Allison, the runner-up finisher, will forever be in awe of what he witnessed from Donohue, with whom hed eventually work while driving for Penske. As ADAM COOPER recalls, though, it ended in tragedy. Together, they took on Trans-Am, then turned their attention to the Indianapolis 500. Donahue qualified fourth and passed Bobby Allison for the lead on Lap 10. He died in 1975 a day after a crash during practice for the Austrian Grand Prix. He will be ranked with A. J. Foyt, Dan Gurney and Andretti in the leading group of American drivers. He never regained consciousness. In lieu of flowers, the family has requested that all memorial donations be sent to the Auto Racing Fraternity Foundation, 13539 Northern Boulevard, Flushing, Queens. As an American driver, he had done it all. In 1970 new Javelin team owner Roger Penske and driver Mark Donohue would breathe new life into the AMC team. David followed his father into sports car racing for Porsche. Ford had developed a new GT, the Mark IV. In 1969, Penske and Donohue raced in their first Indianapolis 500,[14] with Donohue finishing seventh, winning the rookie of the year award. [2] Donohue announced that he would retire from racing after the 1973 Can-Am season. Mark returned [a year later] because he realized he wasnt good at anything else. Even with only three caution flags, the race lasted 12 minutes shy of five hours, a brutal exercise for the majority of the right-turn-averse stock car regulars, but nothing a veteran of the 24 Hours of Daytona and 12 Hours of Sebring hadnt already experienced. He answered, "It will never have enough power until I can spin the wheels at the end of the straightaway in high gear.". Instead, the Racemark GT had Bedard, also a racer, showering praise. Mark Donohue was 38 and a sports car champion and 1972 Indianapolis 500 winner. But he always had good equipment, too. Donohue's racing tradition is carried on by his son, David Donohue, a successful road racer in his own right. He was hit on the side of his helmet with debris as his car, which had suffered a punctured tire, went out of control in prerace practice and crashed through four rows of wire catchfences and some billboards along the Oesterreichring race course. He tinkered his way all through Pingry School, Brown University and a job as a mechanical engineer with the Pulverizing Machinery Corporation in Summit. For Donohue, there was little time to grieve, as his own Le Mans debut was looming. DON HUNTER, BILL OURSLER, THE MANUFACTURERS, Elana Scherr: On the Count of Three (Wheels), Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads. I get all of these tiny little stories from everybody where my dad grabbed this guy as a kid and sat him in the car -- and that motivated him enough to go to engineering school. He died from severe head injuries sustained August 16 in practice for the Austrian Grand Prix at Graz, Austria. Late in 1973, when Penske decided to build a Formula One car for the 1975 season, Donohue knew what would happen. ), entered April 29, 2014 in Albany County, which granted a motion by defendants James Finck and Tougher Industries Enterprises, LLC for summary judgment dismissing the complaint against them. I did everything I could to keep up. Donohue held the record for 11 years, until it was broken by Rick Mears at Michigan International Speedway . Mark Donohue races to the win at the the 1972 Indy 500. That got everybodys attention -- the polished wheels, the way our guys looked, the way the cars were prepared and obviously, the performance was good. His 59 wins remain the most of any driver for Team Penske. He knew, maybe all along, that he would come back. Please try again. The 917-30 is referred to as the "Can-Am killer" [18] as it dominated the competition, winning all but two races of the 1973 Can-Am championship (which is an untrue statement, because OPEC killed the Can-Am series in 19751976). He flew under the radar a lot, but he was always there. He was a winner at the 24 Hours of Daytona and in stock cars. He could drive a car in the 24-hour race at Daytona, a Trans-Am Car, an Indy car and a NASCAR car. In the four-race series, Donohue won the first and third of three races at Riverside and the final race of the year at Daytona. The four-race schedule consisted of three races at Riverside and a finale on Daytonas road course. In auto racing, though, even thinking man's drivers can get killed by punctured tires. I used to hate riding with him to the airport, said Don Cox, a former chief engineer at Penske Racing when Donohue was with the team. At the Austrian Grand Prix, Donohue's career, along with Roger Penske's Formula One aspirations, took a tragic turn. [5][19] Donohue is buried at St. Teresa Cemetery in Summit, New Jersey. How famous was Mark . Police have not yet released his identity. Occasionally the digitization process introduces transcription errors or other problems; we are continuing to work to improve these archived versions. Instructions on how to reset your password have been sent to your email. David Donohue drives his dad's 1972 Indy 500-winning car at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 2016. Donohue