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Frogs on the grid

28. Oct 2021 
by Ziv Knoll
5865 views

The 1980 Belgian Grand Prix was held at Zolder on the 4th of May 1980. It was the 5th round of the season. No less than 7 French drivers appeared on the starting grid: Pironi and Laffite drove for Ligier, Jabouille and Arnoux for Renault, Jarier was at Tyrrell, Depailler drove for Alfa Romeo and young up and coming Prost, in his debut season in F1, drove a McLaren.

Picture above : Pironi, Jarier and Prost, joyful on the pitwall, minutes before the start.

The race was won by Didier Pironi, driving a Ligier JS11/15. It was Pironi’s first Grand Prix victory. The Frenchman won by 47 seconds over Australian Alan Jones (Williams FW07B), the eventual 1980 world champion.

Jean-Pierre Jarier (picture below) qualified 9th and drove a good race to finish 5th in his Tyrrell, while Alain Prost had to retire his McLaren on lap 29 with transmission problems.

Source: DR

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