So that's a fact that Pedro Rodriguez and Jo Siffert were fierce rivals and arguably one of the bravest drivers in the history of motorsport but their careers have several similarities. First of all they were teammates in both Formula 1 and the World Sportscar Championship. They raced together in F1 for BRM in 1971 and for the John Wyer Porsche team with the 917K cars in WSC in 1970 and in 1971. They have the same amount of world championship victories in both F1 and WSC with 2 and 14 respectively. They both died in a racing accident in 1971. They both died at a non-championsip event (Rodriguez at the Nurnberg 200km race at Norisring which was an Interserie sportscar race and Siffert at the World Championship Victory Race at Brands Hatch which was a non-championsip F1 event). And their accident was similar due to both cars caught fire. They both finished on the podium on the last race they finished in both F1 and WSC (Rodriguez finished second and the 1971 Dutch GP in his penultimate race but it was the last one he finished and he won the last sportscar race he entered the Zeltweg 1000km in 1971; Siffert finished second in both his last entries at the 1971 US GP and at the 1971 Watkins Glen 6 hour race). And finally they both scored their last world championship win with BRM in F1 and with Porsche in WSC.
Great video. Unfortunately no pictures of other sections of this old monster course of Spa back then. I was on the grandstand at Au Rouge. It was breathtaking those cars passing by that fast so close. and the sounds of the 917 and the Ferarri 512 S. Pure racing more than 50 years ago. Unfortunately there is not even one video from the even faster 1000km race 1971 (4:09:48 h versus 4:01:09 h means average of 249,1km/h.
this is how to race properly - never giving a shit in the first turn on the first lap of a 24 houres race. todays formula 1 sissys would have shit their fireproof pants
