Hello, hello my friends… here I am again to take you back in time to watch together a piece of F1 history. This time we are going to go right to 1982, and more precisely to the August 15th, 1982. That day, the circuit of Osterreichring saw one of the closest finishes in the Formula 1 history. And the exciting and emotional ending was much needed: 1982 was indeed a tragic year for the sport because the death of Villeneuve and Paletti and the serious accident that almost cost the life of Didier Pironi, who was involved in the three incidents in one way or another.
If you are an enthusiastic F1 follower of the old times and you are a fan of Villenueve, surely you’re not enthusiastic about Pironi, as many pointed at him as the very “direct” indirect reason for Gilles’ death. In 1981 and 1982, Villenueve and Pironi were the official drivers of the Scuderia (though later in 1982 and due both driver’s accidents, Patrick Tambay and Mario Andretti also competed in the Cavallino). The relationship between the Canadian and the French was nor good or bad. They were only colleagues and it was clear for everyone that the Canadian was the driver number 1 of the Team, though Ferrari had contracted the French under the condition that there won’t be such a thing of “main driver”.
Maybe it was because Pironi was eager to get his first victory on Ferrari, maybe he was tired of listen everyone talking about “the Great Gilles”… the point is that in Imola 82, and in the middle of a bloody war between FISA and FOCA who chopped the number of car participants in that race to the middle, Didier stole the victory of Gilles in a fashion many (including me) will consider non-sportive to say the least. Both Ferrari were really strong in that race, and with 15 laps to the end of the GP they were more than 40 seconds ahead Michele Alboreto, who was third in his Tyrrel. From the Ferrari’s box the Team Manager Marco Piccinini showed the sign “SLOW” when Gilles was leading Pironi. Villenueve slowed down then, to save the car and get safely to the end and make the first 1-2 for the Team since Monza 1979. To his amazement and rage, Pironi passed him on lap 48. During the next 12 laps both Ferraris hunted each other like hell, taking the lead in turns. On the last lap Gilles was leading and entering Tosa he took it a little wide to avoid any problems with the car, and his teammate inserted himself in the inside, risking get both out of the race. Pironi got away with it and crossed the finish line as a winner, only 0.366 seconds ahead, a very vicious way to get the very first victory, if you ask me. On the podium Gilles gazed to the space, not once talked to Didier and it must be in that moment he vowed never talk to him again. A vow never broken. The next race, the Belgium Grand Prix, Gilles got killed in an accident trying to beat Pironi’s time in quals. But I guess I’ve lost the thread here. The Austrian Grand Prix is what it took us here and that’s what we are going to talk about. I guess I just wanted to do a small mention to Gilles Villenueve on the 20th anniversary of his death.

Villenueve death was followed by the death of Paletti in Canada, when the Italian smashed the back of the Pironi’s Ferrari after the French stalled the engine at the start. And then, in Germany, Pironi himself almost got killed after touching the rear wheel of Alain Prost and flew 250 meters, overturning 3 times in the air. As a consequence of the accident and the injuries on his legs, he could never race again.

After Germany it was the Austrian Grand Prix. It was totally understandable then why all the drivers wanted quite hard to produce a race that cheered the crowd up. All the teams arrived to Zeltweg ready for action, and that was exactly what they had.

The Osterreichring was located in what today we know as A1-ring, only a bit different in shape. The A1 has 4326 meters of perimeter, and the Osterreichring is a bigger track: 5942.4 meters of perimeter. Basically, few changes have been made to the old track. The Hella-Licht S has been reconverted in the 90 degrees Castrol; the very technical and exciting Seebring-Auspuffkurve has been modified in the very treacherous and same exciting Remus and few modifications more that didn’t affect the general L shape of the circuit.

The high altitude of Zeltweg was, at first glance, a notable advantage to the turbo-engines, which were introduced by Renault some years before and not all the teams had adopted it by that time yet. And the previsions were quite right: the first non-turbo car on the grid was the Williams of Keke Rosberg on 6th position followed by another non-turbo car of Elio De Angelis in 7th. The Brabham/BMW, owned by that time by non other than Bernie Ecclestone, with Piquet and Patresse dominated the first row on the grid, being the Italian in second position almost a second faster than Alain Prost in a Renault. Ferrari participated with only one driver, Patrick Tambay, in 4th position at the start, almost 2 seconds behind the pole time. 

All the hopes of the Scuderia were soon dust in the thin air of the high altitudes of Austria. Tambay picked up debris from an earlier accident, which took the Ferrari out. Then the 2 Brabham and the 2 Renault rushed away leaving the normal aspirated cars the option to fight only for 5th.

But everything can happen in a Formula 1 race, and in this one Austria Grand Prix 1982, if not everything we can say a lot happened. First it was Arnoux in the second Renault who suffered from an engine failure. Soon, Patresse followed. Piquet couldn’t use the whole power of his engine because it simply didn’t respond. And make it a whole disaster for the Turbos, Prost’s Renault engine stopped in lap 49, only 4 laps before the end. 

The previously poor considered normal aspirated cars became then the owners of the race. The Williams of Rosberg was quite faster than the Lotus of De Angelis, and the gap of almost 5 seconds got reduced at 1.6 seconds when they started the last lap. Nor De Angelis nor Rosberg had won a race by then, and both drivers were fighting as it was no tomorrow to cross the finish line ahead of the other. The 80.000 people who witnessed that crazy last lap were to remember it for long time. 

 By the time they arrived to the Texaco chicane, Rosberg’s Williams was stuck behind the Lotus and in the last curve he looked very much to overtake the Italian… but De Angelis whit a great move made the Finn to lift but a millisecond, enough to loose momentum and to enter the main straight a bit behind. However, the Williams was still faster than the Lotus and both cars were head to head when they reached the finish line. Unfortunately for Rosberg, the distance was not long enough to pass De Angelis, and Elio won his first race… by 0.050 of a second! This would be the second closest end in F1 digital era, behind the 0.014 of a second between Mansell and Senna in Spain 1986. But that, of course, is another story. 

This story has a happy ending: Elio De Angelis got his first victory, the great constructor Colin Chapman got to see a win for his team before he died, Keke Rosberg swallowed the bitter pill of defeat but went to win next race at Dijon and the Championship at the end of the year… and Formula 1 got, at least by an instant, the fresh air of forgetting the deaths and accidents and enjoy a great show in motorsport. As it should always be.

Tyron Rubber
tyron@fts-racing.net