{"id":851622,"date":"2026-08-11T16:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T16:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/851622\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T16:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T16:44:09","slug":"damon-hills-1996-title-triumph-remembered-part-1-the-making-of-a-unique-f1-champion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/851622\/","title":{"rendered":"Damon Hill&#8217;s 1996 title triumph remembered: Part 1 \u2013 The making of a unique F1 champion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">2026 marks the 30th anniversary of Damon Hill\u2019s 1996 World Championship. To mark Hill\u2019s achievement, Formula1.com Senior Editor Greg Stuart speaks to the man himself in a two-part feature about conquering the F1 world, defying his critics and dealing with the sport\u2019s ultimate rejection, even as he was en route to the crown\u2026<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">Thirty years ago, <a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" data-f1rd-a7s-click=\"rich_text_atom_click\" data-f1rd-a7s-context=\"eyJhY3Rpb25UeXBlIjoiZGFtb25faGlsbF9saW5rX2NsaWNrZWQiLCJjbGlja1RleHQiOnRydWUsInBhdGgiOiJodHRwczovL3d3dy5mb3JtdWxhMS5jb20vZW4vaW5mb3JtYXRpb24vZHJpdmVycy1oYWxsLW9mLWZhbWUtZGFtb24taGlsbC41Q3dvMkFvZzVuSENSMWVkdUlrcTN5IiwicGF0aFR5cGUiOiJpbnRlcm5hbCJ9\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/information\/drivers-hall-of-fame-damon-hill.5Cwo2Aog5nHCR1eduIkq3y\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Damon Hill<\/a> was crowned Formula 1 World Champion.<\/p>\n<p class=\"typography-module_body-s-regular__ul7F5 typography-module_md_body-m-regular__d9VRg typography-module_lg_body-l-regular__dPa5z\">To those who know a little, but not a lot, of the Hill family history, that may not seem so surprising. Hill was, after all, the son of F1 royalty, in the form of two-time champion <a class=\"text-brand-hot-red underline decoration-1 hover:decoration-[3px]\" data-f1rd-a7s-click=\"rich_text_atom_click\" data-f1rd-a7s-context=\"eyJhY3Rpb25UeXBlIjoiZ3JhaGFtX2hpbGxfbGlua19jbGlja2VkIiwiY2xpY2tUZXh0Ijp0cnVlLCJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZm9ybXVsYTEuY29tL2VuL2luZm9ybWF0aW9uL2RyaXZlcnMtaGFsbC1vZi1mYW1lLWdyYWhhbS1oaWxsLk5VcXpidHRzSjJnc3VHdFc5UHpORyIsInBhdGhUeXBlIjoiaW50ZXJuYWwifQ==\" href=\"https:\/\/www.formula1.com\/en\/information\/drivers-hall-of-fame-graham-hill.NUqzbttsJ2gsuGtW9PzNG\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Graham Hill<\/a> \u2013 so you might be forgiven for thinking that a life of privilege and a Rolodex of F1 contacts had, by 1996, landed Hill in the mighty, title-winning Williams FW18, the strongest car in that season\u2019s field by some distance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"2026 marks the 30th anniversary of Damon Hill\u2019s 1996 World Championship. To mark Hill\u2019s achievement, Formula1.com Senior Editor&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":851623,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-851622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=851622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851622\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/851623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=851622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=851622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=851622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}