did not start the first race of the year at Circuit Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City due to problems getting the engine to start. During their enormous success in Trans-Am, Penske and Donohue would begin to experiment with their Camaros. He became a great friend of mine, Penske said in an IMS tribute to Donohue. Mark told me, Sometimes you just have to get it done., That was my take, too, says Michael Argetsinger, who has just written a riveting biography called Mark Donohue: Technical Excellence at Speed (David Bull Publishing, $39.95). Losing a driver is something you cant replace. Seeing it in real life when you come into the museum here, I know one thing -- I fit in it really well. Mark Donohue (1937-1975), pictured here with wife Eden and nicknamed "Captain Nice", was an American race driver who is probably best known as the driver of the 1500+ bhp Can-Am Penske Porsche 917-30 and as the 1972 Indianapolis 500 winner in a Team Penske-entered McLaren.Sadly, he perished in an accident during practice for the 1975 Austrian Formula One Grand Prix. But he kept complaining of headaches and Mario Andretti, who also has an obsession with grand prix racing, said Donohue was lapsing in and out of consciousness, Donohue was rushed to a hospital at Graz where grays revealed blood clot on the brain. That day at Indy, Bobby Unsers Eagle dominated the contest before Unser dropped out. He had been a national amateur champion and the Sports Car Club of America driver of the year in 1965. GRAZ, Austria, Aug. 19 (AP)Mark Donohue, who ended an eightmonth retirement as an auto driver last year because he couldn't keep away from racing, died tonight of injuries suffered Sunday at the Austrian Grand Prix. They discovered that using a drag racing trick of dipping a car in an acid bath would eat away small amounts of metal, which in turn made the car incrementally lighter, and allowed it to be driven faster. He did it at Talladega, Ala., in the turbocharged Porsche he drove to the 1973 CanAm title. Today, he works for Porsche Cars North America as client relationship manager. 1968 would be a banner year for Donohue in the Trans-Am series, as he successfully defended his 12 Hours of Sebring victory by partnering with Craig Fisher and driving his Penske Chevrolet Camaro to victory. Today, he works. Three years later, Mark was gone, dead from a cerebral hemorrhage suffered in a crash during practice for the Formula 1 Austrian Grand Prix at sterreichring. I always said driving wasn't really a dangerous situation. He went on to assist TVR's David Hives in designing the Series 400 Griffith and then working on the ill-fated Bob Cumberford-designed, Intermeccanica-(Torino, Italy) produced Series 600 Griffith. Email or password is incorrect. Its been 43 years since Donohues death, but he remains Penske Racings cornerstone. The Griffith company closed its doors in November, 1966. His instant F1 success led to no further involvement in the category, Mark instead concentrating on his blossoming Indy career, winning the big one in 1972. . He died on August 19, 1975 in Graz, Styria, Austria. [2], Donohue was hired on March 29, 1964, by Jack Griffith [Griffith Motors, Syosset, N.Y./Plainview, N.Y.] as design engineer for the Griffith, formerly TVR Grantura Mk III, powered by a Ford 289 cid (4.7l) V8 engine. He was so gentlemanly, he was boring. And Mark Donohue couldn't live with retirement. He was helped by Emerson Fittipaldi, Bob Evans and Hans-Joachim Stuck, who arrived to the scene of the accident and parked their cars. In 1971, of the ten races that the Over 2.5L Class cars participated in, Donohue won seven of them, including the final six races in a row, with AMC winning the Manufacturers' championship for the first time ever. "Donohue is no angel out there on the track Parnelli Jones", "Donohue, on the Way Out, Views Things From Top; Calendar of Motor Sports", "1965 Sebring 12-Hour Grand Prix of Endurance Race Profile", "1966 24 Hours of Le Mans Results and Competitors", "1967 24 Hours of Le Mans Results and Competitors", "Mark Donohue Named '500' Rookie of Year", "Mark Donohue set Indy speed record in 1972", "1973 Winston Western 500: Donohue Dominates", "Hall of Fame Members (Mark Donohue Jr.)", "Mark Donohue, Sports Cars, Class of 1990", Mark Donohue's IROC and NASCAR stats at racing-reference.info, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mark_Donohue&oldid=1136103335, Brown University School of Engineering alumni, International Motorsports Hall of Fame inductees, SCCA National Championship Runoffs winners, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from September 2012, Articles with unsourced statements from April 2010, Articles with unsourced statements from June 2014, Pages using small with an empty input parameter, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, run as the Daytona 3 Hour Continental (196263), 24 Hours of Daytona (196671/ 1973/ 1975present), This page was last edited on 28 January 2023, at 19:22. Walt Czarnecki, Team Penske vice chairman and among the operations early members, has a deep admiration and respect for what Donohue meant to the Penske organization. You can go away and the void that you leave gets filled quickly, but when you come back, you are greeted with open arms. Mark Donohue is killed during a practice session for the 1975 Austrian Grand Prix. The bungalow is where team manager Chuck Cantwell and the teams public relations director Dan Luginbuhl worked along with secretary Maryann ODonnell. The two drivers disagreed on many aspects of racing and car setup, but as a team were able to muster a fourth-place finish in the endurance classic.