42 Facts About Mark Donohue

At the age of 22 while a senior at Brown, Mark Donohue began racing his 1957 Corvette.

Mark Donohue won the first event he entered, a hillclimb in Belknap County, New Hampshire.

Mark Donohue graduated from Brown in 1959 with a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering.

Mark Donohue won the SCCA national championship in an Elva Courier in 1961.

Hansgen arranged for Mark Donohue to become his teammate in 1965, co-driving a Ferrari 275 at the 12 Hours of Sebring endurance race, which they finished in 11th place.

That year, Mark Donohue won two divisional championships: in SCCA B Class in a GT350 and in SCCA Formula C in a Lotus 20B.

Mark Donohue went on to assist TVR's David Hives in designing the Series 400 Griffith and then working on the ill-fated Bob Cumberford-designed, Intermeccanica- produced Series 600 Griffith.

In February of '65 Mark Donohue was named comptroller at Griffith Motors, but was lured from Griffith by Roger Penske early in 1966.

Hansgen died while testing the GT40 in preparation for Le Mans so Mark Donohue partnered with Australian Paul Hawkins.

At Hansgen's funeral, Roger Penske spoke to Mark Donohue about driving for him.

Mark Donohue was invited back to Le Mans by Ford in 1967.

In 1967, Penske contacted Mark Donohue about driving Penske's brand new Lola T70 spyder in the United States Road Racing Championship.

Mark Donohue dominated the 1967 race, driving a Lola T70 MkIII Chevrolet for Penske.

Mark Donohue raced in seven of the eight races that year, winning six and finishing third at the Laguna Seca Raceway round behind Lothar Motschenbacher and Mike Goth.

Mark Donohue did not start the first race of the year at Circuit Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City due to problems getting the engine to start.

Mark Donohue began his Trans-Am series campaign in 1967, winning three of twelve races in a Roger Penske-owned Chevrolet Camaro.

Mark Donohue finished fourth at Daytona and won the Trans-Am class at the 12 Hours of Sebring.

Mark Donohue went on to win 10 of 13 races, a Trans-Am series record which would stand until Tommy Kendall went 11 for 13 in the 1997 Trans-Am championship, winning the first 11 races that year in his All-Sport liveried Mustang.

Mark Donohue was considered a leading Trans-Am driver of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Mark Donohue was about to have his race victory taken away for cheating, but Roger Penske stepped in.

Penske and Mark Donohue did not stop acid-dipping after this, however.

Mark Donohue drove the Javelin to three victories, with AMC finishing second overall in the Manufacturers' Championship.

In 1971, of the ten races that the Over 2.5L Class cars participated in, Mark Donohue won seven of them, including the final six races in a row, with AMC winning the Manufacturers' championship for the first time ever.

In 1969, Penske and Mark Donohue raced in their first Indianapolis 500, with Mark Donohue finishing seventh, winning the rookie of the year award.

Mark Donohue raced at Indianapolis each year following, finishing second in 1970 and 25th in 1971.

Mark Donohue raced in several NASCAR Grand American races and a NASCAR pony car division from 1968 until 1971.

The front of the car was torn away, leaving Mark Donohue, still strapped to his safety seat, with his legs dangling outside the car.

Amazingly, Mark Donohue only suffered an internal derangement of his knee with meniscus damage and limited cruciate plus collateral ligament damage.

Mark Donohue held the record for 11 years, until it was broken by Rick Mears at Michigan International Speedway.

The only person to beat Mark Donohue was his former Penske Trans-Am teammate, George Follmer.

Mark Donohue announced that he would retire from racing after the 1973 Can-Am season.

Mark Donohue's retirement was short-lived as he was lured back to full-time competitive driving by Penske when he formed a Formula One team, Penske Cars Ltd, to compete in the final two events of the 1974 Formula One World Championship, and to continue competing in 1975 with the new Penske PC1.

Mark Donohue previously had debuted in Formula One on September 19,1971, with a Penske-sponsored McLaren at the Canadian Grand Prix at Mosport Park, finishing on the podium in third place.

Mark Donohue finished in 12th place at the Canadian Grand Prix, but failed to finish at the United States Grand Prix.

Mark Donohue was able to muster fifth-place finishes at the Swedish Grand Prix and the British Grand Prix, but the new Penske PC1 chassis proved problematic, as evidenced by three retirements in the first six races.

Mark Donohue recently had arrived in Austria for the Austrian Grand Prix at the Osterreichring race track following the successful closed-course speed record attempt at Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama just a few days earlier.

Mark Donohue was survived by his second wife and two sons from his first marriage.

Mark Donohue is buried at St Teresa Cemetery in Summit, New Jersey.

Mark Donohue chronicled his entire racing career in the book, The Unfair Advantage.

Mark Donohue were pioneers in many rights, some as notable as the use of a skidpad as a tool for developing and perfecting race car suspension designs and setups.

The book told how Mark Donohue learned to exploit the antilock braking system and the powerful turbocharged engine of several prototype Porsches, as well as how he learned from various mishaps, including a near-fatal crash.

Mark Donohue's racing tradition is carried on by his son, David Mark Donohue, a successful road racer in his own right.