Brabham was aRoyal Australian Air Force flight mechanic and ran a small engineering workshop before he startedracing midget cars in 1948. His successes with midgets in Australian and New Zealand road racing events led to his going to Britain to further his racing career. There he became part of theCooper Car Company's racing team, building as well as racing cars. He contributed to the design of the mid-engined cars that Cooper introduced toFormula One and theIndianapolis 500, and won the Formula One world championship in1959 and1960. In 1962 he established his own Brabham marque with fellow AustralianRon Tauranac, which in the 1960s became the largest manufacturer of custom racing cars in the world. In the1966 Formula One season Brabham became the only man to win the Formula One world championship driving one of his own cars. At the time of his death, he was the last surviving World Champion of the 1950s.
After the1970 Formula One season, Brabham retired to Australia, where he bought a farm and maintained business interests, which included theEngine Developments racing engine manufacturer and several garages.[1]
John Arthur 'Jack' Brabham was born on 2 April 1926 inHurstville, New South Wales, then a commuter town outside Sydney. Brabham was involved with cars and mechanics from an early age. At the age of 12, he learned to drive the family car and the trucks of his father's grocery business. Brabham attended technical college, studying metalwork, carpentry, and technical drawing.[2]
Brabham's early career continued the engineering theme. At the age of 15 he left school to work, combining a job at a local garage with an evening course in mechanical engineering. Brabham soon branched out into his own business selling motorbikes, which he bought and repaired for sale, using his parents' back veranda as his workshop.[3]
One month after his 18th birthday on 19 May 1944 Brabham enlisted into theRoyal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Although he was keen on becoming a pilot, there was already a surplus of trained aircrew and the Air Force instead put his mechanical skills to use as a flight mechanic, of which there was a wartime shortage. He was based atRAAF Station Williamtown, where he maintainedBristol Beaufighters atNo. 5 Operational Training Unit. On his 20th birthday, 2 April 1946, Brabham was discharged from the RAAF with the rank ofleading aircraftman. He then started a small service, repair, and machining business in a workshop built by his uncle on a plot of land behind his grandfather's house.[4]
Brabham started racing after an American friend, Johnny Schonberg, persuaded him to watch amidget car race. Midget racing was a category for small open-wheel cars racing on dirt ovals. It was popular in Australia, attracting crowds of up to 40,000. Brabham records that he was not taken with the idea of driving, being convinced that the drivers "were all lunatics" but he agreed to build a car with Schonberg.[4]
At first Schonberg drove the homemade device, powered by a modifiedJAP motorcycle engine built by Brabham in his workshop. In 1948, Schonberg's wife persuaded him to stop racing and on his suggestion Brabham took over. He almost immediately found that he had a knack for the sport, winning on his third night's racing. From there he was a regular competitor and winner in Midgets (known as Speedcars in Australia) at tracks such Sydney'sCumberland Speedway, theSydney Showground, and theSydney Sports Ground, as well as interstate tracks such asAdelaide'sKilburn andRowley Park speedways and theEkka inBrisbane. Brabham has since said that it was "terrific driver training. You had to have quick reflexes: in effect you lived—or possibly died—on them."[5] Due to the time required to prepare the car, the sport also became his living. Brabham won the1948 Australian Speedcar Championship, the 1949 Australian andSouth Australian Speedcar championships, and the 1950–1951 Australian championship with the car.[6]
After successfully running the midget at somehillclimbing events in 1951, Brabham became interested inroad racing. He bought and modified a series of racing cars from theCooper Car Company, a British constructor, and from 1953 concentrated on this form of racing, in which drivers compete on closed tarmac circuits. He was supported by his father and by the Redex fuel additive company, although his commercially aware approach—including the titleRedeX Special painted on the side of his Cooper-Bristol—did not go down well with theConfederation of Australian Motor Sport (CAMS), which banned the advertisement.[7] Brabham competed in Australia and New Zealand until early 1955, taking "a long succession of victories", including the 1953 Queensland Road Racing championship.[6] During this time, he picked up the nickname "Black Jack", which has been variously attributed to his dark hair and stubble, to his "ruthless" approach on the track,[8] and to his "propensity for maintaining a shadowy silence".[9] After the 1954New Zealand Grand Prix, Brabham was persuaded by Dean Delamont, competitions manager of theRoyal Automobile Club in the United Kingdom, to try a season of racing in Europe, then the international centre of road racing.[10]
