Top 10 F1 drivers of the 1960s

There was an increase in professional drivers and series in the 1960s as motorsport gained momentum. That makes picking out the top 10 Formula 1 drivers of the decade a challenge.

For the latest in Autosport’s new Top 10s series we’ve considered many factors, including level of success, machinery at their disposal, longevity and how highly the drivers were rated by their contemporaries.

Successes (or failures) outside of the relevant decade are not considered and many drivers are eligible for more than one top 10.

So, here’s our pick of the best drivers who raced in the world championship between 1960 and 1969.

10. Jacky Ickx

Ickx rose to prominence in F1 in the late 1960s, but his true calling came in sportscars in the following decade

Photo by: Rainer W. Schlegelmilch / Motorsport Images

Decade wins: 3
Decade poles: 3
Decade titles: 0 

This spot could have gone to 1961 world champion Phil Hill or Chris Amon, the finest F1 driver never to win a world championship grand prix. But Ickx just edges it thanks to his instant impact and status as one of the top three F1 aces at the end of the decade.

Having starred in F2 machinery, including embarrassing several F1 drivers when the categories were combined at the 1967 German GP, Ickx was signed by Ferrari for 1968. Although the more experienced Amon tended to lead the team’s charge, Ickx showed his potential and won the French GP, underlining his status as a rainmaster.

Ickx joined Brabham for 1969 and impressed alongside triple world champion Jack, taking victories at the Nurburgring and Mosport. That was enough for Ickx to finish a distant second in the standings to runaway champion Jackie Stewart. He also took his first Le Mans 24 Hours victory and was third in Autocourse’s driver rankings, behind Stewart and Jochen Rindt.

Although Ickx would fight for the title in 1970, he was a diminishing F1 force after 1972 and would instead carve out a career as a sportscar racing legend, ultimately winning Le Mans six times.

9. Jochen Rindt

Rindt celebrates victory in the 1969 US GP, setting up a successful but tragic title a year later

Photo by: Sutton Images

Decade wins: 1
Decade poles: 7
Decade titles: 0

Although he only scored one world championship GP victory in the 1960s, Rindt makes it due to his sheer pace and his development as a frontrunner to the point where he finished the decade regarded as the closest challenger to benchmark Stewart.

Rindt made his first world championship start in 1964 and scored his first podiums driving for Cooper in 1966. He impressively led the wet Belgian GP that year and ended up third in the final standings, though new team-mate John Surtees proved tough to beat when the Briton arrived from Ferrari.

Rindt, who was the king of F2 at a time many GP drivers contested the category, joined Brabham in 1968 and outpaced team boss and three-time world champion Jack Brabham, taking two poles. But woeful unreliability meant he only scored two finishes, third places in South Africa and the rain-soaked German GP.

The Austrian took on and beat reigning world champion Graham Hill at Lotus in 1969. He took five poles and was the main challenger to Stewart’s dominant Matra, starring in an epic British GP duel, but misfortune made some question whether a first win would ever come.

But Rindt finally broke his duck at the 1969 United States GP and ended up fourth in the points.

Though it doesn’t count for this list, Rindt starred in 1970, brilliantly winning a dramatic Monaco GP and then taking four straight victories once the Lotus 72 was ready. That was enough to put him out of reach of his rivals and Rindt became F1’s first posthumous world champion after being killed in practice for the Italian GP.

8. Denny Hulme

Consistency underpinned Hulme's 1967 F1 title charge

Photo by: Rainer Schlegelmilch / Getty Images

Decade wins: 5
Decade poles: 0
Decade titles: 1 (1967)

Arguably better in big sportscars, Hulme was nevertheless an F1 frontrunner in the second half of the decade, with a peak across 1967-68.

Hulme stepped up to F1 with Brabham in 1965 and became team founder Jack’s full-time team-mate in 1966, scoring four podiums while his boss took the title.

Hulme managed a level of consistency and reliability in 1967 that neither Brabham himself, nor the pacesetting Lotus 49s of Jim Clark and Hill, could muster. Two wins, at Monaco and the Nurburgring, were backed up by three seconds and three thirds as Hulme pipped Brabham to the crown, though neither could match Clark’s four victories.