[13]. He was good in Trans-Am, Indy cars, Can-Am and Formula One. He was passionate about racing. It was, as they say in racing, a freak accident. J. Funk and J. L. He is buried in Saint Teresa Cemetery in Summit, Union County, New Jersey.R.I.P Mark Donohue \u0026 Manfred Schaller. Oops! Between 1971 and 1972, Penske Racing (along with Donohue as the primary test and development driver) was commissioned by Porsche to help develop the 917-10 to compete in the Can-Am series. [2], At Hansgen's funeral, Roger Penske spoke to Donohue about driving for him. Then, in March, 1974, Peter Revson, Penske's first choice as driver for the Formula One car that was to make its debut later in the season, was killed in an accident practicing for the South African Grand Prix. Mark Neary Donohue, Jr. (born March 18 1937 in Haddon Township, New Jersey, United States - died August 19 1975 in Graz, Austria) was an American racing driver who most notably drove in Formula One and sports cars. Mark Donohue began racing at the age of 22 in a 1957 Chevrolet Corvette . Seeing another man driving your car, a car you know so well. It would have been really fun to watch the two of them because they are so much alike. It was always on to the next project.. Every time David Donohue sees that car, he sees his father. A visit to the gravesite on a gray, cold, foggy March day revelaved little toy race cars on the gravestone, along with a plastic checkered flag -- a testament the life of Mark Donohue. Thank you. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. He was a partner, he was a friend and a critical piece of the foundation of our race team.. No one piece tells you what the puzzle is. A bad week or the dark horse from F1 testing? 1975, resulting from an accident two days earlier during practice for the Austrian Grand Prix. He did the job for Roger, no question. Since his remarriage eight months ago, those same friends found Donohue relaxed and cheerful, something he had not been while retired. Donohue began working with cars while growing up in the nineteenfifties in a comfortable neighborhood in Summit, N. J. Both Donohue and Penske changed teams to American Motors Corporation in 1970 and won their third championship in 1971. He finds the same things funny. Penske's new Penske Racing complex in Mooresville, North Carolina is decorated with various murals of Donohue and his racing cars, most notably the AMC stock car and the various Porsche prototypes that Donohue drove through his career. Once, in 1971, he and Penske showed up at the Canadian Grand Prix and Jackie Stewart, the former world champion, kidded them: Welcome to the major leagues.. However, like most race drivers in the various top racing series around the world, he had lived an outright lot of life. I was at Lime Rock, Connecticut, Donohue said. And when he thought he had done enough, he quit. Nine weeks before the Le Mans race, while testing a GT40 Mk II in the rain, Donohue's friend and former teammate Walt Hansgen lost control and crashed his car into an escape road barrier, suffering fatal injuries. Mark Donohue drove the Porsche 917-30 Can-Am after making various aerodynamic and suspension modifications. Mark Donohue. Through racing and after more than four decades after the tragic death of his father, David Donohue believes he has found Mark Donohue. I think I was the first guy to assert that Mark was a better driver than an engineer, says Bedard. But his thinking man's approach to racing, while successful on the track, was difficult off. I'd always thought that I'm not as good a driver as I am capable of figuring out how to make the car the quickest, he once said. He turned out to be a real partner of mine. It served as the first NASCAR victory for aspiring team owner Roger Penske, a proverbial snowball sent rolling down a path thatd alter the entire American auto racing landscape. The search for Mark Donohue concludes in the upscale community of Summit, New Jersey just outside of New York City. Donohue qualified his Penske midway the grid, and took it to the morning warm-up session before the start of the race. What can be better in life, a better ideal?, In 1966, Penske told him: Try it for a year, you're still a young man, and if it doesn't work out you can always go back to engineering.. It would have really been great watching those two together in the later years if it had gotten that far. Mark Donohue died last night. But where other youngsters were souping up cars to impress girls, I was only interested in the mechanics, Donohue said. