Portuguese Grand Prix
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| Autódromo do Estoril | |
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| Race information | |
| Laps | 70 |
|---|---|
| Circuit length | 4.360 km ( mi) |
| Race length | 305.200 km ( mi) |
| Most wins (drivers) |  Nigel Mansell (3) Alain Prost (3) |
| Most wins (constructors) | Williams (6) |
| Last race (1996): | |
| Pole position | Damon Hill Williams-Renault 1:20.330 |
| Podium | 1.  Jacques Villeneuve Williams-Renault1:40:22.915 |
| Fastest lap | Jacques Villeneuve Williams-Renault 1:22.873 |
The Portuguese Grand Prix (Grande Premio de Portugal) was a motorsports event held for several years, mostly in the 1950s and then in the 1980s and 90s. It was a Formula One race between 1958 and 1960 and between 1984 and 1996.
The first event was held on the Boavista street course in Porto on 17 June 1951 as a sports car race. The Grand Prix was moved to Monsanto Park, Lisbon, in 1954 as a one-off. The first Formula One race was held in 14 August 1958 in Boavista, followed in 1959 by a Grand Prix at Monsanto, return to Boavista in 1960, after which it was ended.
The name was resurrected for a sports car in the Cascais street circuit in 1964. The following two years, it was run for Formula Three cars.
The seeds for the return of the Portuguese Grand Prix were planted with the inauguration of the Autódromo do Estoril in 1972. The Estoril Grand Prix was held as a European Formula Two Championship event during the 1970s. In 21 October 1984, Portugal returned to the F1 calendar, ending the season, where Alain Prost won the race but failed to win the Championship by half a point. In 1985, the Grand Prix was moved to April 21 and held under heavy rain, the ideal conditions for Ayrton Senna to win his first race. From 1986, the race was held in what would become its traditional date, in the penultimate week of September.
After the deaths of Senna and Roland Ratzenberger in Imola in 1994, the Estoril track was changed, with a new chicane built in place of the tank curve, as a security measure. Estoril was then considered an unsafe and outdated track, and the last Portuguese Grand Prix was in Estoril on 22 September 1996, with Jacques Villeneuve as the winner. Estoril was planned to be the site of the 1997 European Grand Prix, but improvements to the circuit were not finished in time. Rumours exist that the race might return to the brand new Autódromo Internacional do Algarve in 2010 or 2011.
[edit] Winners of the Portuguese Grand Prix
A pink background indicates an event that was not part of the Formula One World Championship.
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