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The1964 Formula One season was the 18th season ofFIAFormula One motor racing. It featured the 15thWorld Championship of Drivers, the 7thInternational Cup for F1 Manufacturers, and eight non-championship races open to Formula One cars. The World Championship was contested over ten races between 10 May and 25 October 1964.
John Surtees won the Drivers' Championship withScuderia Ferrari.[1] It was his first and only title. Ferrari were also awarded the International Cup for F1 Manufacturers.[2] It was their second title and the last until1975.
Maurice Trintignant retired at the age of 46 after 15 seasons in F1. He was the last driver to have competed in the first World Championship season in1950.
Dutch driverCarel Godin de Beaufort crashed duringpractice for theGerman Grand Prix and succumbed to hisinjuries the following day inhospital.
The followingteams anddrivers competed in the 1964FIAWorld Championship.
After a dominant1963 season with seven wins in ten races, reigning championJim Clark was still in form for the first race of 1964, theMonaco Grand Prix. Hequalified hisLotus-Climax onpole position, butJack Brabham (world champion in1959 and1960) was just 0.1 seconds behind him in hisBrabham-Climax.1962 championGraham Hill started in third forBRM andJohn Surtees fourth forFerrari. Clark set a blistering pace from the start but went too fast through theharbourchicane and caught somestraw bales lining the track. He was lucky to carry on without losing a position.Dan Gurney had started in fifth but overtook Hill and his teammate Brabham on lap 12. Brabham would later retire, as would Surtees. Clarkpitted to fix the damage from his first-lap misstep, allowing Gurney and Hill to the front. Just past half-distance, Hill took the lead and Gurney retired with a failinggearbox. Surprisingly, Clark could not match Hill's pace, but it did not matter anyway, since his Lotus developed an oil leak and he retired with four laps to go. Hill took the chequered flag, a lap ahead of his teammateRichie Ginther, awarding BRM a surprise 1-2 finish. DebutantPeter Arundell was third for Lotus, with his team leader being classified fourth to rack up valuable points.[10]
Dan Gurney started on pole position at theDutch Grand Prix, with the champions Jim Clark and Graham Hill next to him on the front row. Gurney was the first to brake forTarzan corner, leaving the other two to fight it out side-by-side. It was Clark who just reached ahead and then never looked back. Gurney retired on lap 22, before Hill's BRM developed amisfire. So the order almost automatically became Clark, Surtees, Arundell, and this remained until the finish.[11]
For theBelgian Grand Prix, it was Gurney again on pole, ahead of Hill and Brabham. On the second row stood Arundell, Surtees and Clark. At the start, it was Arundell who reachedEau Rouge first, but after the first was complete, Gurney, Surtees and Clark were the top three. Surtees briefly advanced to the front before his Ferrari engine failed, leading to a second retirement in three races. Clark was now free to challenge Gurney but had to focus more on keeping Hill behind. They traded places a couple of time, allowingBruce McLaren to join them in hisCooper. Gurney broke the lap record multiple times, growing his lead to 40 seconds, but unknowingly, was running low on fuel. He slowed down so much that Hill overtook him even before he reached the pits. But then on the last lap, Hill stopped with a failingfuel pump and McLaren's car started spluttering heavily. His engine cut out with less than akilometer to go, but the track went downhill, so the car was rolling towards the finish line at the bottom when Clark streaked by and narrowly took the victory. McLaren was second, Jack Brabham was third. Clark ran out of fuel during his cool-down lap, so he was brought back to the pits, seated on the engine cover of his teammate's car.[12]
TheFrench Grand Prix saw no surprising names on the front and second rows, although due to the many retirements so far, the fastest drivers did not necessarily feature at the top of the provisional standings. Clark put his Lotus on pole position, ahead of Gurney and Surtees. Clark and Gurney quickly streaked ahead of the rest, while Surtees retired again. Clark set a new lap record and edged away from Gurney, until his engine lost acylinder. He pitted, was sent out again, but then definitely retired. Gurney took an unchallenged victory, while Hill and Brabham fought over second placed, rubbing tires and flicking up dirt all the while. Hill took second place, Brabham third.[13]
In the Drivers' Championship,Jim Clark (Lotus) stood on 21 points, ahead ofGraham Hill (BRM) with 20 and bothRichie Ginther (BRM) andPeter Arundell (Lotus) with 11 points. The Manufacturers' Championship saw Lotus on top with 25 points, ahead of BRM (21) and Brabham (14).
