Sports have often produced several rags-to-riches stories, with several of them becoming global icons today despite coming from humble backgrounds. However, that is sadly not possible for aspiring F1 drivers because of how expensive it is for people to compete in karting and junior racing categories.
F1 expert Karun Chandhok revealed on an episode of The Fast and the Curious podcast last year that a single season of karting can cost as much as a whopping $500,000 on average. With it being so expensive for anyone to make a career in racing, aspiring drivers coming from affluent backgrounds often have a better chance.
One would assume that Damon Hill, son of two-time F1 champion Graham Hill, would have no problems in this aspect. However, even Damon found it difficult to meet the costs of getting to the pinnacle of motorsport.
Had it not been for the support he received from a member of the British rock band, The Beatles, he perhaps would have never made it big in F1. The hosts of the Pitstop podcast revealed that guitarist George Harrison was a huge fan of F1, and since he had a close bond with Graham, he decided to fund the early part of Damon’s career.
“One of the friendships that he [Harrison] formed was with racing driver Graham Hill. He [Graham] ended up having a son, one of the most prominent figures in Formula 1 and a Formula 1 world champion,” Fabio Bocca said on his Pitstop podcast. “Fast forward to the 90s — 1992 — Damon Hill makes his debut with the Brabham Formula 1 team”.
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“We all know how much it costs,” Bocca added. “Money is the biggest thing in F1, and luckily for Damon Hill, the start of his Formula 1 career was funded by George Harrison of The Beatles”. After making this revelation, Bocca made another revelation that was nothing short of startling.
He revealed that Damon was actually a musician himself and played a guitar solo on Demolition Man, which is the opening track of Def Leppard’s 1999 album Euphoria. While Harrison had a close bond with Graham and his son, he also gelled well with other F1 drivers as he simply loved the sport.
Three-time F1 champion Jackie Stewart, another driver who was a good friend of Harrison, once explained how The Beatles’ guitarist’s knowledge of the sport transcended most.
“He [Harrison] was extremely knowledgeable of the sport, and when you think of the swinging 60s and even the 70s, everybody had a tremendous appreciation of the Beatles, so it seemed to many he was just there to be there,” Stewart told The Race in an interview back in 2021.
“But he wasn’t,” Stewart added.”He really understood racing and he met all the interesting people that he wanted to be around. He was very friendly with Jody Scheckter, Emerson Fittipaldi, and many others”. Hill and Harrison’s accounts just show how the crossover between F1 and the music industry goes way back in time.
