Mexican GP 1966

Mexican GP, 1966

Ferrari did not bother to send a team to the Mexican GP but all the other regulars were in action with Lotus running a third car for Pedro Rodriguez (an old Climax engined 33) and Cooper running a third chassis for Moises Solana. Dan Gurney had a pair of Eagles, but decided to drive the Climax-engined car leaving the Weslake V12 car for Bob Bondurant.

In qualifying John Surtees put his Cooper-Maserati on pole position with Jim Clark's Lotus-BRM (which had won the US Grand Prix three weeks earlier) sharing the front row. Then came Ritchie Ginther's Honda and World Champion Jack Brabham in his Brabham-Repco. Jochen Rindt (Cooper-Maserati) shared the third row with the second Brabham of Denny Hulme while Graham Hill and Rodriguez lined up on the fourth row.

In the race Ginther went into the lead as he had done 12 months earlier and he was chased by Rindt, Brabham, Hulme, Surtees and Clark. During the second lap, however, Brabham got into the lead and Ginther then dropped behind Rindt, Surtees and Hulme. Surtees then overtook Rindt and began to chase after Brabham. A lap later he was in the lead and he stayed there for the rest of the afternoon being shadowed all the way by Brabham. Rindt ran third until he retired on lap 32 with a suspension failure. This left Rodriguez in third place to the delight of the locals but on lap 49 he went out with a transmission failure and so Ginther moved to third. On the penultimate lap Hulme overtook him to jump up to fourth in the Drivers' World Championship behind Brabham, Surtees and Rindt but ahead of Hill, Clark and Stewart.

POSNODRIVERENTRANTLAPSTIME/RETIREMENTQUAL POS
John Surtees Cooper-Maserati T81 65 2h06m35.340s  
Jack Brabham Brabham-Repco BT20 65 2h06m43.220s  
Denny Hulme Brabham-Repco BT20 64  
12 Richie Ginther Honda RA273 64  
15 Dan Gurney Eagle-Climax T1G 64  
22 Jo Bonnier Cooper-Maserati T81 63  12 
Peter Arundell Lotus-BRM 33 61  17 
14 Ronnie Bucknum Honda RA273 60  13 
11 Pedro Rodriguez Lotus-Climax 33 49 Transmission 
17 Bruce McLaren McLaren-Ford M2B 40 Engine 14 
19 Jo Siffert Cooper-Maserati T81 33 Suspension 11 
Jochen Rindt Cooper-Maserati T81 32 Suspension 
10 Innes Ireland BRM P261 28 Transmission 16 
Jackie Stewart BRM P83 26 Mechanical 10 
16 Bob Bondurant Eagle-Weslake T1G 24 Fuel Injection 18 
Graham Hill BRM P83 18 Engine 
Moises Solana Cooper-Maserati T81 Overheating 15 
Jim Clark Lotus-BRM 43 Gearbox 
ns 18 Mike Spence Lotus-BRM 25  Accident 19