A rear-engined T51 of the type Brabham used to win his first world championship
Upon arriving in Europe on his own in early 1955, Brabham based himself in the UK, where he bought another Cooper to race in national events. His crowd-pleasing driving style initially betrayed his dirt track origins: as he put it, he took corners "by using full [steering] lock and lots of throttle".[11] Visits to the Cooper factory for parts led to a friendship with Charlie andJohn Cooper, who told the story that after many requests for a drive with the factory team, Brabham was given the keys to the transporter taking the cars to a race.[12] Brabham soon "seemed tomerge into Cooper Cars":[13] he was not an employee, but he started working at Cooper daily from the midpoint of the 1955 season building a modified Bobtail mid-enginedsports car, powered by a Bristol engine, intended forFormula One, the top category of single seater racing.[b] He made his Grand Prix debut at the age of 29 driving the car at the1955 British Grand Prix. It had a 2-litre engine, half a litre less than permitted, and ran slowly with a broken clutch before retiring.[13][14] Later in the year Brabham, again driving the Bobtail, tussled withStirling Moss for third place in a non-championship Formula One race atSnetterton. Although Moss finished ahead, Brabham saw the race as a turning point, proving that he could compete at this level. He shipped the Bobtail back to Australia, where he used it to win the 1955Australian Grand Prix before selling it to help fund a permanent move to the UK the following year with his wife Betty and their sonGeoff.[15]
Brabham briefly and unsuccessfully campaigned his own second hand Formula OneMaserati 250F during 1956, but his season was saved by drives for Cooper insports cars andFormula Two, the junior category to Formula One.[16] At that time, almost all racing cars had their engines mounted at the front but Coopers were different, having the engine placed behind the driver, which improved their handling. In 1957, Brabham drove another mid-engined Cooper, again only fitted with a 2-litre engine, at theMonaco Grand Prix. He avoided a large crash at the first corner and was running third towards the end of the race when the fuel pump mount failed. After more than three hours of racing, the exhausted Brabham, who "hated to be beaten",[17] pushed the car to the line to finish sixth.[18] The following year, he was Autocar Formula Two champion in a Cooper, while continuing to score minor points-scoring positions with the small-engined Coopers in the World Drivers' Championship and driving forAston Martin in Sportscars.[6] His schedule necessitated a considerable amount of travel on the roads of Europe. Brabham's driving on public roads was described as "safe as houses",[19] unlike many of his contemporaries—on the way back from the1957 Pescara Grand Prix, passengerTony Brooks took over driving after Brabham refused to overtake a long line of lorries. In late 1958, Brabham rekindled his interest in flying and began taking lessons. He bought his own plane and on gaining hislicence began to make heavy use of it piloting himself, his family, and members of his team around Europe to races.[20]
In1959, Cooper obtained 2.5-litre engines for the first time and Brabham put the extra power to good use by winning his first world championship race at the season-openingMonaco Grand Prix afterJean Behra's Ferrari andStirling Moss's Cooper failed.[21] More podium places were followed by a win in theBritish Grand Prix at Aintree after Brabham preserved his tyres to the end of the race, enabling him to finish ahead of Moss who had to pit to replace worn tyres.[22] This gave him a 13-point championship lead with four races to go. At thePortuguese Grand Prix at Monsanto Park, Brabham was chasing race leader Moss when a backmarker moved over on him and launched the Cooper into the air. The airborne car hit a telegraph pole, throwing Brabham onto the track, where he narrowly avoided being hit by one of his teammates but escaped with no serious injury.[23] With two wins each, Brabham, Moss, and Ferrari's Tony Brooks were all capable of winning the championship at the final event of the season, theUnited States Grand Prix at Sebring. Brabham was among those up until 1 am the morning before the race working on the Cooper team cars. The next day, after pacing himself behind Moss, who soon retired with a broken gearbox, he led almost to the end of the race before running out of fuel on the last lap. He again pushed the car to the finish line to place fourth, although in the event this was unnecessary as his other title rival, Brooks, finished only third.[24] His championship-winning margin over Brooks was four points. According to Gerald Donaldson, "some thought [his title] owed more to stealth than skill, an opinion at least partly based on Brabham's low-key presence."[9]
