At the risk of sounding anti-intellectual, I think that college should be free and also not a requirement for employment outside of highly specialized career fields
technically you can, if you don't care about degrees.
Free Harvard courses.
Free Courses from Stanford.
Free Courses from MIT.
Free courses from Yale.
Free courses from Princeton.
Free courses on Coursera.
Free Courses on EDx
Free Courses on Alison
For paid, there's The Great Courses+/Wonderium. 20$ a month for unlimited courses.
When searching, the phrases you're looking for are Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), or you can do a general search of say, "free online college courses."
Oh, and so you don't get surprised like I did, have an avoid: Hillsdale College is a conservative Christian site and not a valid MOOC place. Sign up with them and you will get things like THIS IS WHY THE LEFT IS TURNING YOUR KIDS TRANS AND GAY in your inbox.
Joyeux anniversaire, Robespierre. Wherever you are, thank you again and here's to another year.
*The biography is called Robespierre: A Revolutionary Life. For the Introduction's title, Peter Mcphee was in fact referencing another quote by another biographer (Janet Malcolm) for a different biography.
So I finally made the drive with drivers biographys!!!
It's the most I found, sorry I couldn't get nothing about Lella, I also apologize for the Mika book, i found interviews and books about those two but aren't disponible online, same happens with lole, Reutemann books are so hard to find !! I also apologize for not uploading something about Schumacher just... Yk.... I'm not the biggest schumi fan to be honest, BUT I'll be uploading more about more drivers or teams!!
PLEASE SHARE THIS, REPOST, TAG, EVERYTHING, POST ON OUR OWN BLOG, TWITTER, TIKTOK, INSTA, EVERYTHING!!!
You can click this button once a day to help children in Gaza overcome ignorance and donate a few euros. It only takes 5 seconds and could save lives, so please take a moment to click and share this link. I hope this will help support and educate children and that people will donate. You are the only hope pls donate
There are about 650 students waiting for this school to open. Please help now.
Guys, we are close to opening this school, but unfortunately we lack funding for some important things, for example, we still need classroom seats Please, you can help me do that. Please donate to save the children of Gaza from ignorance and educational loss.
Ronnie Peterson taking a turn at Watkins Glen (USA Grand Prix, 1972) in his March 721g/3 and sitting in an unknown March 721. Second picture is the un-edited poster you could get from the magazine “Teknikens Värld” where his chronicles were published.
Grattis, Ronnie!
Happy heavenly birthday to my personal goat, greatest idol and favorite Formula 1 driver of all time. I hope you are having a great time with all of your friends and Barbro up there, taking corners sideways like a madman or just taking care of your aquariums and fishes.
14/2/44 - ♾️🪽
Guess who’s back. The only chronicle other than the ones I’ve already translated and it was a picture from a post on Facebook.. I do not even know which chronicle this is so that’s why it is called Chronicle #X. One of the last ones of 1972 at least. This was supposed to be out by Christmas but I missed it and it is even better for Ronnies birthday. Had a great time translating it, its a good read. Enjoy! :)
Do excuse any grammatical errors, English is not my first language. “(italics)” is my explanation of things.
Chronicle #X below:
“Only one race left with March — then it will be Brabham! “
(Early/mid October, London, England)
”There was a big group that sat in the plane. We flew with a Jumbo-jet from Ireland to get to the USA's Grand Prix.
It was almost like back in the day when us racing guys went in one plane to the races.
Now it is not that often we meet on the planes, most of us have different destinations and travel times, one is testing tires, one is traveling to Can-Am, a third to Formula 2.. But now we sat there all together and it was actually quite nice to hang out with everyone, team-bosses, drivers and mechanics in a way that rarely happens. It’s usually just work in the pits or one or two pricegiving-parties.
We arrived at 12 in the night to New York. By then I had been up and going for 36 hours in total and everything felt quite weird with the time change and all that.
There was not a lot of racing the first days in New York. But I played some golf instead and the fact is that it is starting to go really well since I started this summer. The first time I hit a golf ball was in liaison with my show-off drive at Anderstorp. Since then I have played several more times and I am starting to get quite decent at it. Either way the balls are going farther and farther, the holes in the ground are getting smaller and smaller… Maybe this will be my sport when I retire from racing sometime in the future?
