What is it about June?

Juan Manuel Fangio was born on the 24th of June, 1911. He was nicknamed ‘El Maestro’ (‘The Master’). He won five Formula One World Driver's Championships - a record which stood for 46 years eventually beaten by Michael Schumacher - with four different teams (Alfa Romeo, Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz and Maserati), a feat that has not been repeated since. He is considered by many to be the greatest driver of all time.


Sir John Young ‘Jackie’ Stewart was born on the 11th of June 1939. He is better known as Jackie, and nicknamed ‘The Flying Scot’. He won the F1 World Championship thrice.


Kevin Schwantz, former Motorcycle Grand Prix World Champion, was born on the 19th of June, in Houston, Texas. He was renowned for his aggressive, all-or-nothing riding style.


Giacomo Agostini was born on the 16th of June, 1942 in Brescia, Lombardy. He’s an Italian multi-time Motorcycle Grand Prix World Champion. Nicknamed ‘Ago’, he is the all-time leader in victories in motorcycle Grand Prix history.


Michael ‘Mick’ Sydney Doohan was born on the 4th of June 1965 in Brisbane, Australia. He’s a former Grand Prix motorcycle road racing World Champion, who won five consecutive 500 cc World Championships, second only to Giacomo Agostini. He’s considered to be one of the greatest exponents of motorcycling racing of all time.


‘Turbo’ Tommi Antero Mäkinen was born in Puuppola, Finland near Jyväskylä on the 26th of June 1964. Mäkinen is one of the most successful WRC drivers of all time, having been a 4-time World Rally Champion.


Raunaq ‘Hopeless’ Sahu was born on the 22nd of June in Raniganj, West Bengal to Oriya parents. He writes this shady blog and likes to believe that he is a hard-core motor-racing fan. He hasn’t achieved much in real life, though. He has driven a Toyota Landcruiser and was quite intimidated by it. Sadly, it was an automatic, so he couldn’t pretend to be a proper driver (“Only yummy mummies drive automatics” - Jeremy Clarkson). He had once driven a Maruti 800 3 years back when he’d driven into a hedge as he was standing on the clutch and wondering why the darn car wasn’t stopping.


At least he was born in June.