Despite his success with Cooper, Brabham was sure he could do better. He considered buying Cooper in partnership with Roy Salvadori and then in late 1959 he asked his friendRon Tauranac to come to the UK and work with him, producing upgrade kits forSunbeam Rapier andTriumph Herald road cars at his car dealership, Jack Brabham Motors, but with the long-term aim of designing racing cars.[25] Brabham continued to drive for Cooper, but on the long flight back from the1960 season-openingArgentine Grand Prix, he had a heart-to-heart with John Cooper. John's father Charlie and the designerOwen Maddock had been reluctant to update their car, but although a Cooper had won in Argentina, other cars had been faster before they broke down.[26] Brabham helped design the more advancedCooper T53, including advice from Tauranac.[27] Brabham spun the new car out of the next championship race, theMonaco Grand Prix, but then embarked on a series of five straight victories. He won from the front at theDutch,French, andBelgian Grands Prix, where title rival Moss was badly injured in a practice accident that put him out for two months. Two other drivers were killed during the race. At theBritish Grand Prix, Brabham was closing on Graham Hill's BRM before Hill spun off, leaving Brabham the victory. He then came back from eighth place to second at thePortuguese Grand Prix after sliding off ontramlines and won after race leader John Surtees crashed. Brabham's points total was put out of reach when the British teams withdrew from the Italian GP on safety grounds.[28] Mike Lawrence writes that Brabham's expertise in setting up the cars was a significant factor in Cooper's 1960 drivers' and constructors' titles.[29]
Coventry Climax were late in producing the smaller 1.5-litre engine required for the1961 season and the Cooper-Climaxes were outclassed by new mid-engined cars fromPorsche, Lotus, and championship-winners Ferrari.[30] Brabham scored only three points and finished 11th in the championship. He had a little more success in the non-championship Formula One races, where he ran his own private Coopers and took three victories atSnetterton (26 March),Brussels (9 April), andAintree (22 April).
The same year, Brabham entered the famousIndianapolis 500 oval race for the first time in a modified version of the Formula One Cooper. It had a 2.7-litre Climax engine producing 268 bhp (200 kW; 272 PS) compared to the 4.4-litre, 430 bhp (321 kW; 436 PS)Offenhauser engines used by the front-enginedroadsters driven by all the other entrants. Jack qualified a respectable 17th at 145.144 mp/h (pole winnerEddie Sachs qualified at 147.481 mp/h), and while the front-engined roadsters were much faster on the long front and back straights, the rear-engined Cooper's superior handling through the turns and the shorter north and south sections kept the reigning World Champion competitive. Brabham ran as high as third before finishing ninth, completing all 200 laps. Although most of the doubters in the American Indycar scene claimed that rear-engine cars were for drivers who like to be pushed around, as Brabham put it, it "triggered the rear-engined revolution at Indy" and within five years most of the cars that raced atIndianapolis would be rear-engined.[31]
Brabham and Tauranac set up a company called Motor Racing Developments (MRD), which produced customer racing cars, while Brabham himself continued to race for Cooper. MRD produced cars forFormula Junior, with the first one appearing in mid-1961. Brabham left Cooper in 1962 to drive for his own team: the Brabham Racing Organisation, using cars built by Motor Racing Developments.[32][c] A newly introduced engine limit in Formula One of 1500 cc did not suit Brabham and he did not win a single race with a 1500 cc car.[33] His team suffered poor reliability during this period and motorsport authors Mike Lawrence and David Hodges have said that Brabham's reluctance to spend money may have cost the team results, a view echoed by Tauranac.[d] During the1965 season, Brabham started to consider retirement to manage his team.Dan Gurney, who had taken the team's first championship race win the previous year, took the lead driver role while Brabham gave up his car to several other drivers towards the end of the season. At the end of the season, Gurney announced his intention to leave and set up his own team and Brabham decided to carry on.[34]
In 1966, a new 3-litre formula was created for Formula One. The new engines under development by other suppliers all had at least 12cylinders and proved difficult to develop, being heavy and unreliable. Brabham took a different approach to the problem of obtaining a suitable engine: he persuaded Australian engineering companyRepco to develop a new 3-litre eight-cylinder engine for him.[35] Repco had experience in importing, servicing and producingClimax FPF F1 engines. Brabham had identified a suitableengine block inOldsmobile's aluminium alloyF-85 215ci engine and persuaded the company that an engine could be designed around the block. Brabham and Repco were aware that the engine would not compete in terms of outright power, but felt that a lightweight, reliable engine could achieve good championship results while other teams were still making their new designs reliable.
