1982 Formula One World Championship

The 1982 FIA Formula One World Championship was the 36th season of FIA Formula One motor racing. It included two competitions run over the course of the year, the 33rd Formula One World Championship for Drivers and the 25th Formula One World Championship for Constructors. The season featured sixteen rounds between 23 January and 25 September. The Drivers' Championship was won by Keke Rosberg and the Constructors' Championship by Scuderia Ferrari.
The Championship started with a drivers' strike at the season opener in South Africa and saw a partial race boycott as part of the ongoing FISA–FOCA war at the San Marino Grand Prix. Two drivers died during 1982: Gilles Villeneuve during qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix and Riccardo Paletti at the start of the Canadian Grand Prix. Championship front-runner Didier Pironi also suffered a career-ending accident while qualifying for the German Grand Prix. These incidents and several other major accidents led to regulation changes to increase driver safety for the 1983 season. Motorsport journalist Nigel Roebuck later wrote that 1982 was "an ugly year, pock-marked by tragedy, by dissension, by greed, and yet, paradoxically, it produced some of the most memorable racing ever seen".
Eventual champion Rosberg won only one race all season – the Swiss Grand Prix – but consistency gave him the Drivers' Championship, five points clear of Pironi and John Watson. Rosberg was the second driver to win the championship having won only one race in the season, after Mike Hawthorn in. Eleven different drivers from seven different teams won a race during the season, with no driver winning more than twice; there was also a run of nine different winners in nine consecutive races from the Monaco Grand Prix to the Swiss Grand Prix. Ferrari, who replaced Villeneuve with Patrick Tambay and Pironi with World Champion Mario Andretti, managed to score enough points to secure the Constructors' Championship, finishing five points clear of McLaren with Renault third. Rosberg's team Williams finished fourth in the Constructors' standing a further four points behind McLaren, marking the only time since the Constructors' Championship was introduced in 1958 that a team containing the eventual Drivers' Champion finished outside the top 3 of the Constructors' standings.

Drivers and constructors

The following teams and drivers took part in the 1982 Formula One World Championship:

Team changes

All teams and constructors who had competed in returned for the new season. Brabham had entered an engine supply deal with German car manufacturer BMW for the use of their inline-four turbo engines. The team announced in January that they were committing to the use of the new BMW engine throughout the season, but after experiencing reliability problems with it, they reverted to the Cosworth DFV motor several times during the season.

Driver changes

At the end of the 1981 season, both Williams drivers, World Champion Alan Jones and Carlos Reutemann, had announced their retirement from racing. Reutemann did in fact return for 1982, competing in the first two races, before retiring unexpectedly at the end of March. Jones was replaced by Keke Rosberg, who had previously entered 36 Grands Prix, with a third-place finish as his best result.
The off season saw rumours of several former champions returning to the sport, but in the end only double World Champion Niki Lauda returned to Formula One after an absence of two years to partner John Watson at McLaren. Ferrari and Renault retained their race-winning line-ups of Gilles Villeneuve and Didier Pironi and Alain Prost and René Arnoux, respectively. At Brabham, defending World Champion Nelson Piquet remained with the team, and was partnered by Riccardo Patrese, who moved from Arrows to replace Héctor Rebaque.
The Osella team gave Riccardo Paletti his Grand Prix debut, while Toleman replaced Brian Henton with Teo Fabi, also a newcomer to Formula One. Marc Surer was hired by Arrows, but broke both his feet in pre-season testing at Kyalami. He was set to be replaced by Patrick Tambay, who was then fired after taking part in the drivers' strike at that race and the seat went to Henton. Eliseo Salazar transferred from Ensign Racing to the ATS team.
;Mid-season changes
Following Reutemann's retirement, Williams hired World Champion Mario Andretti as a one-off replacement for the United States Grand Prix West. Derek Daly then became the permanent second driver at the team, as Andretti had racing obligations in the United States to fulfill. Andretti returned with Ferrari for the last two races of the season, replacing Pironi, who had suffered career-ending injuries at the German Grand Prix. Villeneuve, who died following a crash in qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix, was replaced by Tambay starting from the Dutch Grand Prix.
At Team Lotus, Nigel Mansell missed two races due to injuries from a crash in Canada. His substitute at the Dutch Grand Prix was Roberto Moreno, who failed to qualify. Mansell attempted a comeback at Brands Hatch, but was again replaced at the French Grand Prix, this time by Geoff Lees. An accident at the race in France led Jochen Mass, already deeply shaken by the fatal crash of Villeneuve, in which he was involved, to walk away from Grand Prix racing. He was replaced at March by Rupert Keegan. Swedish driver Slim Borgudd had moved from ATS to Tyrrell in the off season, but was forced to leave the team after only three races when his sponsorship money ran out. Henton took his place from the Belgian Grand Prix onwards, as Surer returned to Arrows after his injuries had healed.

