Sadly, in appalling conditions in practice, he hit Alain Prost's Renault and the Ferrari cartwheeled to destruction, ending Pironi's career. But a string of podium finishes had taken Pironi into a nine-point lead when he arrived at Hockenheim for the German GP, round 12 of 16. Gilles Villeneuve was killed in a terrible qualifying crash at the Belgian GP, while Osella driver Riccardo Paletti died when he struck the back of Didier Pironi's stalled Ferrari at the start of the Canadian GP. The car was certainly not Ferrari's luckiest. Renault's RE30B and the Brabham-BMW BT50 were often faster, but lacked the Ferrari's reliability. That came courtesy of Harvey Postlethwaite's 126C2, which won the constructors' championship in 1982.Īside from the ill-starred 1973 312B3, the 126C2 was Ferrari's first full monocoque F1 chassis and the first to successfully utilise ground-effects. Renault led the way with turbocharged engines at the end of the 1970s, but failed to capitalise and Ferrari was the first constructor to take an F1 title with a turbo. That meant the end of the 375's career outside of non-points-paying events, but it had very much made its mark. The smaller rubber could not stand the strain and Fangio was left to win the race and title.Īlfa withdrew at the end of the season and, with BRM's F1 project still failing, the decision was made to switch the world championship to F2 regulations for 1952. It was Ascari who tended to lead the charge, however, and two wins brought him within two points of Alfa's Juan Manuel Fangio heading into the Spanish GP finale.Īscari qualified on pole and led early on, but Ferrari's decision to change the specification of its wheels proved catastrophic. Having scored several more podiums in 1951, the 375 finally defeated the Alfa Romeo team on a historic day at Silverstone, Jose Froilan Gonzalez winning the British GP. Alberto Ascari and Dorino Serafini finished second, albeit over a minute behind the winning Alfa. Aurelio Lampredi was brought in to develop a series of bigger-engined Ferraris and the 4.5-litre 375 first appeared at the 1950 Italian GP, the final round of the season. But it had been noted that the increasingly developed 1.5-litre supercharged straight-eight engine was incredibly thirsty, with multiple stops being required to complete a race distance.īig, unblown Talbot-Lagos had proved reasonably effective and Enzo Ferrari decided to try the unsupercharged route. But whereas the 641 failed to achieve what it was designed to do - win a world title - the 375 is the car that made Ferrari a world championship F1 race victor.Īlfa Romeo's 158, a successful voiturette (very roughly equivalent to Formula 2) before the Second World War, had been the grand prix car to beat following the end of hostilities.Īutosport 70: Remembering Formula 1's first great racing machineĪlfa skipped the 1949 season, during which Ferrari proved successful, but when Alfa returned in 1950 it was still clear of the pack - and hadn't been beaten since 1946. This spot had to go to the 375, which scored Ferrari's first world championship GP victory, or the 641, one of the best-looking F1 cars of all time.īoth narrowly missed out on titles and both won major GPs in the hands of two of the best drivers of their era. Note: Wins are world championship grand prix wins, non-championship successes are not included. To create this top 10 we considered a number of factors, including the level of success each car scored, how important it was for Ferrari, and how iconic they are.Īnd for those with long memories, yes, we know that the Ferrari 500 was an F2 car, but its 1952-53 starts are included in the 1000, so the car is eligible for our list. That means that Formula 1's most famous team has produced a lot of candidates for this list. From its 999 outings so far Ferrari has scored 238 grands prix wins, 15 drivers' titles and 16 constructors' crowns.
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