How a V8 becomes a V7
So then it was time for practice for the USA Grand Prix, the last of this season. I did not go many laps during the first session. It said “bang” behind me and then I sat there with a seven cylinder engine. A valve had jumped off and cozied down deep inside the cylinder.
It was a bit of a shame, because I had a completely new engine that Chris Amon's engine factory had made for me. Chris is nowadays allied to March. And this motor was supposed to give 20 more horsepower so of course I wanted to try it. But with 7 cylinders you do not get far.
Well — there was a reserve engine and we put that in. The mechanics were working so they were polished with sweat. They were finished when there was 45 minutes left of the practice session. This happened the Friday before the race and since there was rain promised for Saturday everyone had tried to get good times during the Friday. Which meant everyone had good times — except me.
But anyways now I had 45 minutes to get a good time. Pete (unfortunately I have not been able to find his full name), my chief-mechanic, gave me the green light. I rolled out of the pits. I did not get further than to the long straight. It said “bang” behind me and there I sat with a seven cylinder motor again. That soon became a six cylinder one. V6 in all its glory but when you have 8 healthy cylinders from the beginning you really want to keep them.
When I entered the pits again it turned out that the old motor had apparently left some parts up in the “air box” — also known as the box that sits on top of the intake manifold. In other words the big air intake. The scrap had probably fallen down when I started driving. And thus messed up the motor. Now we only had one motor left, but that was a tired old stove that there was barely any use in using it.
But my old pal John Young..
I walked around and (an old swedish saying that I have no clue how to translate but he was quite irritated and dejected). Just scrapped around and generally wondering about my existence. Then I meet a certain Mr Tyrrell (Robert Kenneth “Ken” Tyrrell, owner of the Formula 1 racing team Tyrrell from 1970 to 1997) who wonders why I am looking so gloomy.
Now it is hard to think about Ken Tyrrell as a fairy godmother, at least when you see him. He is probably not the most fairy-like person in the racing world. But somewhere inside him a good heart beats. Because Ken says:
“Borrow an engine from Jackie. I will fix it. “
And of course he managed to fix an engine since he was the team chief for John (Jackie) Young Stewart, a twice world champion. So then I actually had something to drive with during Saturdays practice sessions. But the weather forecast had kept its word for once.
It rained. First out on track with dry tires, but that did not work. The track was occasionally wet, occasionally dry. We were struggling with the tires constantly. And in the end I slid off during a tyre-test where I had combined old and new tires. A back wheel flew off when I danced into the fence.
Poor Pete and the rest of the guys in the mechanics gang. They had to work almost all night. But the car was finished in time. And during Sunday I had half an hour to set it up for the track. We adjusted the shock-absorber and the anti-roll bar, then the car drove smoothly.
It has never been that good any time before. Which was proven by my position. I had no practice-time so I had to start second last. But I finished fourth when the race was over. I do not really want to brag, but that was probably one of the best races of all time for me. Everything fit so nicely, the car worked well and it was really fun to drive.
Now we are going to Brazil..
I should have driven F2 at Vallelunga but there was no race. That means that I will drive my last race on March Sunday the 22nd of October. But that does not mean the season is over for me.
I will go to Brazil to drive for Brabham. A few days back I signed a contract with Rondel Racing to drive four races in Brazil. It is going to be really exciting since they have 8 1960-cubic engines, two for each car. It is going to be me, Tim Schenken, Henri Pescarolo and Bob Wollek who will be driving.
It is really going to be nice to get away for a while and drive in South America. You always learn something from a new team and in this way I will not have time to get rusty behind the wheel before I am going to start driving for John Player Special.
My next report will be from the other side of the globe.”
You can find the original chronicle (in Swedish) not through a link but in this picture I found:
(I unfortunately cannot find the facebook post I ‘took’ the picture from though.)
Let me just say that I love Ronnie’s way of writing. It is quite personal and I hope it comes across like that in English too, his chronicles feel more like letters than chronicles. He’s quite funny in his own way too.
