Derek Daly

After honing his skills in the Irish Formula Ford Championship, Daly had his first drive in the European Formula Two Championship in 1977. In 1978 and 1979, he competed in both Formula Two and Formula One, finishing third in the Formula Two championship in both seasons. From 1980 to 1982, he focussed on Formula One, his best year being 1980, when he scored two fourth-place finishes and finished 11th in the Drivers' Championship.

In 1982, Daly began driving in the CART series and continued through 1989. He started 66 CART races, including each Indianapolis 500 from 1983–1989, except for 1986. He finished in the top ten a total of 21 times, including one podium finish, 3rd position, at Milwaukee in 1987. In September 1984 he was nearly killed in a horrible crash in the CART PPG Detroit News Grand Prix 200 at Michigan International Speedway. The front end of his car was sheared off and he suffered multiple injuries including a crushed left ankle, double compound fracture to the left tibia and fibula, fractured left hip socket, severely fractured pelvis, several broken left side ribs, broken left hand, 3rd degree burns to the left arm, dislocated right foot and ankle, deep abrasions and soft tissue to right heel, and internal bleeding.

Daly won the 12 Hours of Sebring in 1990 and 1991 driving a Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo. In 1990, he had the unusual distinction of driving both the first and second-placed cars.[1][2]

Daly is known in motor sports circles around the world as a driver, writer, broadcaster, racing advisor, and businessman. He runs a professional services company called MotorVation, and had been a commentator for American broadcasts of the Champ Car series, as well as a public speaker. One of the agencies that represents him is the National Speakers Bureau.[3]

He was also part of the ESPN Speedworld Coverage of the Grand Prix of San Marino in 1994, and therefore called the race in which Ayrton Senna was killed.

Daly later became a US citizen and now resides in Carmel, Indiana.[4] He has three sons, Conor, Colin and Christian.

Daly's son, Conor Daly, is also a racing driver, starting in GP3 driving for the Lotus GP team in 2012,[5] and then continuing on to GP2 in 2014 driving for Venezuela GP Lazarus,[6] and then IndyCar, starting part-time in 2013 and full-time in 2016.[7]

In 2018, Daly was fired from a racing analyst position he had at WISH-TV when WISH-TV erroneously attributed a racial slur that was uttered by Indianapolis Colts announcer, Bob Lamey, to him. Daly filed a $25M law suit as a result. WISH TV offered to retract its story, but only if Daly would agree not to take any legal action against them.[8] In the aftermath, his son Conor had his sponsor, Lilly Diabetes, pull their support as he was set to make his NASCAR debut at Road America on August 25, 2018 due to the comments, even though Conor was not born for another 8 years after the fact.[9][10]

Daly's niece, Nicola Daly, is an Ireland women's field hockey international and was a member of the squad that won the silver medal at the 2018 Women's Hockey World Cup. She also works as a data engineer for Juncos Racing.[11][12][13][14][15]

• Official site
• Derek Daly Designs (course design business)
• Profile at grandprix.com