1985 Formula 1 European Grand Prix

The 1985 Formula One European Grand Prix held at Brands Hatch on October 6, 1985.

Nigel Mansell in the Williams Honda takes his first Grand Prix victory in front of the home crowd with Alain Prost finishing fourth to take the World Championship. John Watson returns for a one-off drive with McLaren after a 2 year absense in what will be his last GP.

Have a look at Keke Rosberg blocking Senna for nearly 2 laps after a coming together then goes on from a lap down to take 3rd place! Alboreto has a great turbo fire (those were the days when you could count on a Ferrari engine blowing up!). Jaques Laffite makes a brief appearance in the top 6 and takes fastest lap before his Ligier expires, and Marc Surer in the BMW Brabham has a spectacular turbo blow up.

The sleek, streamlined Brabham looks amazing compared with other cars and the simple blue/white colour scheme shows it off to best effect. This is in contrast to the McLaren which seems especially “fat”!

For those with a keen eye you should spot Ron Dennis (with some hair) of McLaren right at the end holding up a pit board with “Prost P1”

For full race stats see Wikipedia or Forix.

1985 Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix

The 1985 Formula One Italian Grand Prix held at Monza on September 8, 1985.

The previous week had seen the tragic and untimely death of Stefan Bellof at Spa in a 1000km sportscar race and there is a brief tribute at the start from Ken Tyrell who was running Stefan this year.

It’s interesting to see the cars sliding around so much during the first couple of laps, particularly through “curva grande” and the “lesmos” and notice how the circuit has changed during the last 20 years. I’d completely forgotten the first chicane was a left/right and the “lesmos” look great with the turbo cars going through.

Listen out for Mansell’s very sick Williams Honda early on and notice Stefan Johansson thumbing a lift back to the pits with Elio de Angelis just after the finish. Alan Jones also makes a brief appearance in the Beatrice Lola Hart after been tempted out of retirement.

The full video is 27 minutes with commentary from Murray Walker and James Hunt.

For full race stats visit Wikipedia or Forix.

1986 Formula 1 Grand Prix of Mexico

I hope this will be the first of many posts. As I’m converting the videos to DVD then extracting the several races it takes quite a bit of time. I also won’t be posting the races in any particular order, just see what tape comes out of the bag next!

Have a look out for a dreadful start by a certain Nigel Mansell and the infamous Peralta final corner.

The full video is 33 minutes long with commentary from Murray Walker and James Hunt and is available to view full screen at Google video

For full race stats see Wikipedia or Forix