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. He is known for Formula 1 (1950) and The Trans-Am Challenge (1972). In 69 Mark repeated his Trans-Am championship, winning six of 12. Donohue recently had arrived in Austria for the Austrian Grand Prix at the sterreichring race track following the successful closed-course speed record attempt at Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama just a few days earlier. During his stay at Griffith Mark drove the Griffith-owned Shelby 289 Cobra making his mark on the SCCA circuit. Donohue drove the Javelin to three victories, with AMC finishing second overall in the Manufacturers' Championship. Browse 481 mark donohue stock photos and images available, or start a new search to explore more stock photos and images. We started with a Lola 4-wheel drive, and in 1971 we got a McLaren. With Roger Penske, you are always going to have good equipment. A track marshal was killed by debris from the accident, but Donohue did not appear to be injured significantly. For him, it was a check in the box, Penske recalled. Prior to a race, he would sit in the back of the transporter by himself in the dark and think about the race, Czarnecki said. Back then it was tape-delayed, and she was watching the race on TV. A bad week or the dark horse from F1 testing? Michael is another guy but there is this thing between Mark and David, even in terms of their life experiences. The book was published shortly before Donohue's death. https://www.nytimes.com/1975/08/20/archives/donohue-38-dead-of-racing-injuries-mark-donohue-is-dead-of-racing.html. He won the Can Am championship in 197, the TransAm title in 1968, 1969 and 1971. His fathers absence from the family took its toll, and eventually the marriage dissolved into divorce. On the phone, the editor said, You gotta come back in. Donohue (along with Penske) were pioneers in many rights, some as notable as the use of a skidpad as a tool for developing and perfecting race car suspension designs and setups. 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Mark Donohue & Manfred Schaller's Fatal Crash @ sterreichring 1975 (Aftermath) FatalMotorsportChannel 26.2K subscribers Subscribe 24K views 4 months ago Mark Donohue and Roger Penske had. They also acid-dipped the body on the Camaro and had to caution people not to lean against it, for fear it would dent. When Penske decided late to enter Formula One full time, Donohue had a difficult decision to make. . There was no real color out of it. We need an obit." Warming up for the Austrian Grand Prix, my hero, Donohue, 38, had spun his March at 150 mph and struck his head on a metal bar supporting a sign. August 19, 1975 in Graz, Styria, Austria (car accident) Birth Name: Mark Neary Donohue Jr. Mini Bio (1) Mark Donohue was born on March 18, 1937 in Haddon Township, New Jersey, USA. Donohue had stepped out of driving retirement . Donohues father was a patent attorney. We werent out there to have fun. The email you entered is not registered with us. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. He wanted to show he could do it all again. Please try again. Donohue. Donohue paced himself that day and took the lead for the first time with 12 laps to go. Password Despite this, Donohue still dominated the series, even though he suffered three DNFs during the season due to mechanical problems with the M6A. 500-mile (800km) SCCA endurance event, which he won. I got to know Mark and hired him to run our Can-Am car. In 1967 he became the USRRC champion, winning six out of eight races. Twice before he had had serious accidents and he walked like a man who had had his knees shattered and put back together again. Had there been a Drivers' Championship in place at the time, he would have won three of them (his last in 1971) while driving Camaros in 1968 and 1969, and an AMC Javelin in 1971, all for Roger Penske Racing. He tried to get a car dealership; that didnt work. If we're right, by next season we could be the dominant team in Formula One.. The lightweight car was featured on an episode of Dream Car Garage on Speed TV in 2005. That was the most striking thing I ever saw him do. Mark Donohue SCCA national champion early in a career Donohue was born in New Jersey on March 18, 1937, and became involved in racing as a senior at college. I could see myself helping to develop the Formula One car, setting it up and then having some younger hotshot driver take over. 1975 Camaro Racemark GT Bob Bailey. Or, signing some autographs. Warming up for the Austrian Grand Prix, my hero, Donohue, 38, had spun his March at 150 mph and struck his head on a metal bar supporting a sign. I always said driving wasn't really a dangerous situation. My friends began warning me., Racing was becoming an obsession, but in 1965, he realized: Maybe I can make a living out of something like to do. Make sure you track out all the way for Turn 7. Donohue was the driver of Penskes first Brickyard effort in 1969. With Donohues methodical approach and his commitment to work for Penske fulltime that counted for a lot Penske said. (He was operated on at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta by Drs. He is really, really like Mark for good or ill. Ive worked with David for a little bit.