Always on the edge

Ferrari introduced a heavily updated version of the championship winning 312T4 for the 1980 season. The Ferrari 312T5 was driven by 1979 World Champion Jody Scheckter and by the formidable Gilles Villeneuve.

This 312T5 was a terrible failure as its wide 12 cylinder “Boxer” engine was not ideal to generate enough ground effect to compete against the teams using the narrow V8 Cosworth DFV.

The car was unreliable, slow, and ineffective and for the first time since 1973, Ferrari did not win a race for an entire season, and the team finished 10th in the Constructors’ Championship.

Jody Scheckter, the reigning World Champion, soon lost motivation and even failed to qualify in Canada and, after only managing to score two points, retired from the sport at the end of the year.

Gilles Villeneuve was heroic, always on the edge trying to squeeze whatever he could from his car, scored 6 points only, but out- qualified his team-mate all season, like at Monaco (picture above and under) where he qualified 6th, a full second quicker than Scheckter only 17th.