Nigel Mansell has the distinction of being the first Formula One driver to be voted BBC Sports Personality of the Year (SPOTY) twice. On the first occasion, in 1986, he beat javelin thrower Fatima Whitbread and footballer Kenny Dalglish in the public vote after narrowly missing out on the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship.After accepting the SPOTY trophy from Sir Henry Cooper, he said, “I think I know where I’d rather be at this minute and that’s certainly on the grid and not standing here. It has come as a complete surprise because I think I’ve been out of the country all but for about two days since Australia…”
Mansell won five Grand Prixs in 1986, but heading into the sixteenth and final race of the season, the Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide, he was just one of three possible world champions, the others being his Williams-Honda teammate Nelson Piquet and McLaren-TAG rival Alain Prost. Mansell was forced to retire when his left-rear tyre exploded with 19 laps remaining and Prost went on the win his second drivers’ title with 72 points, just two points ahead.
Fast forward half a dozen years and, in 1992, Mansell won his first and only drivers’ championship in emphatic style. He won the first five races of the season and went on to become the first Formula One driver to win nine. A second-place finish, behind Ayrton Senna, in the Hungarian Grand Prix Hungaroring in August gave him an unassailable 52-point lead in the championship standings and he finished the season the same margin ahead of his nearest pursuer, Ricardo Patrese.
Mansell thus became the first British Formula One world campion since James Hunt in 1976. In his final season in Formula One – in 1993, he would switch his attention to Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART) in the United States, winning the IndyCar World Series at the first attempt – he also beat the British record for Grand Prix victories, 27, previously held by Sir Jackie Stewart. After beating athletes Linford Christie and Sally Gunnell to his second SPOTY Award, Mansell, on crutches, made the most of his time at the microphone to thank anyone and everyone, not least his wife of 24 years, Roseanne.