Grand Prix Insider

23rd of May – Yesterday I recalled Riccardo Patrese’s first ever Grand Prix start. And today is the anniversary of the Italian’s first Grand Prix win back in 1982, coincidentally also in Monaco, now at the wheel of a competitive Brabham BT49D. For once it was a good thing for Riccardo to be the team’s number two as team-mate had to struggle around the principality with the lag in response of the BMW turbo engine, whereas the BT49D was quick, nimble, an outright winner.

23/5/1972, Rubens Gonçalves Barrichello is born in São Paulo, Brazil.

Barrichello grew up in the Interlagos neighbourhood of São Paulo and his dream one day driving a Formula 1 car around the track came true in 1993. The British Formula 3 champion got signed up by Eddie Jordan’s F1 team after a season in F3000. He scored his first World Championship point at Suzuka where he finished fifth, just ahead of his new team mate Eddie Irvine. After a huge accident in practice for the San Marino GP at Imola, two days later came the shock of Ayrton Senna’s accident, his friend and mentor, was killed on race Sunday. At Spa he had overcome the sorrow and took pole position. Rubens finished second in the 1995 Canadian GP but the Peugeot engines hampered the team’s performance. Barrichello then headed for the new Stewart-Ford team, taking second place behind Michael Schumacher in the rain at Monaco in what was the team’s fifth race. Another pole position at the French GP in 1999, three podiums and a number of other placings to took him to seventh place in the Drivers’ title that year.

Joining Ferrari in 2000 as Michael Schumacher’s team-mate he finally took his first win at the German GP finishing fourth in the World Championship. In the years that have followed he has been a convincing number two at Ferrari, winning when Schumacher runs into trouble or when team orders allowed him to do so. Everything would be fine, hadn’t Rubinho made statements denying his number two status and insisted in promising to fight for the title. He increased his total of poles to 13 and his tally of wins to 9 by the end of 2005. But his constant complaints being in disadvantage to Schumacher, notably after the Monaco and the US-GP finally made Jean Todt tell him he had the choice to leave by the end of the year or being fired immediately for breach of contract. Todt obviously was aiming already to replace him with his protegé Felipe Massa and would have used Rubens’ public statements to make the switch. Frustrated and offended, Barrichello signed for Honda’s F1 team denying any comment about the episode and keeps hoping for his big break with the Japanese since 2006.

23/5/1903, Ernst Klodwig is born in East-Berlin, German Democratic Republic.

Ernst Klodwig was a front-runner in the East German Championship with his self-built rear engined special. The government allowed him to take part in two German Grand Prix appearances in the West, 1952 and 1953, and that’s when Klodwig entered F1 stats as the first driver ever to race a rear engined car in the World Championship.

Born: 23rd of May 1903 in Berlin, German Democratic Republic
Died: 15th of April 1973 in Hamburg, Federal Republic of Germany

23/5/1940, Gérard Larrousse is born in Lyon, France.

Larrousse was quite a competent all-round racer winning the 1971 Sebring 12 Hours, sharing a works-Porsche 917 with Vic Elford. That year he also won the Tour de France automobile, driving a Matra MS660. Aside some rallying with a 911, he was also a Ford factory driver in touring cars in 1972 and in 1973 moved to Matra Sports to be one of the factory sportscar drivers. He won at Vallelunga, Dijon, Zeltweg and Watkins Glen to help Matra to win the World Championship but, most importantly, he shared victory in the Le Mans 24 Hours with Henri Pescarolo. That success was repeated in 1974.

In 1974 he also made a brief entry into Formula 1 at the wheel of a Bretscher Team Brabham BT42 in the Belgian Grand Prix at Nivelles. It was his only Grand Prix start. In 1975 he established the Elf Switzerland Formula 2 team and, with Jabouille driving, won the European F2 Championship and won the Hockenheim Formula 2 race, driving one of his own cars. At the end of 1976 he was appointed competition manager of the new Renault Sport, which was formed by a merger of Alpine and Renault-Gordini. He masterminded the company’s entry into Formula 1 racing, and its victory in the Le Mans 24 Hours and the Monte Carlo Rally. The Renault Sport Formula 1 team won 15 Grands Prix but failed to win the World Championship and at the end of 1985 was closed down.

After Renault’s withdrawal Larrousse went to work with Ligier for a year and then set up his own Formula 1 team in partnership with Didier Calmels. The Larrousse team organised a deal for chassis with Lola Cars and entered F1 in the normally-aspirated class within the turbo engines dominated scene. The team seemd better off when turbos wre prohibited and achieved brief success with Lamborghini V12 engines in 1990 but financial troubles were a constant problem and Larrousse had a string of unsuccessful partnerships in the early 1990s before the team was forced to give up F1 in 1995. Since then Larrousse has run a number of other sportscar teams.