Mark Donohue R.I.P.

It has been 28 years since Mark Donohue passed away at the Ostreichring. Mark had retired after dominating with Roger Penske all matter of racing series in the States (He was also impressive if I remember in his F1 debut at a rain race in the Canada). I suspect for both Mark and Roger F1 was unfinished business and their return was much anticipated at the time. How good could this combination have become in F1 and as a consequence how different a path might the Penske orgainization have taken?

I saw his trans-am car at Laguna seca this weekend, and it looked great !!

RIP, Mark.

The Penske F1 effort had an uncharacteristically difficult time getting off the ground. I suspect much of that was due to the tight schedule and strict rules governing F1 - the opportunities to develop "unfair advantages" simply did not exist as they had with Can-Am and Trans-Am. I wouldn't be surprised if even Roger himself was surprised by the financial and personnel resources necessary to mount a top-level F1 challenge, even in '75.

'76 didn't look too bad from a stats perspective - 5th. in the WCC, a win in Austria - but the DNF's suggest a different story.

It's unfortunate Mark never had the opportunity to speak about the Penske F1 experience. I haven't run across too much from Roger on the subject, either.

There is a major celebration of Mark's career, along with a coming together of many of the cars he raced, at Watkins Glen on September 5-7 at the Zippo U.S. Grand Prix for Vintage Cars (SVRA). I had heard there were as many as 30 ex-Donohue cars coming but the closest to a list I have seen is the following paragraph I have copied from the excellent web site

www.unfairadvantageracing.com


"We now also have an idea of what Mark's cars will be attending the reunion. In no paticular order we are expecting to see Pat Ryans three Donohue cars which are the Elva Courier, Lola T70 MkIII, and his famous "lightweight" Camaro. Bruce Waller will be there with his 69 Daytona 24 hour winning Lola T70 Coupe, Chuck Haine's 73 Eagle Offy, John Darlington's Lola T153 Ford IndyCar, Tom Armstrong's and Tom McIntyre's 68 Camaro's, Tom Epsman's 70 Javelin and 69 Camaro, Michael Eisenberg's 71 Javelin, Roger Penske owned 74 Penske PC-1, that David Donohue is expected to drive in, the 71 Ferrari 512 that is owned by the Quebec of Canada's Ferrari Club, Gerre Payvis's Lola AMC that Mark ran in the F5000 series for a number of races in 1973. Also we are expecting George Schmidt's Lola T152 Offy 4-wheel drive Indy Car, the Shelby Mustang GT350, the original AMC Matador that Mark won the Riverside 500 in what was to be Mark's only NASCAR win. Also attending will be Matt Drendel's most famous Porsche 917/30KL, which to me was the pinacle of Marks career."



In addition to the track events the International Motor Racing Research Center is honoring Mark on Friday evening and his son David will share the m.c. duties with Tommy Kendall. This event is also a fund raising auction to support the Research Center so there will be many wonderful mementos available. It should be a great evening so be there and wear your TNF badge!!

Bob21 asks how good could the Penske/Donohue combination have become in F1 but for Mark's tragic death in Austria. Donohue was a very great all rounder who could sort cars and was quick in anything he drove. However by 1975 he was already 38 years old and probably beyond his best, especially up against the F1 stars of the time, Lauda, Scheckter, Hunt, Reutemann, Peterson, Fittipaldi et al.
An interesting comparison can be drawn from his practice time for the 1975 German GP driving the March 751 that they had replaced the unsuccessful Penske PC1 with. Pole time was Lauda's 6m 58.6 in the Ferrari 312T with Donohue posting 7m 11.8 as against Stuck's 7m 2.1 in the works 751. Fellow American Mario Andretti managed 7m 8.2 in the now largely forgotten Parnelli VPJ4. Obviously Niki and Hans were much more familiar with the 'Ring so MD's effort was pretty good albeit near the back of a very competitive grid.
Personally I doubt whether Donohue's F1 form would have improved, in any case I think he wanted to retire from driving anyway, or am I mistaken?

He already retired but was, alas, persuaded to come back and help Penske success in F1...

Originally posted by Paul Parker
Personally I doubt whether Donohue's F1 form would have improved

With all due respect, I don't think there is enough data to make that assumption. He had never before raced on many of the tracks of the '75 season, and of course the team was struggling with their first car(s). Of course, the age factor can't be ignored, but at this point I don't see much beyonf that to suggest Mark wouldn't have improved.

It was 30 years ago when Mark died in Graz hospital, two days after his horrible accident

R.I.P. Mark, one of my greatest herous.

Don't know much of the circumstances of Marks crash, but didn't he have the crash, appear OK but took a turn for the worse a day later????

That's what happened, Steve. His head banged against a post hard during the crash and he was knocked out for a short while, but then he came around, but was able to talk, etc. but was complaining of a headache, and later on, slipped into unconsciousness again and passed away with two days.