Juan Manuel Fangio, won 5 Formula One driver’s world championships
Fangio left school at the age of 11 and worked as an automobile mechanic in his hometown of San Jose de Balcarce, Argentina before beginning his driving career.
(try telling your 11 year old schools out for ever, time to get a job as a mechanic)
He won his first major victory in the Gran Premio Internacional del Norte of 1940, racing a Chevrolet along the often-unpaved roads from Buenos Aires to Lima, Peru.
In 1948, Fangio was invited to race a Simca-Gordini in the French Grand Prix, also at Reims, which marked his European racing debut.
In Formula One, the top level of racing drivers compete in single-seat, open-wheel vehicles typically built by large automakers and capable of achieving speeds of more than 230 mph.
Individual Formula One events are known as Grands Prix.
Fangio signed on in 1948 with Alfa Romeo, and won his first Formula One championship title with that team in 1951.
Over the course of his racing career, he would drive some of the best cars Alfa-Romeo, Mercedes-Benz, Ferrari and Maserati ever produced. Capturing four more Formula One titles by 1957, Fangio won an impressive 24 of 51 total Grand Prix races, a winning percentage of 46.15%, the best in the sport's history. Alberto Ascari, who is in second, holds a percentage of 40.63%.
In the race on July 6, 1958, Fangio, driving a Maserati, finished fourth, in what would be the last race before announcing his retirement at the age of 47.
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