Hulme joined McLaren, where he would take two Can-Am titles, in 1968. Late-season wins in Italy and Canada launched him into title contention with Hill and Stewart, but non-finishes over the final two rounds left him third in the points.

The New Zealander rounded out the 1960s with a Mexican GP win at the 1969 finale, though he was a distant sixth in the standings.

It doesn’t count for this list, but Hulme also deserves credit for helping to lift McLaren after founder Bruce McLaren’s death in 1970 and being part of the early days of the landmark M23, with which Hulme scored his only world championship pole position.

7. Stirling Moss

Having starred in our top 10 F1 drivers of the 1950s, this format hurts Moss on where he ranks in the 1960s

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Decade wins: 4
Decade poles: 5
Decade titles: 0

Moss perhaps suffers more than almost any other driver by our decade-by-decade approach. He was the undisputed benchmark – in F1 and sportscars – from 1958 until his Goodwood accident in early 1962.

Going on his 1960s F1 performances, Moss’s 1960 season was hampered by his Spa crash – caused by a wheel falling off his Lotus 18 – that forced him to miss three races. Either side of that, he won the Monaco and United States GPs to finish third in the table.

Moss underlined his status as F1’s pre-eminent driver in 1961. Driving an underpowered, Rob Walker-run privateer Lotus, Moss was the only driver to defeat the dominant Ferraris and did so twice: at Monaco, in what he selected as his greatest F1 drive, and at the Nurburgring, adding a GP success around the fearsome Nordschleife to his four 1000Km sportscar victories. He was again third in the championship.

Moss knew that Clark was a rising threat and a Walker-run Ferrari might not have been good enough to see off the Lotus and BRM challenges in 1962, but what could have happened after that? We can never know. But what we do know is that F1 lost its established top driver when Moss hit the Goodwood bank on Easter Monday 1962.

6. Dan Gurney

Three of Gurney's four F1 wins in the 1960s were first-time victories for those teams

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Decade wins: 4
Decade poles: 3
Decade titles: 0

A combination of bad luck and a crucial career move meant that Gurney only won four world championship GPs, but he was one of the true aces of the 1960s. Those four victories encompassed first-time wins for three teams, including his own.

Gurney was already a podium finisher when the decade began, thanks to some fine performances in his rookie season with Ferrari in 1959. After an unhappy year at BRM the American joined Porsche and three second places – including a narrow defeat at the French GP – helped Gurney to fourth in the points.

He took his first championship race victory in the 1962 French GP and was part of one of the epic Nurburgring races that year, finishing a close third to Hill’s BRM and the Lola of Surtees.

Gurney then joined the fledgling Brabham team and quickly outpaced team boss Jack Brabham. Unreliability and misfortune, most notably running low on fuel after dominating at Spa, kept him out of the 1964 title fight but there were still two victories.

A more reliable 1965 helped Gurney to fourth in the points and he would have been in the prime spot to take the 1966 title with the Repco-engined Brabham had he remained at the team. But instead, Gurney struck out on his own with Angle American Racers.

Reliability was again an issue, but the iconic Eagle scored its one and only world championship race victory at the 1967 Belgian GP in Gurney’s hands. The team faded thereafter and Gurney’s final F1 starts came with McLaren in 1970 but his impact on motorsport would go on for many more years as a team boss and key player in America.

5. John Surtees

Surtees beats Brabham by 0.2s for a thrilling Italian GP win in 1967

Photo by: Keystone / Hulton Archive / Getty Images

Decade wins: 6
Decade poles: 8
Decade titles: 1 (1964)

Surtees probably should, or could, have been a double world champion had he not fallen out with Ferrari team manager Eugenio Dragoni in 1966, which led to him leaving mid-season. As it was, he moved to Cooper, outpaced highly rated team-mate Rindt and finished second to Jack Brabham in the championship.

Before that, Surtees had made a brilliant transition from world motorcycle champion to F1 driver. He scored a pole as early as his third world championship GP at Portugal in 1960 with Lotus – another promising drive that slipped away due to politics outside the car – and impressed for Lola in 1962 before joining a struggling Ferrari.