The combination of theRepco-Brabham V8 engine, designed by Phil Irving, and theBrabham BT19 chassis designed by Tauranac worked. At theFrench Grand Prix atReims-Gueux, Jack Brabham took his first Formula One world championship win since 1960 and became the first man to win such a race in a car of his own construction. Only his two former teammates,Bruce McLaren andDan Gurney, have since matched this achievement. It was the first in a run of four straight wins for the Australian veteran. The 40-year-old Brabham was annoyed by press stories about his age and, in a highly uncharacteristic stunt, at theDutch Grand Prix he hobbled to his car on the starting grid before the race wearing a long false beard and leaning on a cane before going on to win the race.[36] Brabham confirmed his third championship at theItalian Grand Prix and became the only driver to win the Formula One World Championship in a car that carried his own name.
The season also saw the fruition of Brabham's relationship with Japanese engine manufacturerHonda in Formula Two. After a generally unsuccessful season in 1965, Honda revised their 1-litre engine completely. Brabham won ten of the year's 16 European Formula Two races in his Brabham-Honda. There was no European Formula Two championship that year, but Brabham won theTrophées de France, a championship consisting of six of the French Formula Two races.[37]
In 1967, the Formula One title went to Brabham's teammateDenny Hulme. Hulme had better reliability through the year, possibly due to Brabham's desire to try new parts first.[38]
Despite taking pole position in the first two rounds, mechanical problems halted his chances of victory. He spun numerous times inSouth Africa, and atMonaco, his engine blew up at the start, and the win went to his teammateDenny Hulme. At theDutch Grand Prix, he scored his first podium of the season, with second place, behind ScotsmanJim Clark. He retired in theBelgian Grand Prix with another blown engine. He fixed this by winning theFrench Grand Prix at theBugatti Circuit inLe Mans. He came fourth at theBritish Grand Prix, behindChris Amon, his teammate Hulme, and Clark. At theGerman Grand Prix, he had a huge battle with Amon, and Brabham eventually finished ahead of the New Zealander, by only half a second. Hulme was the winner. At the first everCanadian Grand Prix atMosport Park, he took a huge win, ahead of Hulme, in cold and rainy conditions. At theItalian Grand Prix atMonza, Brabham had to finish second, only a few car lengths behindJohn Surtees, who took his last GP win. Hulme retired from the race, cutting the gap to 3 points between the two, as the circus headed for the United States, atWatkins Glen for theUnited States Grand Prix. Brabham outqualified his teammate, and finished fifth in the race, and with Hulme on the podium, this meant the championship chances were looking slim for Black Jack, as the circus went toMexico for the championship deciding and final race of the season. Once again, he outqualified his teammate, and needed to win, with Hulme fifth or lower. ButJim Clark was simply too fast during the whole weekend, and dominated the race from pole to win, with Brabham finishing over 1 minute and 25 seconds behind. Hulme finished third, and so the New Zealander won the championship, while Brabham settled for second place. The team secured the Constructors' Championship, with 67 total points scored, and 23 points ahead of Lotus which scored a total of 44 points.
Brabham raced alongside his teammateJochen Rindt during the1968 season. It wasn't a good season for him. He retired from the first seven races, before scoring two points for fifth place at theGerman Grand Prix. He retired from the remaining four races. At the end of the year, he fulfilled a desire to fly from Britain to Australia in a small twin-enginedBeechcraft Queen Air.[20] Partway through the1969 season, Brabham suffered serious injuries to his foot in a testing accident. He returned to racing before the end of the year, but promised his wife that he would retire after the season finished and sold his share of the team to Tauranac.
"I felt very sad, [...] I didn't feel I was giving up racing because I couldn't do the job. I felt I was just as competitive then as at any other time, and I really should have won the championship in 1970. [...] I'd have been a lot better off if I'd stayed, but sometimes family pressures don't allow you to make the decisions you'd like to."
