Jim Rathmann
Richard "Jim" Rathmann (* July 16, 1928 in Valparaiso, Indiana, † November 23, 2011 in Melbourne, Florida) was an American race car driver.
Life
To be able to contest car race before his 21st birthday, which was then banned, Richard Rathmann presented the birth certificate of his older brother James Rathmann. When his brother was also a racing driver later, this appeared under the name "Dick Rathmann ." Among them - the actual reversed - Name the brothers to this day are known.
Jim, the more successful of the two, began his career with touring car race before he first time in 1949 at the Indianapolis 500 and launched one of the most successful Champ Car driver was in the 1950s. 14 times he competed in Indianapolis and played numerous other races in the Champ Car series. Three times he finished the 500 miles of Indianapolis as a Second (1952, 1957 and 1959 ) and is considered as an eternal second, before he was able to crown his career with a victory in this race in 1960. Since then, the Indy 500 was part of the Formula 1 World Championship, his name appears on the list of winners in this class of motorsports.
Outside the Americas saw Jim Rathmann only once, at the " Race of Two Worlds " at Monza in 1958, a comparison race between the American Champ Car and the European Formula 1 racing cars. Rathmann won this race.
1956 Rathmann drove the first offshore race from Miami to Nassau. However, he broke off a few minutes after the start of a leg and never went back boat racing.
After the Indy 500 1963, which he finished in ninth place, he retired from racing and opened a Cadillac and Chevrolet car business in Florida, which he ran until his death.