His previous experience with Italian motorcycle firm MV Agusta helped him lift Ferrari. Armed with Mauro Forghieri’s 158, Surtees overcame a poor start to the 1964 season to win in Germany and Italy to launch himself into title contention. When championship rivals Clark and Hill hit trouble in the Mexico City finale, team-mate Lorenzo Bandini moved aside to allow Surtees to finish second and take the crown by a point.

There were no wins in 1965, but Ferrari was better placed than most at the start of the three-litre era the following year. A fine victory at Spa brought him to within a point of the championship lead before the falling out with Ferrari.

As well as forming his own team, initially for sportscar racing, Surtees joined Honda and took victory in a dramatic 1967 Italian GP, beating Brabham by 0.2s. The Honda project never quite reached the same heights again and, after a poor season with BRM, Surtees took his own team into F1.

Surtees took two victories in the non-championship Oulton Park Gold Cup in 1970-71 with his own cars, but there were no more GP podiums before he retired in 1972.

4. Jack Brabham

Brabham's two titles and starting his own team in the 1960s puts him high on this list

Photo by: David Phipps

Decade wins: 11
Decade poles: 11
Decade titles: 2 (1960, 1966)

During the decade, Brabham was outpaced by team-mates Gurney and Rindt, but his impact on – and success in – F1 surpassed both. Having started the decade with a second, convincing, drivers’ crown with Cooper, Brabham struck out on his own and famously won the title again in 1966.

Brabham was the man to beat in 1960, particularly with Moss out following his Spa crash, and five straight victories in the T53 meant he led team-mate Bruce McLaren in a Cooper 1-2 in the standings.

Unreliability and Ferrari domination made 1961 much harder, Brabham taking no wins and only one pole (while helping to develop the V8 Climax engine) on his way to 11th in the points. It was clear Cooper had lost its edge and Brabham founded his own squad, initially running a Lotus before Ron Tauranac’s BT3 was ready.

Gurney proved quicker when he joined the team and, with increasing responsibilities running the team, Brabham was happy to let the American lead the way. But Gurney left to set up his own operation just when Brabham had put together a tidy package with Repco power for the new three-litre regulations in 1966.

A revitalised Jack took four consecutive victories in the BT19 to clinch his third title and only narrowly missed out to team-mate Hulme the following year. Brabham remains the only driver to take the F1 crown in a car bearing his own name.

Rindt (1968) and Ickx (1969) subsequently led the way for the team on-track and Jack had two winless campaigns. But Brabham enjoyed a superb final season in 1970, winning at Kyalami and being unfortunate not to win at Monaco and Brands Hatch on his way to sixth in the standings.

3. Jackie Stewart

Having burst on to the F1 scene midway through the decade, Stewart took his first title in 1969

Photo by: Rainer W. Schlegelmilch / Motorsport Images

Decade wins: 11
Decade poles: 2
Decade titles: 1 (1969)

Stewart burst onto the F1 season in 1965 as the reigning British F3 champion, winning the Italian GP and finishing third in the points, beaten only by dominant Lotus ace Clark and BRM team-mate Hill. His was one of the great rookie F1 campaigns.

The Scot won the Monaco GP at the start of 1966 with the two-litre version of the P261 but BRM’s full three-litre P83 was a disaster. The following season wasn’t much better, though Stewart did score a fine second place in the difficult H16-powered car at Spa.

Courted by Ferrari, Stewart elected to join Ken Tyrrell’s ‘Matra International’ operation for 1968. Despite missing two races thanks to an injury from an F2 accident, Stewart fought Lotus’s Hill for the title after Clark’s death in April. Stewart scored three wins, including wet-weather masterclasses at Zandvoort and the Nurburgring, but fuel-feed trouble struck in the Mexico City showdown and he missed out by 12 points.

There was no stopping Stewart and Matra in 1969, JYS taking six wins from 11 races and scoring as many points as closest challengers Ickx and Bruce McLaren combined.

Stewart ended the decade having established himself as the pre-eminent driver of the post-Clark era, a status he would retain until his retirement at the end of 1973.

2. Graham Hill

Hill on the podium after winning the 1965 Monaco GP - one of his greatest drives

Photo by: Sutton Images

Decade wins: 14
Decade poles: 13
Decade titles: 2 (1962, 1968)

Hill was a near-constant throughout the decade, taking his first world championship GP victory at the 1962 Dutch GP and his 14th and final success at Monaco in 1969. Known as a grafter, which sometimes means his abilities are underestimated, Hill also helped pick up the Lotus team after his rival and team-mate Clark was killed in 1968.

