This weekend is the final race of the 2023 Canadian Formula 1200 Championship season. So we’re dedicating this week’s Fast Film Friday to one of the greatest racing movies of all time, ‘Rush‘. Rather than just another movie review, we’re going to focus on the early years depicted in the film and the junior formulas these men raced in.

The 2013 film was directed by Richie Cunningham from Happy Days (Ron Howard) and starred Chris Hemsworth as McLaren driver James Hunt and Daniel Bruhl as Ferrari pilot Niki Lauda. The movie centres around the 1976 Formula 1 season and their epic battle for the championship.

But you probably know this already, don’t you? The movie is only 10 years old, so you’d have to be living under a rock to have missed this one. It was a big hit! Plus, the fact that you’re reading Demaras Racing’s website means that you are likely a gearhead. Why have you NOT seen this movie!

Formula Vee

Niki Lauda is one of Formula One’s greats, having won championships in 1975, 1977 and 1984. His open wheel racing career started in 1969 when he was offered a ‘factory drive’ by the Kaimann team. Lauda had watched fellow Austrian racer Helmuth Marko compete in the Kaimann MkIII the previous year with some success.

So, in 1969 the Kaimann Mk4 Formula Vee powered Lauda to two wins, including one at Monza. Combined with several podium finishes, Niki finished third overall in the Formula Vee championship, and the next year was off to Formula 3, where he’d meet his rival, James Hunt.

Formula Ford

Hunt raced a Mini Cooper for a season before stepping up to Formula Ford in 1968. He raced a Alexis chassis, but didn’t impress. Many of Hunt’s early races ended in accidents, earning him the nickname ‘Hunt the Shunt’.

In one of his Formula Ford races, his car crashed and sank in the middle of a lake, and he might have drown if he had the mandatory seatbelts, which he couldn’t afford to buy. In 1969, Hunt bought a Merlyn Mk11A Formula Ford which he expected better results from, but made a mid-season switch to Formula 3.

Formula 3

By 1970, both Lauda and Hunt had moved up the ladder to Formula 3 where they became rivals on track, and friends in the paddock. Austrian Lauda was proficient in English and often spent time visiting with Hunt, who was not as successful on track, but was nonetheless envied by Lauda.

Perhaps it didn’t work for the plot line of the movie, but these racers did not hate each other. They were sometimes bitter, jealous rivals, and always cut-throat competitors. Racing can strained a friendship.

“Yes, we were friends. I knew him before at Formula 3. We always crossed each other’s lines. He was a very competitive guy and he was very quick. In many ways we were the same. I had a lot of respect for him on the circuit. He was a very solid driver.”

-Niki Lauda to The Telegraph in 2013

Formula 1

By the tame the two heros make it to Formula 1, their relationship is strained. Always fighting each other on track, and even off-track there’s sibling rivalry. This is best characterized in an excellent scene in the film where Hunt kicks the crap out of a reporter for asking cruel questions to Lauda about his appearance (scarred by fire after his tragic accident). You don’t violently defend people you despise. You defend your friends.

This Ferrari and McLaren drivers weren’t in a Carlando bro-mance like the current F1 drivers. On track, they would do everything possible to defeat the other. But having a rival of equal skill pushed these men to greatness, to become better than they themselves thought possible. That’s what the competition in racing is truly about, and why some people cannot understand why racers ‘drive around in circles going nowhere’ every weekend.

Racing is about trying to be your best, and the characters in ‘Rush‘ show how a rivalry can force an individual to bring their A-Game every time. That’s how champions are made.