On the 16 July 1995, the Argentinean racing car driver, Juan Manuel Fangio, died of kidney failure. Nicknamed El Chueco, the ‘bowlegged one’, he dominated the first decade of Formula One racing, winning the World Drivers’ Championship five times, a record which stood for 47 years until beaten by Michael Schumacher.
Regarded as one of the greatest F1 drivers of all time, Fangio is the only Argentinean driver to have won the Argentine Grand Prix, having won it four times in his career.
After his retirement, Fangio presided as the honorary president of Mercedes-Benz Argentina from 1987, a year after the inauguration of his museum, until his death in 1995.
Fangio’s grandfather, Giuseppe Fangio, emigrated to Buenos Aires from Italy in 1887. The fourth of six children, Fangio was born in Balcarce on San Juan’s Day in 1911.
After finishing military service, Fangio opened his own garage and raced in local events.
Unlike later Formula One drivers, started his racing career at a mature age and was the oldest driver in many of his races.
Fangio’s first entry into Grand Prix racing came in the Grand prix de l’ACF at Reims , where he started his Simca Gordini from 11th on the grid but retired.
In 1956 Fangio moved to Ferrari to win his fourth title. Enzo Ferrari and Fangio did not have a very warm relationship, despite their shared success with the Lancia-Ferrari car that was difficult to drive. Fangio took over his teammate’s cars after he suffered mechanical problems in three races, the Argentine, Monaco and Italian Grands Prix. In each case the points were shared between the two drivers. At the season-ending Italian Grand Prix, Fangio’s Ferrari teammate Peter Collins, who was in a position to win the World Championship with just 15 laps to go, handed over his car to Fangio. They shared the six points won for second place, giving Fangio the World title.
The Batista Dictatorship of Cuba established the non-Formula One Cuban Grand Prix in 1957. Fangio won the 1957 event, and had set fastest times during practice for the 1958 race.
On 23 February 1958, two unmasked gunmen kidnapped Fangio at gunpoint. The motive was simple: By capturing the biggest name in motor-sport the rebels were showing up the government and attracting worldwide publicity to their cause. Fangio was taken to three separate houses. His captors allowed him to listen to the race via radio, bringing a television for him to witness reports of a disastrous crash after the race concluded. In the third house, Fangio was allowed his own bedroom but became convinced that a guard was standing outside of the bedroom door at all hours.
After retiring from racing Fangio sold Mercedes-Benz cars, often driving his former racing cars in demonstration laps. He was appointed President of Mercedes-Benz Argentina in 1974, and its Honorary President for Life in 1987.
Fangio was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1990.
Juan Manuel Fangio died in Buenos Aires in 1995, at the age of 84 from kidney failure and pneumonia; he was buried in his home town of Balcarce.
Fangio was never married, but was involved in a romantic relationship with Andrea Berruet whom he broke up with in 1960. They had a son named Oscar Cacho Espinosa who was acknowledged as the unrecognised son of Fangio in 2000. In July 2015, an Argentinian court ruling ordered exhumation of Fangio’s body after Espinosa’s claims to be the unacknowledged son of the former race car driver.
16 July, 2019