Calendar

The following rounds were included on the provisional calendars but were cancelled:

Grand Prix

Circuit

Original date

|1868dts|7 Marchnowrap|Spanish Grand Prix

Calendar changes

The Argentine Grand Prix was scheduled to take place on 7 March, but was cancelled due to lack of sponsors, as several pulled out due to uncertainty following the drivers' strike in the opening race. The Grand Prix was also cancelled due to political unrest in Argentina.
The Spanish Grand Prix was omitted from the calendar for several reasons. The Circuito del Jarama, where the race had been held the previous year, was unpopular with the drivers. In addition, the organisers had failed to pay their fees for 1981. Although the race was re-instated for 27 June after the organisers had paid off their debts to the Formula One Constructors' Association, protests from the teams over the dangerous nature, the very narrow track, and outdated facilities of the Jarama venue led to the race being cancelled.
Two new races were added to the calendar compared to 1981: the Detroit Grand Prix and the Swiss Grand Prix, the latter to be held at Dijon-Prenois in France since motor racing has been outlawed in Switzerland since the 1955 Le Mans disaster. The addition of Detroit meant that the United States hosted three Grands Prix, the only time one country had more than two races in one season until 2020, when Italy also hosted three Grands Prix.

Background

Politics

Starting in the early 1970s, Bernie Ecclestone, owner of the Brabham team, had seized control of the Formula 1 Constructors Association, later renamed Formula One Constructors' Association. In this role, he began to negotiate more lucrative contracts between the teams and the track owners, including obtaining full control over television rights for FOCA. Realising the growing influence of Ecclestone and FOCA, the sport's governing body, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile and its head, Paul Metternich, instated Frenchman Jean-Marie Balestre as the head of the Commission Sportive Internationale in 1978, which was then renamed to Fédération Internationale du Sport Automobile. FIA delegated running of the sporting regulations governing Formula One to FISA.
Over the following years, a power struggle developed between FOCA and FISA and Ecclestone and Balestre in particular. This conflict is generally referred to as the FISA–FOCA war. FOCA consisted of the majorly British constructor teams, while the manufacturer or "works" teams, together with Osella and Toleman were aligned with FISA.
The conflict came to a head at the 1980 Spanish Grand Prix, where the drivers of teams belonging to FOCA boycotted the obligatory drivers' briefing and were threatened by FISA with having their licences revoked. The race went ahead as a non-championship event, without the non-FOCA aligned teams participating.
Following an aborted attempt to establish a breakaway World Championship, FOCA agreed to the Concorde Agreement with FISA in March 1981. This agreement stipulated that all teams were obliged to attend all rounds of the championship, while at the same time settling differences over future regulation changes.

Regulation changes and technological development

Sporting regulations

The new rules for the 1982 season included an increase in the number of cars permitted to enter a Grand Prix from 30 to 34, and the number of starters from 24 to 26. To avoid having all 34 cars on the track at one time, a pre-qualifying session was introduced in which the three teams with the worst record in the previous year would compete to be allowed into qualification proper. Just as the previous year, the best eleven results from all the races counted towards the Drivers' Championship. All races counted towards the Manufacturers Championship.

