Lotus 59 in the 1969 F3 Guards Trophy at
Brands Hatch At age 14, Fittipaldi was racing
motorcycles, and at 16,
hydroplanes. While racing one day, his brother
Wilson blew over at and landed upside down. Wilson was uninjured in the accident, but it prompted both Fittipaldi brothers to stop competing in boat racing and focus solely on racing land vehicles. In 1967, Fittipaldi won the 6 Hours of Interlagos in a
Volkswagen Karmann Ghia at the age of 20, and a year later the 12 Hours of Porto Alegre. The pair moved to racing
Formula Vees, and built up a company with their parents. In his second season in single-seaters, Fittipaldi won the Brazilian Formula Vee title at age 21. He left for Europe in 1969, with the ambition to convince team owners of his talent in three months. After some podiums and his first victories in
Formula Ford, Fittipaldi was first trained and then subsequently engaged by the Jim Russell Driving School
Formula Three team. He won nine F3 races on the Jim Russell
Lotus 59 in the MCD Lombard Championship to become the
1969 champion.
Formula Two For , Fittipaldi moved up to F2 by joining the Lotus semi-works Team Bardahl campaigning
Lotus 59B. With six finishes in the points and four on the podium, he ended the eight-race season in third place behind
Clay Regazzoni and
Derek Bell. While this result was very impressive for the newcomer to the series, the spotlight was on Fittipaldi that year because of his activities in Formula One instead.
Formula One Lotus (1970–1973) Based on the success of the
Cosworth DFV engine and
Lotus 49/
49B cars in 1968,
Team Lotus was enjoying the reputation as one of the top F1 teams with the inflow of sponsorship money, and
Colin Chapman used the third seat on the team for championship races as the testing ground for younger drivers. This was in contrast to the team's tradition to use non-championship F1 events for the purpose. The third seat was given to
Alex Soler-Roig in early 1970, and then to Fittipaldi starting with the
British GP in July, with
Jochen Rindt and
John Miles as the regular seat holders. Fittipaldi scored a fourth place as the No. 3 driver at the next
German GP where the No. 1 Jochen Rindt won, and the No. 2 John Miles retired.
Team Lotus plans for the season drastically changed when Jochen Rindt was killed at
Monza in September and became the only driver to win the championship posthumously. John Miles also left the team, and Fittipaldi was promoted to be the Lotus No. 1 driver on his fifth F1 race at the
United States GP with
Reine Wisell and
Pete Lovely as the teammates. Fittipaldi proved up to the task and won this first post-Rindt race for Lotus. In his first full year as Lotus's lead driver in 1971, Fittipaldi finished sixth in the Drivers' Championship as the team further developed the previous season's
Lotus 72. Fittipaldi proved dominant in 1972, as he won five of 11 races and claimed the F1 Drivers' Championship. At 25, Fittipaldi was then the
youngest champion in F1 history. It appeared he might do it again in 1973. After three wins in four attempts with the 72D, he began to struggle in the new 72E that was unveiled mid-year. It resulted in the reverse of the previous year, with
Jackie Stewart beating Fittipaldi for the Drivers' Championship.
McLaren (1974–1975) Fittipaldi left Lotus to sign with the promising
McLaren team. Driving the highly efficient
McLaren M23, he had three victories in 1974, reached the podium four other times, and beat out
Clay Regazzoni in a close battle for his second championship. The following season, he notched two more victories and four other podiums, but was second to a dominant
Niki Lauda.
