DVD Review: Grand Prix Heroes – Jody Scheckter by Duke Video
Positives
Negatives
Looking at the many accidents of Romain Grosjean last season and his race ban after Spa, a lot of people labeled him as a dangerous lunatic. Funnily there are early career similarities between Grosjean and 1979 World Champion Jody Scheckter. Scheckter was also considered to be a “mad man” of the track after causing several […]
Looking at the many accidents of Romain Grosjean last season and his race ban after Spa, a lot of people labeled him as a dangerous lunatic. Funnily there are early career similarities between Grosjean and 1979 World Champion Jody Scheckter. Scheckter was also considered to be a “mad man” of the track after causing several accidents in his first year including a massive multi-car pileup during the 1973 British Grand Prix driving for McLaren. Of course, Scheckter matured and developed into a race winner with Tyrrell, Wolf and world champion with Ferrari. Last year, I posted a review on Duke’s Grand Prix Heroes DVD documentary series on Ronnie Peterson. The Duke series also includes a DVD title on Jody Scheckter. So on with the review…
The documentary follows the same format with the funky Street Furniture bass music, Stirling Moss’ commentary and tracking the driver from early career to retirement. There are however some differences from the Ronnie Peterson film. Here, Jody Scheckter gives his voice over to some of the race footage and also includes personal interviews at the time (e.g. Monaco 1976).
The archival footage is excellent, particularly the race images of the McLaren M23, Tyrrell 007 and the radical P34 6 wheeler.
If you’re a fan or student of the Tyrrell P34, I think this DVD is worth picking up for the footage and driver insight provided by Jody. There are clips of the launch of the P34 (the beautiful high airbox chassis version – check out the sample video) at Silverstone and later season interviews with Jody describing to Stirling Moss the handling characteristics of the P34.
Another car that doesn’t get much coverage but is featured here is the Wolf WR1 and Walter Wolf Racing. There is some great footage of the ’77 Monaco.
Finally, the successful ’79 season with Ferrari teamed with Gilles is covered but footage is short with mostly action from the Monaco ’79 GP and a few short clips from the Dutch and Italian GPs.
Unlike popular multiple world champions of the same era like Lauda and Stewart, Jody Scheckter belongs to the less high profile one world championship club like Alan Jones, Keke Rosberg and company. This documentary however is a great reminder of his blistering speed and career success across multiple teams. As I mentioned earlier, even if you aren’t a particular fan of Jody’s, the DVD’s included action footage of the P34 and Wolf WR1 powersliding is a good enough reason to pickup a copy.