TheBritish Grand Prix was held atBrands Hatch for the first time and received the honorary title ofEuropean Grand Prix. Championship leaderJim Clarkqualified hisLotus-Climax onpole position, ahead of main rivalGraham Hill (BRM) andDan Gurney (Brabham). Gurney got up to second at the start but had topit on lap 3 with electrical problems. Hill pressured Clark during the whole race, but the Lotus driver held on to take the win.John Surtees finished third in hisFerrari.[14]
Duringpractice for theGerman Grand Prix,Dutch driverCarel Godin de Beaufort crashed his famous orangePorsche 718. He was rushed tohospital but would pass away two days later.Honda made their debut but their chassis and engine were marred by reliability problems. The organisers saw the PR value of the new team and scheduled an extra practice session, so that driverRonnie Bucknum could reach the minimum of 5 laps required to qualify for the race. This gave local heroGerhard Mitter the chance to do the same. Surtees qualified on pole, ahead of Clark and Gurney, but it was Surtees's teammateLorenzo Bandini that took the lead at the start. Surtees and Clark went by on the second lap, before Gurney started challenging the pair and snatched the lead away. The Ferrari andBrabham changed places a couple of times, while still lapping faster than Clark and Hill behind them, until Gurney, almost unsurprisingly at this stage, ran into technical issues. His engine was overheating. On lap 7, Clark retired, leaving Surtees to take the win, ahead of Hill and Bandini.[15]
The firstAustrian Grand Prix saw Hill score his first pole position, although he was the championship leader at this point. Surtees and Clark started with him on the first row. Hill and Clark bodged the start, which allowed fourth-starting Gurney to come through into the lead. Surtees overtook him on lap 2 but his rearsuspension violently collapsed on lap 8. He became one of many victims of theairfield's rough surface: Hill already on lap 5, theLotuses of Clark andSpence on lap 40, and then Gurney retiring from the lead on lap 47. Ferrari's Lorenzo Bandini took over at the front, ahead ofRichie Ginther (BRM) andJo Bonnier (Brabham). The latter's engine gave up as well near the finish, theSwede still scoring a point in the end but allowing fellowprivateerBob Anderson into third place.[16]
The Drivers' Championship looked set to become a one-on-one fight between the1962 and1963 champions:Graham Hill (BRM, 32 points) versusJim Clark (Lotus, 30 points).John Surtees (Ferrari) was third with 19 points. BRM now also led the Manufacturers' Championship with 36 points, ahead of Lotus (34) and Ferrari (28).
For theItalian Grand Prix,John Surtees (Ferrari)qualified onpole position, ahead ofDan Gurney (Brabham) andGraham Hill (BRM).Jim Clark (Lotus) started in fourth and got lucky at the start, because Hill's clutch would not bite. Surprisingly, it wasBruce McLaren (Cooper) that converted his fifth starting position into the lead of the race. Then the traditionalslipstreaming commenced: Gurney and Surtees both went by McLaren half-way into the first lap, Surtees took the lead on lap 2, before Gurney was back in front on lap 5. On lap 27, Clark joined Hill in retirement with a brokenpiston on theClimax, and on lap 68, Gurney's engine beganmisfiring. He slowed his Brabham down, scoring no points for the sixth time this season, despite his outright pace. It left Surtees to take a comfortable win ahead of McLaren, who settled for 'best-of-the-rest' quite early on. Surtees's teammateLorenzo Bandini took third, after a race-long battle gave him just half a car length advantage overRichie Ginther.[17]
Surtees's win inItaly, coupled with Hill and Clark's retirements, had suddenly brought him into play for the Drivers' title and it had put Ferrari on top the Manufacturers' standings. The season traditionally ended outside of Europe andWatkins Glen hosted theUnited States Grand Prix for the fourth time. Clark started on pole, ahead of Surtees and Gurney. The Ferrari cars were not painted in traditionalred but inwhite and blue, the national colours of theUnited States. This was done as a protest concerning arguments betweenEnzo Ferrari and theAutomobile Club d'Italia regarding the homologation of Ferrari's new mid-enginedLe Mans race car.[18] The Ferrari cars were entered by the AmericanprivateerNorth American Racing Team. At the start, Clark lost out to Surtees and Lotus teammateMike Spence, moving up from his sixth place on the grid. Hill had started fourth but, on lap 5, moved past both Spence and Clark, before Clark suddenly found his rhythm and passed all in front to take the lead. It looked like theBrit would run away with the win, but the Climax engine started having trouble picking up fuel. Team bossColin Chapman called Spence into the pits to switch cars. (Clark would not have scored points in his teammate's car but, under the rules of the time, could at least try to push his rivals a place down the order.) However, that car struck mechanical troubles as well. Hill had snatched the lead and stayed there, finishing half a minute ahead of Surtees and a lap ahead ofJo Siffert in a privately run Brabham.[19]
