F1 Legends: Emerson Fittipaldi

Emerson Fittipaldi in Sweden, 1973, thanks to the Cahier Archive

Sit down with Emerson Fittipaldi to chat about playing football with Pelé, taking his first win at Watkins Glen and helping to secure Jochen Rindt’s posthumous title, fine-tuning race cars with Colin Chapman and much more.

Making his Formula 1 debut for Team Lotus and taking his first win in just his fourth race, Emerson Fittipaldi built an astonishingly successful and long lasting career in motorsport.

He won his first Formula 1 World Drivers’ Championship at just 25 years old, at the time the youngest in the sport’s history, and would win two Formula 1 drivers’ titles in his career. He would spend the entirety of the ’70s racing in Formula 1, leaving the sport at the end of the 1980 season and moving to CART.

When he got there, he won the 1989 CART PPG Indy Car World Series and would come close to following up in both ’93 and ’94 with second place finishes. The Indy 500 title would be his twice, in ’89 and ’93, and he made some magnificent history there – in particular putting on a spectacular battle with Al Unser Jr. in the ’89 race and another in the ’93 race with Nigel Mansell.

This F1 Legends interview with presenter Steve Rider is relaxed, entertaining and fascinating. Fittipaldi is humble and interesting, and makes this well worth a watch. Hit play!