Mike Spence

Name: Mike Spence

Nationality: Great Britain

Date of birth: December 30, 1936 - Croydon

Date of death: May 7, 1968 - Indianapolis Speedway, USA

Born into a racing family which owned a garage in Maidenhead Mike Spence began racing in his father's Turner 950 sportscar in 1959 and, having developed a taste for the sport tried an AC-Bristol before buying a Formula Junior car in 1960. He began to score good results with an Emeryson Formula Junior car and made his F1 debut for Emeryson in a factory car at the non-championship Solitude Grand Prix in 1961. He raced the same car later that year in the Lewis-Evans Trophy at Brands Hatch, finishing second.

For 1962 he joined Ian Walker Racing in Formula Junior, driving a Lotus with much success which led to a Team Lotus Formula Junior drive with the Ron Harris-run team in 1963. He made his Grand Prix debut in Italy that year after Trevor Taylor was injured and did a solid job before his engine gave up.

In 1964 Lotus started the year with Jim Clark and Arundell in F1, although Spence had an F1 run in the non-championship Syracuse GP. He raced in F2 winning the British F2 Championship for Team Lotus but in July Arundell was out of action after an F2 crash at Reims and Spence became Clark's number two from the British GP onwards. He finished sixth in Italy and ran second in the United States GP at Watkins Glen and was fourth in Mexico.

The following year he won the Race of Champions at Brands Hatch and in 1966 was signed by BRM but seconded to drive for their second-division Parnell Racing operation. He was then promoted to the works team in 1967 alongside Jackie Stewart. His best placing that year was fifth in the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps, three places behind Stewart on the only occasion that both the complex BRM H-16s finished in the points together. The 1967 season also saw Spence share the winning Chaparral sports car in the BOAC 1000km race at Brands Hatch and he really looked poised for great success in 1968 with the new BRM P126 V12. After showing himself to be a potential front-running force in both the Race of Champions and the Silverstone International Trophy, he was killed testing one of the Lotus 56 turbine cars at Indianapolis when he crashed and the front right wheel of his car hit him on the head.

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