Jacky has emerged from the last three vital years with one broken leg from the 1968 Canadian GP, a lot of scar tissue from bad burns he received in 1970 at Jarama, a wide experience in the dangers and disasters of his job and a reputation for going his own way.

Without doubt, he is an outstandingly versatile driver, as competent in sports cars as in Formula 1, and he enjoys racing in all kinds of weather, on all types of circuits.

Jacques-Bernard is the younger son of the renowned Belgian motoring writer, Jacques Ickx. He was born in Brussels on New Year's Day, 1945, and until he married recently, he lived in the beautiful family home at Braine L'Alleud, a few kilometers south of Brussels. The house was built from the stones of a 14th century convent which stood there previously and the original convent church still exists on the grounds.

School was purgatory to him. "I learned just enough to go up into the next class each year. I was very lazy, that was my most obvious characteristic. The teachers said I was good for nothing and I wanted to leave as soon as possible. During the summer holidays when I was 16 my parents tried to persuade me to work harder by letting me have a 50-cc Zundapp motorcyc1e. My father had been the Belgian scrambles champion before the war and my brother Pascal was entering trials at that time. All I wanted in life then was to be like my father and brother. So I began like that, with a very small engine. That first year I won eight out of 13 races-and the 50-cc European championship.

From this small competitive beginning grew all his subsequent successes on two wheels and four and very quickly. He counts it one of his biggest strokes of luck that the importer of Zundapp cycles in Belgium was also a BMW importer.

"He said, 'I'll lend you a car for a year but I don't want to see you at the factory. You do what you want, you work for yourself, but I don't want to see a single bill.' So I took the car away and I began to work. My first race was a hillclimb in Belgium. I did the fastest time in my class during practice but it was raining in the race and after three corners I just-phtt!-roll over, quite safely.

But it was lucky because that scene was shown on television a lot. I was already quite popular on motorcycles and now I arrived like a bomb in cars because of the incredible publicity.

"But I never intended to be a racing driver. Life seemed to decide for me. I did it just for fun - I enjoyed it. If you do something for fun and you do it well and win something, you say to yourself, 'Well, I'm not really bad and you go on."

And that is how things have always been for Jacky. From BMWs he went on to race for Ford of Belgium and while in Budapest driving a Lotus Cortina, he was noticed by Ken Tyrrell. It was 1964. Ken asked Jacky if he'd like to try a Formula 3 Cooper for him but Jacky had to go into the army just then for his national service. They agreed to put off the Formula 3 trial for 15 months while Jacky taught other soldiers how to drive tanks. "I learned to spin with a tank!"

After that the Tyrrell offer was taken up and Jacky has nothing but praise and

admiration for Ken-the man who taught him most of his fluent English and

who had enough confidence in him to give him drives in Formula 3 and then Formula 2. In 1967 he became Formula 2 champion, scored four victories in prototype racing with a J ohn Wyer Mirage and at the end of the year was offered a Cooper-Maserati to drive in the Italian and U.S. Grands Prix. He finished sixth in the Italian and scored his first-ever World Championship point.

Now carne a basic turning point in his career. Team managers had noticed Jacky and he had an offer from Ferrari. But Jacky wanted to stay with Ken, and go into the newly announced Tyrrell-Matra-Ford team and Ken wanted him. But the Matra side of the arrangement fell down and after a lot of discussion and a lot of troubles, Jacky signed with Ferrari for one year.