Ronnie Peterson
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| Ronnie Peterson | |
| Nationality |  Swedish |
|---|---|
| World Championship Career | |
| Active years | 1970 - 1978 |
| Team(s) | March, Tyrrell, Lotus, privateer March |
| Races | 123 |
| Championships | 0 |
| Wins | 10 |
| Podium finishes | 26 |
| Pole positions | 14 |
| Fastest laps | 9 |
| First race | 1970 Monaco Grand Prix |
| First win | 1973 French Grand Prix |
| Last win | 1978 Austrian Grand Prix |
| Last race | 1978 Italian Grand Prix |
Bengt Ronnie Peterson, (IPA: [rɔniə petɛʂon], February 14, 1944 - September 11, 1978) was a Swedish racing driver.
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[edit] Early life
Ronnie Peterson was born in Örebro, in the neighbourhood of Almby, Sweden. He developed his driving style at a young age, when he was competing in karting, and carried this style forward into Formula 1. He rapidly worked his way up to the pinnacle of European karting, and from there made the switch to cars.
[edit] Formulas Three and Two
After his karting years, Ronnie Peterson entered Formula Three racing in the Svebe, a 1L, Brabham-derived Formula car he co-designed with his father Bengt, who by day made his living as a baker, and Sven Andersson. Superb results from the outset quickly attracted the attention of the ambitious Tecno company from Italy, and he signed to race with them from 1968. The pairing produced some fine results, with Peterson and Tecno winning the 1969 Formula Three Championship.
Even after his elevation to F1 status, as was common at the time, Peterson still drove in lesser formulae. In 1971 he won the European Formula Two Championship driving for March.
[edit] Formula One
[edit] Early years
Peterson made his Grand Prix debut, driving a March for Colin Crabbe's works-supported Antique Automobiles Racing Team, at Monaco in 1970. Unfortunately, the March 701, despite being the same chassis as that year's Champion Jackie Stewart was equipped with, was not suited to Peterson's driving style, and the limited budget of Crabbe's privateer team did not allow the Cosworth DFV motor to be properly maintained. In 1971 Peterson moved up to the full March works team, and made an instant impression. Five Formula One Grand Prix second places earned him the position of runner-up to Jackie Stewart in that year's World Championship. Peterson stayed at March until 1973, when he signed for John Player Team Lotus to partner Emerson Fittipaldi.
[edit] 1973 - 1976
His first Grand Prix win was at the 1973 French Grand Prix, held at Paul Ricard, in a Lotus 72. There were three more wins that year, in Austria, Italy and the United States, but poor reliability restricted him to only third place in the World Championship at season's end.
1974 yielded three more victories, France and Italy again, but also at Monaco, the blue riband event of Formula One. After a bad year with Lotus in 1975, in which the Lotus 76 proved a failure and he reverted to driving the 72F, Peterson drove the first two races of 1976 in the Lotus 77 before rejoining March Engineering, with whom he won yet again in Italy, driving their 761.
[edit] 1977 - 1978
Another poor year in 1977 with the six-wheel Tyrrell P34B followed, a third place at the Belgian Grand Prix being his best result. Peterson surprised many by leaving Tyrrell to return to his spiritual home at John Player Team Lotus for 1978. Two wins followed, in South Africa he took a close last lap victory over Patrick Depailler and then he won in Austria, in the innovative 'ground effects' Lotus 79.
[edit] Death
The 1978 Italian Grand Prix at Monza started badly for Ronnie, when in practice he damaged his Lotus 79 race car beyond immediate repair and bruising his legs in the process. Team Lotus possessed a spare 79, but it had been constructed for team-mate Mario Andretti, and the taller Peterson was unable to fit comfortably inside. The team's only other car was a type 78, the previous year's car, which had been dragged around the F1 circuit that season with minimal maintenance.
Come racing time, the grid lined up as normal. The race starter, however, was overenthusiastic and several cars in the middle of the field got a jump on those at the front. The result was a funneling effect of the cars approaching the chicane, as a result the cars were tightly bunched together with little room for manoeuvre. James Hunt collided with Peterson, with Riccardo Patrese, Vittorio Brambilla, Hans-Joachim Stuck, Patrick Depailler, Didier Pironi, Derek Daly, Clay Regazzoni and Brett Lunger were all involved in the ensuing melee. (Later on, Hunt, among other drivers, unjustly blamed Patrese for starting the accident, and viewers of Hunt's commentaries of Formula 1 races from 1980-1993 on BBC Television were regularly treated to bitter diatribes of Patrese when the Italian appeared on screen).
Peterson's Lotus went into the barriers hard and caught fire. He was trapped, but Hunt, Regazzoni and Depailler managed to free him from the wreck before he received more than minor burns. He was dragged free and laid in the middle of the track fully conscious, his severe leg injuries obvious to all (Hunt later said he stopped Peterson from looking at his legs to spare him further distress). Violating safety requirements it took 20 minutes before the Italian circuit dispatched medical help to the scene. At the time, there was more concern for their fellow-Italian Brambilla (a native of Monza), who had been hit on the head by a flying wheel and was slumped comatose in his car (he later recovered and drove on in F1 until 1980). Peterson's life was not, however, seen to be in any danger. The injured drivers were taken to hospital in Milan and, after a major cleanup job, the race was restarted.
At the hospital, Peterson's X-rays showed he had 7 fractures in one leg and 3 in the other. After discussion with Ronnie himself, the surgeons decided to operate to stabilise the bones.
Unfortunately, during the night, bone marrow had got into Peterson's bloodstream through the fractures, forming fat globules on his major organs including lungs, liver, and brain. By daybreak he was in full renal failure and was declared dead a few hours later. The cause of death was given as fat embolism.
The tragedy is that Peterson's life would most likely have been saved had he received medical attention immediately after his accident.
Ronnie Peterson ran a total of 123 Grand Prix races during his career and was the winner in ten of them. He is arguably the greatest driver, along with Stirling Moss and Gilles Villeneuve, never to have won the Formula One World Championship.
[edit] Complete World Championship results
(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)
[edit] Trivia
According to the shops selling flowers in Örebro, there has never been an Örebro funeral with more flowers than the one of Ronnie Peterson. Furthermore, there is a statue of Ronnie Peterson in Örebro, by Richard Brixel. The same artist was asked in 2005 to make a statue of racing driver Ayrton Senna from São Paulo, who had also died during a Grand Prix.
Ronnie Peterson married former top model Barbro Edwardsson in April 1975 and their first child, a daughter, Nina-Louise, was born later that year. Barbro never got over his death and committed suicide on December 19, 1987. She was buried, alongside Ronnie, in the Peterson family grave in Örebro.
[edit] References
Nyberg, R. & Diepraam, M. 2000. Super Swede. 8W, January 2000.
[edit] External links
| Preceded by Clay Regazzoni |
European Formula Two Champion 1971 |
Succeeded by Mike Hailwood |
| Preceded by Tom Pryce |
Formula One fatal accidents Sept. 10, 1978 |
Succeeded by Patrick Depailler |