First he insults his future team-chief twice and almost in the same sentence says how grateful he is for the engine that he got. Also the fact that he just got an engine from a rivaling team?? Well, March was quite low in the team standings at that point but still! I wonder if Stewart found out that Ronnie got one of his engines?
Well I had a good laugh from this chronicle, both from the insults and Ronnies bad luck. “V6 in all its glory but when you have 8 healthy cylinders from the beginning you really want to keep them” — he knows what’s up🤣! I also reacted a little to the fact that he calls Jackie Stewart John Young. From what I’ve read/heard not a lot of people did that.
And for the last time for probably forever (unfortunately):
Thank you for reading, if you notice anything wrong or have anything I can improve on please tell me!
Ronnie Peterson and Colin Chapman ‘chewing the fat’ (I have no clue what that is supposed to mean) before the French Grand Prix at Clermont-Ferrand.
So, last part of the Ronnie-chronicles for a while! Like I said in the last chronicle I have a picture of the 22’nd chronicle but I have no clue when I will have it done. The picture is quite low in quality. Probably save it for a more special occasion.
Before you read the chronicle I would like to thank everyone who has read my little project and given me lovely messages/reblogs. It was very fun to read everyones thoughts and feelings about the chronicle and made it even more fun for me to get the next one posted. Onwards!
Do excuse any grammatical errors, English is not my first language. “(italics)” is my explanation of things.
Chronicle 15 below:
“Two fresh points — and there will be more!”
(Early/mid June, London, England)
“Finally! Now I have a competitive Formula 1-car! My new March 721g Formula 2-car with a Formula 2-motor— seems to be working as promised. I am writing this chronicle before the English Grand Prix at Brands Hatch, I said pepper pepper(similar to ‘knock on wood’). But I am very optimistic after my fifth place and two points in France.
Immediately after the sports cars race in Austria during the Midsummer weekend we flew back to England to test the March at Silverstone. It went really well and I had quite big hopes when we traveled to Clermont-Ferrand and the French Grand Prix that Wednesday. We chartered a plane and all of us Grand Prix-guys flew down together.
The connector rod was looking out of the engine block!
And then I had barely sat down before everything went to hell. I got to do two practice laps — when suddenly a connector rod pierced right through the engine block. A towing to the pits, change of engine and no more practice for Peterson that day.
Instead I got to see François Cevert drive the fastest lap with Tyrell's new car, which is looking very promising. Unfortunately François crashed the car later during practice, so both he and Jackie Stewart had to race with their old cars.
On Saturday I got the new motor installed and got to drive four laps and improve my starting position from 25’th to ninth. The car went fantastically well and I was surprised the time was not better. But it was probably because I got to drive so few laps and never got time to get the right tempo.
Denis Hulme and Chris Amon was the fastest during practice right before Jackie Stewart, who was making a comeback after nursing his stomach ulcer for a while.
Clermont-Ferrand is a quite long track, 8 km and lots of turns and very hilly. It is very similar to the Nürburgring but even harder, since so many of the turns are so called blind turns. You cannot see the end of the turn when you choose your line. There is also half a meter of sharp gravel between the asphalt edge and the guard rails. If you slide out over the edge of the asphalt you can both damage your tires because of the rocks and the risk of flying stones increase.
Helmut Marko got to experience that. Another car threw up a large rock that hit him through his visor and hit him in his eye. Unfortunately there is a risk Helmut will be blinded in that eye. He was in fourth place when the accident happened.
Me myself was at ninth place at the first turn and started to work my way up the grid. Everything was working perfectly and it was a pure delight to drive. The March 721g is lighter than any other F1car and it is small and adaptable — an ideal car for tracks like Clermont-Ferrand, Brands Hatch and Nürburgring.
Peterson was third — then the antirollbar broke
I started fighting with Emerson Fittipaldi and had the fastest laptimes of us all in the beginning of the race. Then my times got beaten by Chris Amon. Of course you drive faster at the end of a race since the fuel tank is emptier and thus the car a lot lighter.
During the 29’th lap the leading Denis Hulme got a puncture — Chris Amon in the Matra had earlier had to let go of the lead because of the same issue— and Stewart took the lead, followed by Emerson Fittipaldi. Then Peterson from Örebro came and was following Emersons black John Player Special closely.