The World according to Jack, Motor Sport (May 1999) p.36
Finding no top drivers available despite coming close to bringing Rindt back to the team, Brabham decided to race for one more year. He began auspiciously, winning the first race of the season, the South African Grand Prix, and then led the third race, the Monaco Grand Prix until the very last turn of the last lap. Brabham was about to hold off the onrushing Rindt (the eventual 1970 F1 champion) when his front wheels locked in a skid on the sharp right turn only yards from the finish and he ended up second. While leading at the British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch, he ran out of fuel at Clearways and Rindt passed him to take the win while Brabham coasted to the finish in second place. After the 13th and final race of the season, the Mexican Grand Prix, Brabham did retire. He had tiedJackie Stewart for fifth in the points standings in the season he drove at the age of 44. Brabham also drove for the worksMatra team during the1970 World Sportscar Championship season and won the final race of the season and his final top level race at the Paris 1000 km in October that year.[39] He then made a complete break from racing and returned to Australia, to the relief of his wife who had been "scared stiff" each time he drove.[40]
Brabham continued his involvement in motorsport after his retirement. Former rivals Brabham andStirling Moss shake hands at the 2004Goodwood Revival meeting.
Following his retirement, Brabham and his family moved to a farm between Sydney and Melbourne. Brabham says that he "never really wanted"[41] the move, but his wife Betty hoped their sons could grow up away from motorsport. As well as running the new venture, he continued his interest in businesses in the UK and Australia, including a small aviation company and garages and car dealerships. He also set upEngine Developments Ltd. in 1971 withJohn Judd, who had worked for Brabham on the Repco engine project in the mid 1960s. The company builds engines for racing applications.[42] Brabham was also a shareholder in Jack Brabham Engines Pty Ltd., an Australian company marketing Jack Brabham memorabilia.
The Brabham team continued in Formula One, winning two further Drivers' Championships in the early 1980s underBernie Ecclestone's ownership. Although the original organisation went into administration in 1992, the name was attached to a German company selling cars and accessories in 2008, and an unsuccessful attempt to set up a new Formula One team the following year. On both occasions the Brabham family, which was unconnected to the ventures, announced its intention to take legal advice.[43][44] In September 2014, Brabham's youngest sonDavid announcedProject Brabham, a new team planning to use acrowdsourcing business model to enter the 2015FIA World Endurance Championship in the LMP2 category.[45]
During his own retirement from international motorsport, Brabham continued to be semi-involved as both a driver in Australia, mostly racingtouring cars in the famedBathurst 1000 race, and supporting the racing ambitions of his 3 sons. His last ever international race came in December 1984 at the age of 58 in the last round of the1984World Sportscar Championship held atSandown Park inMelbourne, the1984 Sandown 1000. Jack drove as a guest driver in a Rothmans sponsoredPorsche 956 co-driving with1984British Formula 3 champion andScottish Aristocrat,Johnny Dumfries. The pair, driving a car with an in-car camera showing Jack up close and personal at the wheel for the first time, were not classified as finishers after only completing 108 laps. The race was Australia's first everFISA World Championship road racing event, preceding the1985Australian Grand Prix inAdelaide by 11 months.
Despite his three titles, and although John Cooper considered him "the greatest",[e] Formula One journalist Adam Cooper wrote in 1999 that Brabham is never listed among the Top 10 of all time, noting that "Stirling Moss and Jim Clark dominated the headlines when Jack was racing, and they still do".[46] Brabham was the first post-war racing driver to beknighted when he received the honour in 1978 for services to motorsport.[47] He has received several other honours and in 2011, the suburb ofBrabham inPerth, Western Australia, was named after him.[48] A race circuit and an automotive training school were also named after him in the early 2010s.[49]
Brabham at the Classic Adelaide rally in 2002.
