt went past in a flash. “Every lap Rindt and Brabham seemed to leave their braking a fraction later and every lap their angles through Bottom Bend [now Graham Hill Bend] got more acute,” reported Autosport. “But Brabham could not push Rindt into a mistake.”
With 140bhp from his Brabham-cosworth,
Rindt held off Brabham's 150 Honda horses right to the end, winning by 0.2s, with Clark an envious spectator four seconds back.
These three were a minute ahead of the rest, led by the Matra of Jacky Ickx, once again leader of the F2 fraternity.
To underline the pace of the cars by the end of the 1000cc era, Brabham's fastest lap of 1m36.0s was a whole second better than his three-litre F1 Brabham-repco had gone on its way to winning the British GP three months earlier. Three of the greatest drivers of the time had produced one of the most exciting dramas, climaxing with defeat of the mighty Honda.