Fittipaldi (1976–1980) However, at the height of his F1 success, Fittipaldi shocked everyone by leaving McLaren to race for older brother
Wilson Fittipaldi's
Copersucar-sponsored
Fittipaldi Automotive team. Fittipaldi remained with the team for five seasons but only managed a best finish of second. Fittipaldi decided to retire from racing at the end of 1980. He has since said that his last two years in Formula One were very unhappy: "I was too involved in the problems of trying to make the team work, and I neglected my marriage and my personal life", although at the time he cited the deaths of many of his colleagues as his reason. He was only 33, but had been racing in Formula One for a decade. He had failed to finish seven of the last ten races that year and had several times been outpaced by his Finnish teammate
Keke Rosberg (a future champion himself). He moved into the management of the team alongside his brother. The team struggled on for another two years with minimal sponsorship, going into receivership at the end of 1982. File:1971 Emerson Fittipaldi, Lotus 72 (kl).JPG|Fittipaldi driving the
Lotus 72 at the
Nürburgring in File:Emerson Fittipaldi 1972 Austrian GP.jpg|Fittipaldi at the wheel of the Lotus 72D at the
1972 Austrian Grand Prix File:Emerson Fittipaldi GP74 01.jpg|Fittipaldi at
Silverstone in 1974 File:Emerson Fittipaldi McLaren M23 1974 Britain.jpg|Fittipaldi in the
McLaren M23 in the
1974 Race of Champions at
Brands Hatch File:Copersucar FD04 1976.jpg|Fittipaldi driving for his brother's
eponymous team at the
1976 Brazilian Grand Prix at his home circuit,
Interlagos File:A Escuderia Emerson Fittipaldi Copersucar, Jacarepagua, 1978.tif|Fittipaldi Copersucar,
Jacarepaguá, 1978
CART After leaving F1 in 1980, Fittipaldi took time out from major racing for four years. In 1984, the 37-year-old Fittipaldi made his debut in the American
CART series. He spent his first season acclimatising to IndyCars, driving for two teams before joining
Patrick Racing as a replacement for
Chip Ganassi, who had been seriously injured in the 1984
Michigan 500. The 1985 Michigan 500 marked Fittipaldi's first victory in CART. Fittipaldi stayed five years with Patrick Racing, recording six victories and solid finishes in the overall standings. In 1989, Fittipaldi had five wins, finished in the top five in every race he completed, and was the CART champion. Among his wins was a dominant performance in the
1989 Indianapolis 500, where he led 158 of 200 laps and won by two laps, but only after a dramatic duel with
Al Unser Jr. in the closing laps of the race. Unser ran down Fittipaldi after a late-race restart and passed him for the lead on lap 196. Three laps later, Fittipaldi used lapped traffic to his advantage to pull alongside Unser on the backstretch. Neither driver would give way, and the two cars touched wheels as they went through turn three side by side. Unser's car spun out of control to hit the outside wall, while Fittipaldi was able to maintain sufficient control to keep his car moving straight. In spite of the altercation, Unser applauded Fittipaldi from the infield as Fittipaldi passed by on the final lap.
Roger Penske hired Fittipaldi for his
racing team in 1990 and he continued to be among the top drivers in CART, winning at least one race with Penske for six straight years. But for bad luck he might have won three consecutive Indianapolis 500s, suffering blistered tires in 1990 and a gearbox failure in 1991, both while leading. In
1993 he added a second Indianapolis 500 victory by taking the lead from reigning Formula One World Champion
Nigel Mansell on lap 185 and holding it for the remainder. in 1992 The race saw Fittipaldi break Indianapolis victory lane tradition when he drank a celebratory bottle of orange juice before the traditional bottle of milk. He was only the second driver to not drink milk at Indianapolis since the tradition was founded in 1936 (and firmly established in 1956). Fittipaldi owned several orange groves in his native Brazil, and wanted to promote the citrus industry. Fan reaction was negative to the break in tradition despite the fact that Fittipaldi did drink milk shortly after. As a result of drinking the juice, Fittipaldi forfeited $5,000 from the winner's purse and publicly apologized to the American Dairy Association. Fan reaction to the milk snub was highly negative, and he was booed a week later at
Milwaukee, a center of the American dairy industry. In the years that followed, many fans continued to hold the action against him. In interviews since, Fittipaldi explained his action, and apologised for the wave of negativity that followed. Fittipaldi returned to Indianapolis to drive the
Chevrolet Corvette Pace Car for the
2008 Indianapolis 500. Despite the passage of 15 years, he was again booed and heckled by some fans during the parade laps. in 1994 In May 1994, Fittipaldi skipped a practice session for the
Indianapolis 500 after his close friend
Ayrton Senna, also a native of Brazil and a former Formula One champion,
died in a crash. Fittipaldi was one of the pallbearers during Senna's funeral, alongside
Jackie Stewart,
Alain Prost and several other F1 world champions. Fittipaldi nearly won his third 500 but clipped the turn 4 wall with 15 laps to go while he was holding a nearly full lap lead over teammate Unser Jr. Approaching 50, Fittipaldi was still driving in
CART in 1996 when an injury at
Michigan International Speedway ended his career. Fittipaldi did not return to the series as a driver after the injury. Fittipaldi finished his CART career with 22 wins. In 2003 he made a return to CART as a team owner.
Later career . He waved the green flag at the start of the race. Fittipaldi was the acting team principal for the Brazilian
A1 GP entry. In 2005 Fittipaldi made a surprise return to competitive racing in the
Grand Prix Masters event held at
Kyalami in
South Africa, finishing second behind fellow F1 driver
Nigel Mansell. In 2008, Emerson and his brother Wilson entered the
Brazilian GT3 Championship, driving a
Porsche 997 GT3 for the WB Motorsports team. In 2011, he started embracing social media and became a
Chairman of Motorsport.com. In 2013 he began writing a regular monthly blog column on the official website of
McLaren.
Awards • Fittipaldi was inducted in the
Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 2001. • Fittipaldi was inducted into the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame in 2004. ==Personal life==