He is the F1 champion who started racing barefoot and was McLaren’s first back-to-back Grand Prix winner

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In the 75 years of Formula 1, each of the 34 drivers who have gone on to become world champions has reached the pinnacle of the sport in very different ways.

Ferrari, McLaren, Mercedes and Red Bull have seen more drivers’ championships won in their cars than any other teams.

Williams, Lotus and Brabham are the only other manufacturers to have witnessed more than two titles earned in their machines, with a variety of teams no longer on the grid interspersed throughout Formula 1’s history.

McLaren have had a fascinating history in Formula 1, even since founder Bruce McLaren entered a Ford-powered car into the 1966 Monaco Grand Prix.

He scored three points that season before recruiting his first driver in 1968, Denny Hulme.

That season, McLaren won the team’s first Formula 1 race at Spa, before Hulme won back-to-back races at the Italian and Canadian Grand Prix a year after becoming F1 champion.

The quiet New Zealander had a fascinating racing career that included confusing his rivals by driving barefoot and earning the nickname ‘The Bear’.

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Denny Hulme’s racing career from racing barefoot to becoming a Formula 1 world champion

Hulme was born 18 June 1936 in Motueka, New Zealand, and had some success racing in Europe at a young age, including in the Campionato Italiano in 1960.

He won the New Zealand Gold Star Championship the following year, before starting his Formula 1 career with Brabham in 1965.

According to the Formula 1 official website, Hulme quickly developed his nickname, ‘The Bear’, for ‘both his rugged features and a gruff nature,’ and it didn’t take him long to put his stamp on the sport.

After four podium finishes in his second season, Hulme defeated Jack Brabham and Ayrton Senna’s hero Jim Clark to win the drivers’ championship in 1967.

Hulme joined fellow New Zealander McLaren’s team the following year, where he recorded the team’s first back-to-back victories, but only finished third in the standings.

He finished his F1 career with the team in 1974, finishing with a record of eight victories, 33 podiums and a single pole position at the 1973 South African Grand Prix.

Hulme died aged 56 in 1992 at the Bathurst 1000, suffering a heart attack while driving a BMW M3, but left a racing legacy that still exists today, with Liam Lawson the latest driver from New Zealand to reach Formula 1.

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Bruce McLaren paid tribute to Denny Hulme after winning the Formula 1 world championship

Bruce McLaren, in Motor magazine’s November 25, 1967 edition, via McLaren’s official website, said of Hulme: “You would have to call Denny a relaxed sort of bloke.

“Big and strong, yes, but gentle and shy with it, and just a little suspicious of people. He likes getting the job done, whether putting a car together, making the fastest practice lap, or getting an interview over with.

“A clue that gives an insight into the Denny that doesn’t show is that he hates to waste a day; unless he accomplishes something, he’s not happy.

“It’s a part of the drive that made him World Champion.”

Why Denny Hulme started his racing career driving barefoot

Historian Michael Clark, speaking about the New Zealander on RNZ, said about Hulme’s upbringing: “Growing into his mid-teens, he’d just pick things up, and some people can do it, and he was one of those people who could do it.

“That served him very well when he got to Europe because he was not only the driver of the car, he was the tow car driver, he was the mechanic, he was the manager, he had to organise his entry fees … you had to do the whole thing.

“He had a love of driving and racing barefoot, and he took the view that he could feel the pedal so much better if he was barefoot. Well, Denny and his bare feet have become the stuff of legend.

“The Brits couldn’t believe this … you always knew where Denny had gone because there would be these big greasy footprints right through the showroom, and they got to the stage where they said ‘look, Denny, this has got to stop’.”

Hulme may not have won a championship with McLaren, as his teammate Emerson Fittipaldi became their first champion during his final season on the grid.

However, he helped pave the way for McLaren to become one of the most famous and dominant forces in Formula 1 history.