That ‘70s F1!
I was so excited to finally tell you about the 70s in F1. It took me a while because there is much more material available and the number of races per season increased compared to the 50s and 60s.
In the 70s, the seasons had an average of 15 races. This means that regularity and reliability continued to be the key factors of this sport.
The 70s are eventful…
Starting with the only posthumous champion of all F1 history: Jochen Rindt had a fatal accident four races before the end of the season and even though, he won the 1970 championship.
Two engines were successful: The Ferrari 12-cylinder 3.0 boxer engine conquered four titles and the Ford Cosworth DFV V8 3.0 engine won six titles. In addition, Renault brought a turbocharged 1.5 engine by the end of the decade, it had lots of reliability issues!
Safety came into attention as well: tire barriers, colored flags, and other devices started being used in most races. The safety car had an appearance in 1973 but it was only officially introduced in 1993. Also in 1973, the warm-up lap was introduced, making the starting grid more organized.
The famous Lauda accident in Nurburgring takes place in 1976, making the battle for the title with Hunt last until the final race. Also during this year, Tyrrel brought the 6-wheeler concept: they won a single race and some years later the rules changed to cars strictly with 4 wheels.
Ground effect was also introduced in the 70s, with the Lotus 78. For me, it was the most good-looking car of the 70s and one of the most beautiful F1 cars ever.
And what about the races?
I must confess… the 70s are amazing to watch. In 1974, Fittipaldi (McLaren) and Regazoni (Ferrari) arrive at the last race with the same amount of points. Only in 2021, the history have repeated itself.
The 1971 Monza Grand Prix is one of the closest F1 finishes ever. The gap between first and second places was 0,011s and you can watch it here.
In general, there are a lot of wheel-to-wheel battles, awesome overtakes, and hundreds of laps of cars right behind each other. If you consider watching old F1 races, go for that 70s F1 show.
Even though, the championship battles did not translate into these amazing races. Most of the seasons were decided by some races before the ending.
Here you find a summary of the 70s season:
1970 — Jochen Rindt (Lotus) is the only posthumous F1 champion. He won 5 out of 13 races before dying in Monza, four races before the end of the season. Jacky Ickx and Clay Regazoni struggled with reliability and the rookie Lotus driver, Emerson Fittipaldi, made a brilliant debut guaranteeing the title to the former team-mate.
For the only time in Formula 1, there is a streak of seven different champions in a roll (1964–1970).
1971 — Jackie Stewart (Tyrrel-Ford) conquers his second title by winning 6 out of 11 races, securing the title four races in advance. Even though, the championship has good and battled races.
1972 — Emerson Fittipaldi (Lotus) wins his first title. He won 6/12 races and had the most reliable car by far. The races were also good. Jackie Stewart started the championship stronger, but Fittipaldi surpassed him in the 3rd race and secured the title with two races to spare.
1973 — Jackie Stewart (Tyrrel-Ford) wins his third title and retires after this season. He managed to win 5 out of 15 races, while Fittipaldi claimed only 3 victories. The Brazilian led the championship until the 7th round but his Lotus suffered from reliability issues.
1974 — Fittipaldi (McLaren) wins his second title and the first for Team McLaren. But this was no easy task. The title was fiercely disputed until the last race, where Fittipaldi and Clay Regazoni arrived with the same number of points.
It is believed that Fittipaldi is the father of the tire blankets. During a race in Canada, he had an idea to warm up his tires in McLaren’s trailer and got really good results during qualifying. His engineers later came up with a device that would maintain an optimal tire temperature before fitting them into the car.
1975 — Niki Lauda (Ferrari) wins his first title with a magnificent car. The McLaren from Fittipaldi had a better season start but failed to keep the pace. Lauda managed to win 5/15 races and was more consistent than the Brazilian driver.
1976 — James Hunt (McLaren) wins his only title in an eventful season that later was transformed into the Rush movie. However, there are few wheel-to-wheel battles between Lauda and Hunt, the championship contenders. Lauda led by far the championship until the 10th round when he almost died in his Nurburgring crash.
Ferrari’s second driver, Clay Regazoni, failed to keep the team on top while Lauda was in recovery. This made a huge difference since Hunt managed to shrink the difference by 3 points at the last race of the season.
Lauda abandoned the last race due to the bad weather and Hunt got the points he needed to be crowned champion.
1977 — Niki Lauda (Ferrari) claims his second title two races in advance. and winning just 3 out of 17 races. Mario Andretti won 4 races in total and finished the season in fourth. In fact, the championship was balanced between Lauda, Scheckter, and Andretti until the 10th round. Then Lauda became more regular and scored the necessary points to finally cut his relationship with Ferrari and don’t compete for the team in the last two races.
The season had excellent drivers (Lauda, Hunt, Scheckter, Andretti, Laffite) and competitive teams (Ferrari, McLaren, Wolf, Lotus, Ligier) that together achieve numerous pole positions, fast laps, victories, and fierce battles.
1978 — Mario Andretti (Lotus) finally conquers his first title by winning 6/16 races. His Lotus 79 is incredibly superior, his teammate Ronnie Peterson finishes second in the championship.
Peterson made awesome races coming from the back of the field, but unfortunately, he was involved in a fatal accident in Monza which guaranteed the championship for his teammate.
Brabham and Ferrari also made good races. By the end of the season, the turbocharged Renault car appeared in the front rows.
1979- Jody Scheckter (Ferrari) won his only title. Ferrari would see a championship again only in 2001 with Schumacher. Actually, the Ligiers started the season in front, it was only by the 6th race that Scheckter took the lead in the championship.
Once again, regularity makes world champions! Scheckter and his team-mate, Villeneuve, won 3 races each. But Scheckter managed to score points in 12 of the 15 races, while Villeneuve did the same in only 8 races.
In fact, Alan Jones (Williams) achieved 4 amazing wins during this season but retired on 7 occasions. Brabhams, Williams, Renaults, and Ligiers made awesome races but failed to finish most of them!
I can say that the 70s seasons were not as disputed as the races themselves. Nonetheless, I truly recommend you to spend some hours understanding how the 70s were to F1!
See you in the 80s, my friends!
