Jody David Scheckter was born in January 29, 1950, in East London, South Africa. He is the 1979 formula one world champion. Scheckter got to formula one fast, after moving to Britain in 1970. He made his debut in formula one at Watkins Glen in 1972 with Mclaren and ran as high as 3rd, until he had a spin and finished in 9th place. The next year he won the formula 5000 championship and competed in formula one five times. In 1974 Tyrrell offered Scheckter his first full-time drive in formula one. Scheckter rewarded them with a third place finish in the drivers championship, and by scoring points in eight consecutive races, a long streak for that time. In 1976 Tyrrell introduced a six-weeled car to formula one, the Tyrrell P34. Scheckter competed with the six-weeled in 12 races and scord points in 10 of them taking another third place in the driver's championship.
In 1977 Scheckter left Tyrrell for Walter Wolf's new team and he gave the team a win in its maiden race. Scheckter won two more Grand Prix that year and finished many times in the podium, but in the end he finished second in the drivers championship behind a dominant Niki Lauda. In 1978 he finished 7th in the championsip and left the team to join Ferrari alongside Gilles Villeneuve. Scheckter helped Ferrari win another constructors championship and after 3 wins he won the title. But he had a very bad season next year in 1980, by scoring only 2 points. Scheckterretired from formula one at the end of that year.
Jody Scheckter was the last driver to win a drivers championship for Ferrari until Michael Schumacher did 21 years later. Jody's son Tomas is currently racing in Indy Racing League and he is a former test driver for Jaguar, in formula one. He also held pole position for he 2003 Inianapolis 500. Jody's brother, Ian Scheckter also raced in frmula one fo a few years. Jody Scheckter competed in 113 races in his career with 4 different teams (Mclaren, Tyrell, Wolf, Ferrari), and won one championshp title. He won 10 races during his career, got on the podium 33 times, took 3 pole positions and made 5 fastest laps, gathering a total of 246 points From 1972 to 1980.
