A plaque unveiled at the Circuit of The Americas during the United States Grand Prix race weekend has drawn scrutiny across social media after fans spotted a factual inaccuracy.
Installed as part of the circuit’s celebration of the Andretti corner, the plaque describes Mario Andretti as being “the only American to win the Formula One World Championship.”
As many have pointed out, Phil Hill has also won the title, taking the victory in 1961 with Ferrari.
Turn 20, COTA’s final corner, has been named after the 1978 world champion, celebrating the long relationship he’s had with American motorsport and the venue itself. While he never raced there, he has been an ambassador for the grand prix, and with the former driver being involved heavily with the newly formed Cadillac F1 team, his contribution to the championship is undeniable.
But there’s also no denying that two Americans have won the F1 world championship. Hill, born in Miami and raised in California, became the first American to win the title. And in fact, he’s still the first and only American-born driver to do so. Andretti, while he is an American citizen, was born in Montona, Italy, before he immigrated to the States in 1955.
Andretti’s career spans a number of huge successes on top of his F1 title, including an Indy 500 victory and IndyCar Series championship, a Daytona 500 win, and three wins at the 12 Hours of Sebring.
Hill competed in F1 from 1958 to 1966, in which he took three grand prix wins. He also became a three-time winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the 12 Hours of Sebring, and in 1964 he won the 24 Hours of Daytona.
The 1961 Italian Grand Prix was difficult for the championship winner. Hill’s team-mate, Wolfgang von Trips, hit the wheels of Jim Clark’s Lotus when his car lurched into the air and into a crowd. He was killed alongside 15 spectators. Hill won the race, but something changed that day for the driver.
“I went on and won the race,” he told Autosport in 1988. “And all the other Ferraris went out with broken valve springs. Even though none broke before the race, the damage was done. We didn’t know von Trips was dead until after it was all over.
“For me it was dreadful, quite dreadful. I didn’t really know what was happening, I couldn’t take it in: I’d won the race and the championship but the accident took all the joy out of it.”
Hill died in 2008 after a battle with Parkinson’s disease.
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