In March 1971, 21-year-old South African Jody Scheckter pitched up in a cold and wet England. He was selected for the ‘Driver to Europe’ program. He had shown some good things in the Formula Ford races at home.
In the UK he bought a second-hand Merlyn MK11 from Colin Vandervell. Emerson Fittipaldi had used it before. His first race was at the Race of Champions. He finished second, even after a spin. Despite numerous crashes, he got some interest. Because he worked in in Merlyn’s workshop, he also got a chance to drive the F3 car. There were wins at Oulton Park, Mallory Park and Thruxton.
Being on the radar, he got F2 offers from Team Surtees and McLaren. He chose the McLaren for 1972 because he got a quasi-works position in the team. The Ralph Bellamy designed M21 was tricky to drive even after the input from Denny Hulme and Peter Gethin. He won the Thruxton race. After that the M12 was shelfed.
Then at the end of the 1972 season Lotus knocked at the door and to prevent Scheckter doing it, Mclaren offered him a F1 drive at Watkins Glen. He ran as high as P4 when rain caught him into a spin. He finished P9.
He got a new chance in the M19C at Kyalami in 1973. He qualified on the front row. Because McLaren had a full programme for Hulme and Revson, so they could only offer occasional GP outings.
So he entered a F5000 19 races-program in the USA with Trojan and with three wins became the champion after a season-long battle with Brian Redman.
Without a full time F1 deal, Jody also signed to join Ron Dennis and Neil Trundle at Rondell Racing for the F2. Last season they raced with Brabham, but now they had constructed their own car. With lack of fundings, Scheckter quit after two races. Rember: Henri Pescarolo and Tim Schenken would go on a win a race.
In the USA Jody even found time to race in the CanAm with the Porsche 917/10 TC from Vasek Polak. With a P2 at Elkhart Lake and a P3 at road Atlanta and Watkins glen, he was 6th in the championship.
When occasional GP outings were on offer, he made the most of it. At Paul Ricard (His third F1 race) Scheckter found himself driving the Gordon Coppuck’s new McLaren M23. He led the race sensationally until 12 laps from the end when Emerson Fittipaldi made a move and the pair ended up in the catch fencing. In Silverstone he was caught in the first lap nine-car-pile-up (car #30-photo below). He also retired in the last 2 races of the season.
Frustrated by the lack of opportunity, he moved to Tyrrell in 1974. It was all a hush-hush deal, because Jacky Stewart would retire after 1973 and Francois Cevert had a tragic accident at Watkins Glen. In these circumstances, Jody was a little short of a brilliant season. After three races with the 006, he had victories in Sweden and at Brands Hatch in the Tyrrell 007. With four more podium finishes, he was an impressive third in the final standings.
The 1975 season, driving an updated Tyrrell 007, started strong with a win in his home-country, where his team mate Patrick Depailler finished third. After a disaster race in Spain, Jody was running third at Monaco when he had a puncture. This was followed by a P2 in Belgium. He got a third spot after crashing in the last laps of the British GP. It was only in the last race of the season, that he would score again a point. Seventh in the final standings.
In September, the covers came of the new Tyrrell Project 34, a six-wheeler race car.
The Tyrrell team started the 1976 season with the old 007. Jody Scheckter finished fifth at Interlagos and fourth at Kyalami. The P34 made his debut at Zolder. Jody drove it to fourth place. Schekter and Depailler finished 2-3 in Monaco before Jody qualified on pole-position and both led to a famous 1-2 in Sweden. Jody went on with second at the Nurburgring and Brands Hatch. He crashed out of the lead in Austria (suspension failure) and finished fifth in Holland and Italy. Fourth at Mosport was followed with P2 at Watkins Glen. This time Schecker was third in the F1 standings ( and Tyrrrell was third in the Constructors).
Jody was now ready for a change. Enter eccentric Austrian-born Canadian Walter Wolf. He pieced together a F1 superteam. Peter Warr was hired from Lotus to run the operation, former Hesketh designer Harvey Postlethwaite produced a conventional tidy F1 car, the Wolf WR. Jody completed the picture for a one-car attack. He brought along Roy Topp, his mechanic from Tyrrell. And nobody would guess what would happen next.
The striking deep blue and gold car caused a shock by winning his debut race at Argentina. Jody would go on an win the race at Monaco and the Canadian GP. He added three more podium finishes. That gave him a second place in the championship behind Niki Lauda.
The Wolf team was not ready for the upcoming ground-effect cars. In 1978 Jody started the first five races with the old designed car, the WR4 and the WR1. He finished third in Monaco. From Zolder onwards he could use the Wolf WR5. This was a hastily designed ‘ground-effect’ car by Harvey Posthlethwaite. Because of the oil radiator mounted in an angulated nose section, a new WR6 was used in the last races. Jody finished sixth in France and was in the lead in the British GP when both Lotus cars retired. His best result was second at Hockenheim. With the WR6 he finished on the podium at Watkins Glen and Montreal.
But Jody had since august 1978 a new deal in the bag long before the end of the season. He would be a Scuderia Ferrari driver next to Gilles Villeneuve. That would be the most important decision in his career.
The size and the layout of the boxer flat-12 engine made that Mauro Forghieri could not produce a ground effect car. Still, the proven 312T series and the Michelin tyres in combination with two top drivers were hard to beat in 1979. Jody Scheckter and Gilles Villeneuve got really well together and both found it fun to work hard.
The first two races of the season saw the dominant force of the Ligier JS11. The new 312T4 cars with the centrally mounted front wing and the wide flat rear body dominated immediately during the South-African GP, their first race. Villeneuve won that race and the next on the streets of Long Beach. Jody was second in both races. After a fourth in Spain, he got the upper hand at Zolder. In Monaco, Scheckter withstood the late pressure of Regazzoni (Wiiliams). On the Dijon circuit, Villeneuve had the famous race against the Renault of Rene Arnoux. Both Ferrari’s were off the pace at Silverstone and at Hockenheim, but places within the top 6 made that Scheckter stayed in the lead for the championship. He lost third place in Austria to a charging Lafitte. At Zandvoort, Villeneuve had an explosion of the rear tyre and damaged his wheel when trying to get to the pits. Schecker made it to second place. Then he won the Italian GP in front of ecstatic tifosi. Jody Scheckter was now the new world champion; Villeneuve was his runner-up.
A new Ferrari 312T5 still with the flat-12 engine was not yet a full ground-effect car despite a new suspension configuration and side skirts. From the beginning of the 1980 season there were speculations about Scheckter’s imminent retirement. Boss Enzo Ferrari started questioning his motivation. And yes, in July he announced his retirement during a press conference.
The season for the Scuderia started with 11 engine failures in the first three races. With new sidepods and bodywork, Jody made it fifth at Long Beach, but only P8 in Belgium. The rest of the season was bad with even a non-qualification in Montreal.
After the last race and a P11, Scheckter walked away from the cockpit and from the sport completely. The magic was gone. He later started his own business, the Firearms Training System. It was active in 35 different countries and had 95% of the market operating from South Carolina, USA. After 12 years, he relocated to England. There he started in the healthy food business as a farmer. He crated Laverstoke for dairy buffalo herds and more. The business and the park came up for sale in June 2025 as Jody moved to Italy.