It was the third time in F1 history that the championship was decided at the final race and, for the first time, no less than three drivers and three manufacturers had a chance of winning the respective titles. For Hill (39 points) and Surtees (34), and for their teams Ferrari (43) and BRM (42), winning the race would be enough, no matter the results of others. Clark (30) and his team Lotus (36) had to win and, at the same time, hope that his rivals finished low enough. He started off well, at least, with a pole position, ahead of Gurney and Bandini. Surtees and Hill started fourth and sixth, respectively, and both had a slow getaway off the line. After the first third of the race, Clark was leading comfortably ahead of Gurney, who in turn was more than 10 seconds ahead of Hill, Bandini and Surtees. Hill and Bandini were busy fighting each other and even locked their wheels. Both spun, letting Surtees through and forcing Hill to pit. With eight laps to go, everyone expected Clark to win, until the race turned around like it had done inBelgium. But while Clark had been gifted an unexpected win atSpa, this time it was him that started losing fluids and had to slow right down. Gurney took the lead and scored his second win of the year. Bandini immediately let Surtees through, and the pair sprinted to the line. If Clark had finished ahead of Surtees, then Hill had become champion, but the Ferraris could relax when they saw the Lotus had ground to a halt on the last lap, gifting Surtees his first Formula One World Championship.[20]
In the Drivers' Championship,John Surtees (Scuderia Ferrari, 40 points) was awarded the 1964 trophy, ahead ofGraham Hill (BRM, 39) andJim Clark (Lotus, 32). In the Manufacturers' Championship, Ferrari racked up 45 points, enough for their second title, ahead of BRM (42) and Lotus (37).
Points were awarded to the top six classified finishers. Only the best six results counted towards the championship.
The International Cup for F1 Manufacturers only counted the points of the highest-finishing driver for each race. Additionally, like the Drivers' Championship, only the best six results counted towards the cup.
Numbers without parentheses are championship points; numbers in parentheses are total points scored. Points were awarded in the following system:
| Position | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Race | 9 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| Source:[21] | ||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Pos. | Manufacturer | MON | NED | BEL | FRA | GBR | GER | AUT | ITA | USA | MEX | Pts. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ferrari | 10 | 2 | Ret | 9 | (3) | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 45 (49) |
| 2 | BRM | 1 | (4) | (4) | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | (4) | 1 | 8 | 42 (51) |
| 3 | Lotus-Climax | 3 | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 8 | Ret | (6) | (5) | 4 | 37 (40) |
| 4 | Brabham-Climax | 7 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 10 | 3 | 10 | Ret | 1 | 30 |
| 5 | Cooper-Climax | 5 | 7 | 2 | 6 | 6 | Ret | Ret | 2 | Ret | 7 | 16 |
| 6 | Brabham-BRM | 9 | Ret | 11 | 4 | Ret | 7 | 3 | 13 | 7 | ||
| 7 | BRP-BRM | Ret | 7 | Ret | 10 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 12 | 5 | ||
| 8 | Lotus-BRM | 6 | 5 | Ret | 8 | Ret | 11 | 8 | 13 | 8 | Ret | 3 |
| — |  Honda | 13 | Ret | Ret | 0 | |||||||
| — | Cooper-Ford | 14 | 0 | |||||||||
| — | Scirocco-Climax | WD | Ret | DNQ | 0 | |||||||
| — | Porsche | Ret | DNS | 0 | ||||||||
| — | Brabham-Ford | Ret | 0 | |||||||||
| — | ATS | Ret | 0 | |||||||||
| Pos. | Manufacturer | MON | NED | BEL | FRA | GBR | GER | AUT | ITA | USA | MEX | Pts. |
*Bold = results counted to championship totals
Eight other races which did not count towards the World Championship of Drivers and the International Cup for F1 Manufacturers were held for Formula One cars during the season.
| Race Name | Circuit | Date | Winning driver | Constructor | Report |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IIDaily Mirror Trophy | Snetterton | 14 March | Innes Ireland | BRP-BRM | Report |
| INews of the World Trophy | Goodwood | 30 March | Jim Clark | Lotus-Climax | Report |
| XIIISyracuse Grand Prix | Syracuse | 12 April | John Surtees | Ferrari | Report |
| IXAintree 200 | Aintree | 18 April |  Jack Brabham | Brabham-Climax | Report |
| XVIBRDC International Trophy | Silverstone | 2 May | Jack Brabham | Brabham-Climax | Report |
| XIVSolitude Grand Prix | Solitudering | 19 July | Jim Clark | Lotus-Climax | Report |
| IIIMediterranean Grand Prix | Pergusa | 16 August |  Jo Siffert | Brabham-BRM | Report |
 VIIRand Grand Prix | Kyalami | 12 December | Graham Hill | Brabham-BRM | Report |
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