1985 French Grand Prix

  1985 French Grand Prix

Race details
Race 7 of 16 in the 1985 Formula One season
Date	July 3, 1985
Location	Paul Ricard Circuit
Course	Permanent racing facility 5.148 km (3.199 mi)
Distance	67 laps, 344.916 km (214.333 mi)
Weather	Dry
Pole position
Driver	Keke Rosberg	Williams-Honda
Time	1:32.462
Fastest lap
Driver	Keke Rosberg	Williams-Honda
Time	1:39.914 on lap 46
Podium
First	Nelson Piquet	Brabham-BMW
Second	Keke Rosberg	Williams-Honda
Third	Alain Prost	McLaren-TAG

The 1985 French Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Paul Ricard on July 7, 1985. It was the seventh round of the 1985 Formula One season. It was the 63rd French Grand Prix and the ninth to be held at Paul Ricard. The race was held over 67 laps of the five kilometre circuit for a total race distance of 345 kilometres.

This was the last time the entire Paul Ricard circuit was used for the French Grand Prix. In 1986 a shorter version was used after Elio De Angelis' fatal accident during a test session.

Nelson Piquet won the race driving a Brabham BT54. It turned out to be the Brabham team's last victory in Formula One. It was also the first Grand Prix victory since their return to Formula One for Italian tyre manufacturer Pirelli. Piquet won the race by six seconds over Finnish driver Keke Rosberg driving a Williams FW10. Third was French driver Alain Prost driving a McLaren MP4/2B. Prost's podium finish allowed him to close to within five points of championship leader Michele Alboreto.

Qualifying

Williams-Honda driver and 1982 World Champion Keke Rosberg broke the Lotus-Renault stranglehold on 1985 pole positions by putting the FW10 on pole position at Paul Ricard, averaging 140.561 mph (226.612 km/h). Ayrton Senna was second in his Lotus followed by the Ferrari of Michele Alboreto and the McLaren of Alain Prost. The third row of the grid was taken by the first of the Pirelli runners in Nelson Piquet while defending World Champion (and 1984 French Grand Prix winner) Niki Lauda rounded out the top six.

Nigel Mansell had an accident at Signes during practice, and he suffered a concussion which kept him out of the race. Mansell had broken the record for the fastest accident in Formula One history at 200 mph.

The BMW M12 straight 4cyl engine, rated at about 1,000 bhp (746 kW; 1,014 PS), showed its worth on the 1.8km long Mistral Straight, the most distinguishing feature of the Paul Ricard Circuit, when it propelled the Brabham BT54 of Marc Surer to a season fastest 338 km/h (210 mph) during qualifying.

The French Grand Prix also marked the first time the Tyrrell team used the Renault turbocharged engine with Martin Brundle having use of it for the race mounted in a new Tyrrell 014 chassis while team mate Stefan Bellof still used the Cosworth DFV powered Tyrrell 012. It allowed Brundle to qualify some four seconds faster than his team mate.

Funnily enough after all this wait it doesn't seem as quick as I expected. Mind you I don't know why I say that because on one lap I came onto the Mistral Straight about 100 yards behind Bellof in the Cosworth car - and by the end of it he was literally just a tiny speck in my mirrors.

—Martin Brundle, after qualifying for the first time with the turbo engine.

Tyrrell were the last F1 team to change from a naturally aspirated engine to a turbocharged engine having done a deal with Renault in late 1984 but the new Tyrrell 014 was not ready until this race.

Race

Ayrton Senna had a huge accident at the extremely fast Signes corner at the end of the long Mistral straight when his Lotus's Renault engine blew up, slipped on his own oil that was leaking onto the rear tyres, spun backwards at extremely high speed and went into the catch fencing and the Armco guard-rails. He emerged unscathed albeit a few bruises.

Keke Rosberg overtook Alain Prost on the last lap but the computers recording the final results listed Prost finishing second ahead of Rosberg in third.

