Todt was born in Pierrefort, a village in the Auvergne region of France. After high school he studied at the Ecole des Cadres School of Economics and Business in Paris.
The young Todt was fascinated by motorsport and had particular respect for drivers like Jim Clark and Dan Gurney. He first co-drove with Guy Chasseuil in 1966, using his parents' Mini Cooper. His talent for calculation, strategy, and organisation quickly made him a sought-after navigator. By 1969 he was working with world-class rally stars including Jean-Pierre Nicolas, Rauno Aaltonen, Ove Andersson, Hannu Mikkola, and Guy Fréquelin.
Over his career as co-driver he participated in 54 WRC competitions and scored four victories between 1973 and 1981: the Rally of Poland in 1973 (with Achim Warmbold), the Österreichische Alpenfahrt in 1973 (with Achim Warmbold), the Rallye du Maroc in 1975 (with Hannu Mikkola), and the Rally Argentina in 1981 (with Guy Fréquelin). He also represented drivers in the FISA Rally Commission from 1975 to 1981.
In 1981, as Fréquelin's co-driver with Talbot — a Peugeot subsidiary — Todt won the manufacturers' World Rally Championship and was runner-up in the drivers' championship. This result earned the Prix Roland Peugeot of the French Académie des Sports for the outstanding French motorsport achievement of the year.
In 1981, Todt retired from co-driving and was appointed Director of Racing for Peugeot by CEO Jean Boillot. He created Peugeot Talbot Sport and oversaw the development of the Peugeot 205 Turbo 16, the 405 Turbo 16, and the 905.
Peugeot returned to the World Rally Championship in 1984. In 1985 and 1986, the 205 Turbo 16, driven first by Timo Salonen then by Juha Kankkunen, won back-to-back manufacturers' World Championship titles. In 1986, Henri Toivonen died driving a Lancia Delta S4 during the Tour de Corse rally, leading the FIA to drop the Group B class.
In 1987, Todt adapted the 205 Turbo 16 for off-road racing to target the Paris-Dakar Rally. During the 1989 Paris-Dakar, he tossed a coin to decide between Ari Vatanen and Jacky Ickx to prevent internal rivalry from costing the team victory. From 1987 to 1990, Peugeot won four successive Paris-Dakar Rallies with Vatanen and Kankkunen.
In 1992, Todt led Peugeot to victory at the Le Mans 24 Hours with the 905, driven by Derek Warwick, Yannick Dalmas, and Mark Blundell. In 1993, three 905 cars driven by Geoff Brabham, Christophe Bouchut, and Éric Hélary achieved a 1-2-3 victory at Le Mans.
In 1993, at the age of 47, Todt was recruited by Luca di Montezemolo, the new CEO of Scuderia Ferrari. On 1 July of that year, at the French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours, he started as General Manager of the Racing Division heading a team of 400 technicians. He was the first non-Italian to head the Scuderia since Marco Piccinini.
Ferrari had won no drivers' championship since 1979. In 1994, barely a year after Todt's arrival, Gerhard Berger won the German Grand Prix — Ferrari's first win in four years. Todt asked Michael Schumacher, the German double world champion, to join Ferrari at the end of the 1995 season. In 1996, after an early-season win at the Spanish Grand Prix, Schumacher won the Belgian and Italian Grands Prix. Todt then hired former Benetton aerodynamics specialist Rory Byrne and technical director Ross Brawn to replace John Barnard.
In 1997 and 1998, Ferrari missed the drivers' title by a few points in the final races, in 1997 behind Jacques Villeneuve's Williams-Renault and in 1998 and 1999 behind Mika Häkkinen's McLaren-Mercedes. Schumacher's early-season injury at Silverstone in 1999 cost him the drivers' title. Nevertheless, Ferrari won the Constructors' Championship in 1999.
Starting in 2000, Schumacher won five consecutive World Drivers' Championships through 2004, with Ferrari also winning six straight Constructors' Championships — a dominance then unmatched in the sport's history. Of Schumacher's 91 career victories, 72 came under Todt's direction. Kimi Räikkönen added a further Drivers' Championship in 2007, and Ferrari won the Constructors' Championship in both 2007 and 2008.
On 1 June 2004, Todt was appointed CEO of Ferrari in addition to his General Manager role. In October 2006, three days after the end of the Formula One season and following Schumacher's retirement, he took up a new post as Special Advisor for Scuderia Ferrari. He prepared Stefano Domenicali to succeed him as head of the Scuderia on 1 January 2008, and resigned as Special Advisor on 18 March 2008, replaced by Amedeo Felisa. He resigned all functions within Ferrari in March 2009.
On 16 July 2009, Todt announced his candidacy for the FIA Presidency, having received the support of outgoing president Max Mosley. On 23 October 2009, he was elected FIA President with 135 votes against Ari Vatanen's 49. He was re-elected unchallenged for a second four-year term on 6 December 2013 and again unopposed for a third four-year term on 8 December 2017. His presidency ended in December 2021, with the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix being the last race he attended as president. He was succeeded by Mohammed Ben Sulayem.
On 29 April 2015, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed Todt the United Nations Special Envoy for Road Safety; this role was confirmed by Secretary-General António Guterres in April 2017.
Todt has received numerous distinctions including the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour (2011), the Gold Medal of Youth and Sports (1987), Commander of the Italian Republic (2002), Doctor Honoris Causa in Mechanical Engineering at Florence University (2004), and the Palme d'Or of the International Automobile Festival (2015). He was appointed Dato Seri of Malaysia in 2006 and has been an Honorary President of the Federazione Auto Motoristica Sammarinese (FAMS) since 2003.
Todt has been in a relationship with Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh since 2004. A post by former Ferrari driver Felipe Massa revealed they were married on 27 July 2023 in Geneva. He has a son from his previous marriage, Nicolas Todt, a driver manager and former co-owner of ART Grand Prix.
This article is based solely on the supplied corpus. No external sources were consulted; claims that could not be substantiated against the corpus were omitted under the drop-the-claim rule.
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