Autosport Awards
AUTOSPORT Awards 2013: Niki Lauda gets Gregor Grant Award
Niki Lauda has been presented with a Gregor Grant Award at the 2013 AUTOSPORT Awards
The Formula 1 legend was back in the headlines this season as he took on a managerial role with the Mercedes grand prix team and his epic 1976 title battle with James Hunt found a new audience thanks to the hit movie Rush.
Lauda collected the award from his former F1 team-mate John Watson.
"I had a lot of fun, I have to say," Lauda said. "People ask me if I was always that mad and I say 'in the old days, yes.'
"I would say my toughest year was my final season with McLaren, fighting over every point with Alain Prost. There were races you didn't win but you knew you had done a good job.
"My first championship with Ferrari was comparatively easy because the car was the best. But that McLaren year was really hard.
"I also want to take this opportunity to really thank Ross Brawn for what he did for Mercedes in the past and especially this year.
"He helped bring Lewis Hamilton to the team, which was the bit of magic we needed to get things going, and he also helped the team to finish second to Red Bull, which was a big achievement because we needed to do two steps.
"So congratulations to Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull: I really have to say [what they did] was unbelievable.
"I don't know what I have to do to beat [them], but I will try."
Little was expected when Lauda made his F1 debut in 1971 after a patchy junior career.
But he showed enough potential with March and BRM to earn a surprise Ferrari seat for 1974.
The partnership he formed with designer Mauro Foghieri and team manager Luca di Montezemolo transformed the struggling Scuderia's fortunes.
Lauda delivered the 1975 F1 title and was on the way to a repeat in '76 before the fiery Nurburgring accident that almost killed him.
He made an extraordinary recovery and missed just two races, then came within a point of the world championship in the famous Fuji finale.
Lauda won the crown again in 1977 before leaving for Brabham and then walking away from F1 completely in mid-79.
Following three years focusing on his airline business, Lauda was enticed back to F1 by McLaren, beating Alain Prost to the 1984 title by just half a point before retiring for good at the end of '85.
AUTOSPORT Awards 2013: Andrew Jordan wins National Driver Award
AUTOSPORT Awards 2013: John Surtees receives Gregor Grant Award
Rating the best drivers of the century so far
Autosport's Top 50 feature has been a staple of the magazine for the past two decades since its first appearance in 2002. Here are the drivers that have featured most prevalently during that time
The best motorsport moments of 2021
Motorsport produced one of its greatest years of all-time in 2021 despite a backdrop of ongoing COVID-19 challenges and an ever-changing racing landscape. Through the non-stop action Autosport has collected the finest moments from the past 12 months to highlight the incredible drama and joy motorsport generates
The racing comeback artists who resurrected long-dormant careers
Making it in motorsport can be tough, and sometimes drivers move elsewhere before their best chance arrives. Here are some of those who made it back
The hidden racing gem attracting ex-F1 heroes
It’s rarely mentioned when it comes to assessing the best national contests, but the Brazilian Stock Car series that reaches its climax this weekend has an ever-growing appeal. Its expanding roster of ex-Formula 1 names has helped to draw in new fans, but it's the closeness of competition that keeps them watching
The one-time Schumacher rival rebooting his career Down Under
Joey Mawson made waves in the middle of the last decade, beating future Haas Formula 1 driver Mick Schumacher - among other highly-rated talents - to the 2016 German F4 title. A run in F1's feeder GP3 category only caused his career to stall, but now back in Australia Mawson's S5000 title success has set that to rights
The lesson football’s would-be wreckers could learn from racing
OPINION: The greed-driven push for a European Super League that threatened to tear football apart is collapsing at the seams. Motor racing's equivalent, the football-themed Superleague Formula series of 2008-11, was everything that the proposed ESL never could be
The F1 and Indy 'nearly man' that found contentment in Japan
Having had the door to F1 slammed in his face and come within three laps of winning the Indianapolis 500, the collapse of a Peugeot LMP1 shot meant Japan was Bertrand Baguette's last chance of a career. But it's one which he has grasped with both hands
The female all-rounder who arrived "too early"
From Formula 3 to truck racing, Dakar and EuroNASCAR via a winning stint in the DTM, there's not much Ellen Lohr hasn't seen in a stellar racing career that highlights the merit in being a generalist. But she believes her career came too early...