In retirement, Brabham continued to be involved in motorsport events, appearing at contemporary and historic motorsport events around the world where he often drove his former Cooper and Brabham cars until the early 2000s. In 1999, after competing at theGoodwood Revival at the age of 73 he commented that driving stopped him getting old.[46] Despite a large accident at the 2000 Revival, the first racing accident to put him in hospital overnight, he continued to drive until at least 2004.[41] By the late 2000s, ill-health was preventing him from driving in competition. In addition to the deafness caused by years of motor racing without adequate ear protection, his eyesight was reduced due tomacular degeneration and he hadkidney disease for which by 2009 he was receivingdialysis three times a week. Nonetheless, that year he attended a celebration of the 50th anniversary of his first world championship at the Phillip Island Classic festival of motorsport,[50] and in 2010 flew to Bahrain with most of the other Formula One world Drivers' Champions for a celebration of 60 years of the Formula One world championship. Brabham was the oldest surviving F1 champion.[51]
Brabham and Betty had three sons together:Geoff,Gary, andDavid. All three became involved in motorsport, with support from Brabham in their early years. Between them, they have won sportscar and single-seater races and championships. Geoff was an Indycar and sportscar racer who won five North American sportscar championships as well as the24 Hours of Le Mans,[52] while David competed in Formula One for the Brabham team and has also won the Le Mans race as well as three Japanese and North American sportscar titles.[53] Gary also drove briefly in Formula One, although his F1 career consisted of two DNPQ's for theLife team.[54] Brabham and Betty divorced in 1994 after 43 years. Brabham married his second wife, Margaret in 1995 and they lived on theGold Coast, Queensland.[41] Brabham's grandsonMatthew (son of Geoff) graduated from karts in 2010 and won two ladders of theRoad to Indy, eventually racing in the2016 Indianapolis 500 and winning threeStadium Super Trucks championships. Another grandson,Sam, the son of David andLisa, whose brotherMike also was an F1 driver, stepped up to car racing from karts in 2013 when he made his debut in theBritish Formula Ford Championship.[55] The Brabham family have been involved in world-class motorsport for over 60 years.[56]
Brabham made his last public appearance on 18 May 2014, appearing with one of the cars he built.[57] He died at his home on theGold Coast on 19 May 2014, aged 88, following a lengthy battle with liver[58] disease. He was eating breakfast with his wife, Margaret, when he died.[59] In a statement on the family's website, Brabham's sonDavid confirmed his father's death.[57]
"It's a very sad day for all of us", David Brabham stated. "My father passed away peacefully at home at the age of 88 this morning. He lived an incredible life, achieving more than anyone would ever dream of and he will continue to live on through the astounding legacy he leaves behind."[57]
Brabham was the last surviving world champion from the 1950s era.
Officer of the Order of Australia (AO; for service to motor sport as an ambassador, mentor and promoter of safety, and to the community through support of charitable organisations,2008)[67]
^abUp until1990, not all points scored by a driver contributed to their final World Championship tally (seelist of points scoring systems for more information). Numbers without parentheses are Championship points; numbers in parentheses are total points scored.[72]
^Formula One rules did not at that time prevent the use of cars with enclosed wheels.
^Brabham, Nye (2004) pp. 14, 145–9 Brabham's and Tauranac's (Lawrence 1999 p. 32) accounts differ on whether the BRO was formed for the purpose of F1, or was already in existence.
^Tauranac says (Lawrence (1999) p.48) that he feels a third mechanic would have reduced the reliability problems. Lawrence himself notes (Lawrence (1999) p.71) that 'If only Jack had been prepared to spend a little more money, the results could have been so much better'. Hodges (1990, p.32) notes, 'Economy was a watchword. ...It was this attitude, perhaps, which cost [Brabham] some races'.
^Drackett (1985) p.17 "Of course, he turned out one of the best. In my book, taking everything into consideration, the greatest. He was a damn good driver because he used his nut. Later when Bruce McLaren joined the team, what Bruce didn't know, Jack taught him. They were both good engineers. They could set up the cars and they didn't mind getting their hands dirty and working on them."
^Cooper, Adam (May 1999) "The world according to Jack"Motorsport p. 36 The article quotes Jack as saying "There's no way you could call those 1500-cc machines Formula One."
^Long, Gary."Geoff Brabham". Motorsports Hall of Fame of America. Archived fromthe original on 25 July 2011. Retrieved9 November 2010. OneCan-Am championship (1981), and fourIMSA GT Championships (1988, 1989, 1990, and 1991). He won Le Mans in 1992.
^abcSmall, Steve (2000). "Denny Hulme".Grand Prix Who's Who (Third ed.). Reading, Berkshire: Travel Publishing. pp. 96–99.ISBN978-1-902007-46-5. Retrieved14 September 2025 – via Internet Archive.
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