Having suffered reliability frustrations with Lotus in 1958-59, Hill joined BRM for 1960. It took some time before he made his breakthrough, though he did star in an ultimately fruitless comeback charge in the 1960 British GP.

Hill and the P57 battled Clark and the Lotus 25 throughout 1962, during which Hill scored a brilliant victory on the fearsome Nurburgring in a rain-hit German GP. When Clark’s Lotus failed while leading the South African finale, Hill swept by to take his fourth victory of the championship and the drivers’ title.

Clark and Lotus were almost unbeatable in 1963, but Hill and BRM remained the closest challengers. Two wins, including the first of five Monaco GP successes, meant he was second in the championship. It was a position Hill repeated in 1964 and 1965.

Hill came close to winning the 1964 championship in a battle with Clark and Surtees. But a controversial clash with Surtees’s Ferrari team-mate Lorenzo Bandini in the Mexican decider meant Hill missed the title by one point on dropped scores.

Stewart proved a tough team-mate across 1965-66, even though Hill finished ahead in both seasons and scored perhaps his greatest victory at the 1965 Monaco GP, and Graham took the opportunity to join Clark at Lotus in 1967. Clark proved to have the edge, but Hill still took three poles and only appalling reliability kept him off the top step of the podium.

After finishing second to Clark in the 1968 opener at Kyalami, Hill stepped forward following the Scot’s death. He won the next two races – Spain and Monaco – and managed to hold off the increasingly strong challenge from Stewart’s Matra to take his second title.

Hill’s 1969 started well enough, with second in South Africa and his record-setting fifth win in Monaco. But thereafter points became harder to come by and Hill was overshadowed by team-mate Rindt.

A horrible accident at Watkins Glen broke both Hill’s legs and meant he missed the final GP of the decade. He made a heroic return in 1970 and would go on to win Le Mans, but there would be no more F1 world championship race victories.

1. Jim Clark

Clark's status as one of the greatest ever F1 drivers meant he was always going to top the 1960s list

Photo by: Autocar / LAT Images via Getty Images

Decade wins: 25
Decade poles: 33
Decade titles: 2 (1963, 1965)

Motorsport was denied two great battles in the 1960s, that between Moss and Clark thanks to the former’s Goodwood crash, and the one between friends Clark and Stewart due to the events of 7 April 1968. But there can be little doubt that Clark was regarded as the best driver in the world between 1962 and his death at Hockenheim in 1968.

All of Clark’s F1 career – 72 starts, 25 wins, 33 poles and two world titles – took place in the 1960s (and with Lotus). That record and his status as one of the all-time greats mean he was always going to top this list.

His first podium came as early as his fifth start, at the 1960 Portuguese GP, but Clark really broke through with the Lotus 25. Following Moss’s Goodwood crash, there was a vacuum at the top of the sport and Clark battled Hill to fill it.

The 1962 championship could have gone either way, but BRM reliability told and Clark had to settle for second after suffering an oil leak while leading the South African finale. With the monocoque 25 perfected in 1963, Clark made amends, taking seven wins and two other podiums across the 10 races to easily become champion.

Unreliability again denied Clark in 1964, limiting him to third despite three victories. But his status was underlined by a brilliant 1965 season that featured six wins from his nine starts; he missed the Monaco GP to win the Indianapolis 500!

Clark usually had the best kit, though his incredible smoothness and feel often helped fragile machinery to the finish line, but he had to fight against the odds in 1966. Lotus had either the underpowered two-litre version of the type 33 or the unreliable BRM H16-engined type 43 and neither was good enough, though Clark did score a lucky win in the latter at Watkins Glen.

The Cosworth DFV-engined Lotus 49 changed the game in 1967. Clark generally had the edge over (and better reliability than) team-mate Hill, but four wins were not enough to overcome all the non-finishes and Clark finished behind two-time victors Hulme and Brabham.

Clark dominated the South African GP that opened the 1968 season. Another title beckoned, but it would be his final GP.

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Photo by: Motorsport Images