Technology

In the years leading up to 1982, two major technological developments had shaped Formula One: the turbocharged engine and "ground effect". In, Lotus had revolutionised aerodynamics in Formula One by introducing the Lotus 78, known as the "wing car". The car used what is commonly referred to as "ground effect", with the physical principle applied being the "Venturi effect". The sides of the underside of the car would be shut off with skirts to trap the under-pressure airflow underneath the car, effectively "sucking" the vehicle to the ground. This led to increased cornering speeds, but at the same time brought implications that had an adverse effect on the drivers' safety. Moveable skirts were thus banned in 1981, accompanied by a minimum ride height for the cars of, targeted at minimising the "ground effect" and to reduce cornering speed.
For 1982, both regulations were reversed as a result of the new Concorde Agreement. The skirts around the underpart of the chassis, which locked the airflow underneath the car, necessitated very stiff suspensions to work properly. This meant that every bump on track was putting enormous strain on the drivers, shaking them around in the cockpit. Additionally, the cornering speed and the resulting high g-forces put pressure on both the drivers and the cars' suspensions, making them prone to breaking. The cars would also move up and down on the road, in an effect called "porpoising", making the cars very hard to control. These adverse effects were particularly impactful at bumpy circuits, such as Jacarepaguá, where Riccardo Patrese retired due to exhaustion. Other drivers reported dizziness and blurred vision.
File:Keke Rosberg 1982 British GP.jpg|thumb|The Cosworth DFV-powered Williams FW08 was the last naturally aspirated car used to win the Drivers' Championship until. Pictured here is eventual World Champion Keke Rosberg at the British Grand Prix.|alt=Sideview of a white Williams racing car going through a corner during a race
The potentially dangerous implications of "ground effect" were only worsened by the advent of very powerful turbocharged engines. In 1977, Renault had introduced the first turbocharged engine into the sport with their Renault RS01. The regulations at the time allowed for either three-litre normally aspirated or 1.5-litre turbocharged engines, with Renault being the first to attempt to go the latter route. Over the next few seasons, the turbo engines proved fast, yet unreliable. The cars also suffered from an effect often labelled "turbo lag", meaning that a significant and indeterminable time gap existed between applying the throttle of the car and the point when the full power of the turbo was taking effect. This made the turbo cars very difficult to drive. In, Renault took the first victory with a turbo-charged engine. In 1981, Ferrari had followed them by introducing their own turbo engine. Additionally, the Toleman team also used turbo engines for 1982, supplied by Hart, while Brabham started using turbocharged BMW engines at some, but not all, rounds that year.
Alfa Romeo retained what motorsport writer Doug Nye called the most powerful three-litre engine seen in Formula One at that time, with. They tested their turbocharged V8 engine during practice for the Italian Grand Prix, but did not race with it until. Most FOCA teams still relied upon the Cosworth DFV engine, which had been introduced by Lotus in.
In 1981, McLaren had built the first monocoque car from carbon fibre composite. This resulted in lighter cars, while at the same time being more rigid. McLaren had proven that carbon-fibre cars could be quick, with John Watson winning the 1981 British Grand Prix. Watson's lack of severe injuries following a severe accident at that year's Italian Grand Prix had shown the superiority of the material in terms of safety. Lotus followed suit for 1982, introducing carbon fibre for their Lotus 91.
Even with these effective technical advances in chassis design, the FOCA teams with a Cosworth DFV motor had a significant power disadvantage compared to the constructors who used a turbocharged engine. To counteract this, the non-turbo teams used a loophole in the regulations. The weight of the car was measured before and after the race, with oil and cooling liquids allowed to be refilled before the final weigh-in. The teams would therefore build their cars lighter than allowed by the regulations and added water tanks, which they claimed were used to cool brake temperatures, but in reality the water was dumped on the track as soon as the car left the pitlane, allowing them to run faster. Keke Rosberg later explained that "the water tank was the one that gave us at least a theoretical chance to compete with the turbos." In other regulation changes, the minimum weight of the cars was reduced from to. A new "driver survival cell" cockpit protection was made mandatory as well.
Four companies, Goodyear, Michelin, Pirelli, and Avon, supplied tyres, including special qualifying tyres with an increased grip level. These qualifying tyres had originally been banned in, but had since been reallowed. For the first time the number of tyres permitted for qualification was limited to two sets per session, creating a situation which Villeneuve thought "...unnecessarily dangerous. If I have only two chances to set a time, I need a clear track, OK? If it isn't clear, if there's someone in my way, I just have to hope he's looking in his mirrors – I mean, I can't lift, because this is my last chance." The necessity of having a clear track to make the most of the short-lasting qualifying tyres led to drivers taking risks, further increasing the danger.