Classification

Qualifying

Pos	No	Driver	Constructor	Q1	Q2	Gap
1	6	Keke Rosberg	Williams-Honda	1:33.484	1:32.462	—
2	12	Ayrton Senna	Lotus-Renault	1:32.835	1:33.677	+0.373
3	27	Michele Alboreto	Ferrari	1:35.421	1:33.267	+0.805
4	2	Alain Prost	McLaren-TAG	1:33.547	1:33.335	+0.873
5	7	Nelson Piquet	Brabham-BMW	1:33.981	1:33.812	+1.350
6	1	Niki Lauda	McLaren-TAG	1:33.860	1:34.166	+1.398
7	11	Elio de Angelis	Lotus-Renault	1:34.022	1:34.227	+1.560
8	17	Gerhard Berger	Arrows-BMW	1:34.674	1:37.445	+2.212
9	15	Patrick Tambay	Renault	1:34.680	1:36.339	+2.218
10	16	Derek Warwick	Renault	1:34.976	1:35.190	+2.514
11	18	Thierry Boutsen	Arrows-BMW	1:36.051	1:35.488	+3.026
12	25	Andrea de Cesaris	Ligier-Renault	1:37.335	1:35.571	+3.109
13	8	Marc Surer	Brabham-BMW	1:35.572	1:35.640	+3.110
14	26	Jacques Laffite	Ligier-Renault	1:38.173	1:36.133	+3.671
15	28	Stefan Johansson	Ferrari	1:37.546	1:36.140	+3.678
16	22	Riccardo Patrese	Alfa Romeo	1:36.729	1:38.745	+4.267
17	23	Eddie Cheever	Alfa Romeo	1:36.931	1:38.489	+4.469
18	19	Teo Fabi	Toleman-Hart	1:37.142	1:37.657	+4.680
19	9	Manfred Winkelhock	RAM-Hart	1:37.654	1:45.628	+5.192
20	3	Martin Brundle	Tyrrell-Renault	1:40.486	1:40.015	+7.553
21	30	Jonathan Palmer	Zakspeed	1:40.647	1:40.289	+7.827
22	10	Philippe Alliot	RAM-Hart	1:41.647	1:44.221	+9.185
23	24	Piercarlo Ghinzani	Osella-Alfa Romeo	1:42.136	1:42.968	+9.674
24	29	Pierluigi Martini	Minardi-Motori Moderni	1:47.523	1:44.350	+11.888
25	5	Stefan Bellof	Tyrrell-Ford	1:44.404	1:45.478	+11.942
DNS	5	Nigel Mansell	Williams-Honda	1:34.191		+1.729

Race

Pos	No	Driver	Constructor	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Points
1	7	Nelson Piquet	Brabham-BMW	53	1:31:46.266	5	9
2	6	Keke Rosberg	Williams-Honda	53	+ 6.660	1	6
3	2	Alain Prost	McLaren-TAG	53	+ 9.285	4	4
4	28	Stefan Johansson	Ferrari	53	+ 53.491	16	3
5	11	Elio de Angelis	Lotus-Renault	53	+ 53.690	7	2
6	15	Patrick Tambay	Renault	53	+ 1:15.167[1]	10	1
7	16	Derek Warwick	Renault	53	+ 1:44.212	11
8	8	Marc Surer	Brabham-BMW	52	+ 1 Lap	14
9	18	Thierry Boutsen	Arrows-BMW	52	+ 1 Lap	12
10	23	Eddie Cheever	Alfa Romeo	52	+ 1 Lap	18
11	22	Riccardo Patrese	Alfa Romeo	52	+ 1 Lap	17
12	9	Manfred Winkelhock	RAM-Hart	50	+ 3 Laps	20
13	4	Stefan Bellof	Tyrrell-Ford	50	+ 3 Laps	26
14	19	Teo Fabi	Toleman-Hart	49	Fuel System	19
15	24	Piercarlo Ghinzani	Osella-Alfa Romeo	49	+ 4 Laps	24
Ret	3	Martin Brundle	Tyrrell-Renault	32	Gearbox	21
Ret	1	Niki Lauda	McLaren-TAG	30	Gearbox	6
Ret	12	Ayrton Senna	Lotus-Renault	26	Engine, accident[2]	2
Ret	17	Gerhard Berger	Arrows-BMW	20	Accident	9
Ret	29	Pierluigi Martini	Minardi-Motori Moderni	19	Accident	25
Ret	10	Philippe Alliot	RAM-Hart	8	Fuel System	23
Ret	30	Jonathan Palmer	Zakspeed	6	Engine	22
Ret	27	Michele Alboreto	Ferrari	5	Turbo	3
Ret	25	Andrea de Cesaris	Ligier-Renault	4	Steering	13
Ret	26	Jacques Laffite	Ligier-Renault	2	Turbo	15
DNS	5	Nigel Mansell	Williams-Honda	0	Injury	8

Lap leaders

• Race leaders: Keke Rosberg (1-10), Nelson Piquet (11-53)

Standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings Pos Driver Points 1 Michele Alboreto 31 2 Alain Prost 26 3 Elio de Angelis 26 4 Keke Rosberg 18 5 Stefan Johansson 16

Constructors' Championship standings Pos Constructor Points 1 Ferrari 50 2 Lotus-Renault 35 3 McLaren-TAG 29 4 Williams-Honda 23 5 Renault 13

• Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.

References

Unless otherwise indicated, all race results are taken from "The Official Formula 1 website". http://www.formula1.com/results/season/1985/301/. Retrieved 2007-06-17.