Dave Morgan

7/8/1944

Record updated 10-Mar-08

Gained notoriety for being decked by James Hunt in a televised F3 race at Crystal Palace in 1970. Moved up to F2 and then made one F1 appearance at the British Grand Prix in 1975.

Dave Morgan
Born in Shepton Mallet, David Morgan started racing in 1965 with a Mini.

He progressed up to Formula 3 in 1970 with a March 703. The final event at Crystal Palace in October that year was immortalised on television when the BBC broadcast the Formula 3 final. Morgan tried just a bit too hard on the last corner going for third place and caused a huge accident involving James Hunt. James jumped out of his car, ran over to Morgan and flattened him with a single blow. Dave Morgan was later found guilty of reckless driving by the RAC, and was fined and banned. He subsequently appealed and was allowed to continue his racing activities in Formula Atlantic in 1971.

The high point of his career came at the start of 1972 when his private Brabham, which was actually a converted Formula Atlantic car, won the Formula 2 race at Mallory Park against works teams. However two more seasons in the formula brought little in the way of success and Morgan returned to Formula Atlantic in 1974.

He then managed to get together the money neccessary for his one Grand Prix drive with a Surtees at the British Grand Prix in 1975. A heavy hail storm started on Lap 53 and only 6 cars were running at the end. The RAC declared the race finished on lap 55, the last lap when most of the cars were running. Morgan crashed during the storm and was classified 18th.

He stopped racing until 1980 when he returned to race a Colt Lancer in the RAC Tricentrol series for a couple of years.

In the early nineties he was Eric van de Poele's engineer in F3000 and Lamborghini Formula 1 in 1991.

In 1992 he continued in Formula 1 as an engineer with Brabham before heading to Mexico. Dave then moved to the USA to work in the CART series with Payton-Coyne Racing.

He returned to Europe in 2000 and recently worked in the World Renault Series for Epsilon Euskadi looking after Felix Porteiro and Robert Kubica. He was also reunited with Eric van der Poele, working as his engineer again in the GP Masters series in 2006.



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