Ranked! Jim Clark’s top 10 performances in F1, Indy and more

The quiet Scot nevertheless left a lasting legacy, his 25 world championship victories from 72 starts is still enough for 10th on the all-time F1 wins list.

Clark was also successful in Indycar racing, sportscars and touring cars, so selecting his greatest races was always going to be tough, but here they are in reverse order…

10: 1961 South African GP, East London

Lotus 21 
Started: 1st 
Result: 1st

Stirling Moss was the undisputed world’s best in 1961, pulling off some famous victories in inferior equipment, but Clark’s performances at the end of the season showed that things were changing. Clark’s Lotus 21 had beaten the older 18/21 model of Moss in the Natal Grand Prix earlier in the month, but the East London race stepped things up a notch.

Poleman Clark and team-mate Trevor Taylor led away, but Moss was soon into second and took the lead when Clark spun avoiding another car. Now Clark charged, despite sustaining gearbox damage, lapping faster than his pole time, and Moss was powerless to stop him coming through to win.

“Moss pulled in behind Clark and tried to stay in his slipstream but could not keep up with Clark’s fast and furious driving and fell slowly, but surely, behind,” read Autosport’s report. “Clark demonstrated that the world championship is no pipe-dream for him.”

Clark was a little more circumspect, though beating Moss was clearly a watershed: “I had the satisfaction of beating Stirling twice in two weeks, although, in all fairness, my car was newer than his,” he wrote in his 1964 book, Jim Clark – At the wheel.

9. 1968 Australian GP, Sandown Park

Jim Clark, Lotus 49 Cosworth, Gold Leaf livery

Photo by: Motorsport Images

Lotus 49T 
Started: 3rd 
Result: 1st

Clark demonstrated an ability to withstand intense pressure from a potentially faster car in the hard-fought 1968 Australian GP.

It was a round of the Tasman Series, essentially a winter world championship in Australia and New Zealand. Clark had given the newly branded Gold Leaf Team Lotus (his Lotus 49T sporting the red, gold and white livery later seen in F1) a victory on its debut at the Lady Wigram Trophy the month before, but arrived leading Ferrari’s Chris Amon by just three points in the standings.

Running the same DFW engine (the 2.5-litre version of the Cosworth DFV) he had already used in five Tasman races, Clark qualified third, behind Jack Brabham and Amon. It was a…