Then the rear antirollbar broke, the car became understeery and hard to drive and I could not keep up anymore. Then the brakes got overheated. I had to let Cevert pass me a few laps before the finish and right after came Chris Amon with an unimaginable spurt of speed and went past both me and Cevert. At least I got two points and was more than satisfied.
If the car holds up in England and Germany I will probably have a decent chance. Guess if it feels nice now when everything has started working! The weekend after Clermont-Ferrand I was supposed to drive Formula 2 in Austria.
But the club did not want to spend anymore money on so-called graded drivers other than Emerson Fittipaldi. We Grand Prix-racers are not allowed to compete in the European championship-title in Formula 2.
The testing bodes well
So then I could continue testing the Grand Prix-car in peace and quiet. At first I drove at Brands Hatch on a so-called clubtrack which is not identical to the Grand Prix-track itself. I actually managed to drive around at 43,2 seconds and that is faster than anyone has ever gone there. The old record was 44 seconds blank.
We tested for example different types of suspension and tested springs of titanium. They are very expensive but they are also very light. Since Brands Hatch is a bumpy track we tested springs that are soft in the beginning of the suspension movement but then get harder the more pressure applied. We decided to not use the titanium springs in the end.
Another detail that has been improved is the airintake, which has been remade to give better cooling for the brakes. We went directly from Brands Hatch to Silverstone, where I pressed the time to 1. 18,6 — only half a second over the best lap time during last year's Grand Prix at the old airfield track.
After the United Kingdom Grand Prix there will be a short trip to the USA. We are going to drive the last race in the sports cars-world championship at Watkins Glen and Ferrari is gonna drive with three cars. Ferrari have won every world championship-race this year except Le Mans, since we did not compete.
Watkins Glen probably seems like a boring duty, but not for me! I actually won there last year together with Andrea de Adamich in an Alfa Romeo and now I of course want to repeat that triumph. I will as usual drive together with my neighbor in Maidenhead, Tim Schenken.
Two Ronnie-Reine duels
Then there is the German Grand Prix at Nürburgring and the 6’th of August I will race at Mantorp Park in Formula 2 and maybe even in the road car-class, if I can get my hands on a decent car. It would be fun, since Reine will be racing in both of the classes!”
You can find the original chronicle (in Swedish) here.
It is interesting to read Ronnies thoughts about Helmut Markos accident, especially considering how he is often seen as the person to blame for the accident in recent days. Kind of weird thinking about how they are only a year apart. Ronnie you should also have had the chance to support this sport that late in life…
Again thanks to everyone who has supported this little series of translated chronicles. Everyone is greatly appreciated! I promise I will continue to search for the rest of the chronicles from the 1972 season, it feels very abrupt to end in the middle of the season..
And for the last time for a while;
Thank you for reading, if you notice anything wrong or have anything I can improve on please tell me!
Ronnie Peterson in his March 721x before the show-drive at Anderstorp Raceway (also known as Scandinavian Raceway).
Unfortunately second last chronicle. I am trying to find the rest of them from 1972 but for some reason Teknikens Värld only posted the chronicles for half the year. The only one after the 15’th one I’ve found is a picture of the 22’nd chronicle, so if I do not find any of the others I will get working on that someday.
Also still posting this on mobile though so again excuse any formatting/other issues. Quite hard to type on a computer when two of your fingers are splinted together on your dominant hand. So there is that.
Do excuse any grammatical errors, English is not my first language. “(italics)” is my explanation of things.
Chronicle 14 below:
“The accelerator got stuck, had to short circuit my way through the turns”
(Late June, London, England)
“Hi again! Since you last heard of Peterson he has had it quite easy. It has only been one race, the sports car-world championship, and I have had time to be home in Sweden a whole ten days straight. Just because there are not constant races does not mean us racing drivers can laze around all the time. Most of our time goes to testing.
There was supposed to be testing at for example Anderstorp. We were supposed to try fixing the unfortunate March 721x. But after Monaco we found a columbus egg in the combination of a Formula 2-body/Formula 1-engine.
That car was not finished until Anderstorp, but since I had promised to do a show at Scandinavian Raceway we still went there with the x-car. There was not a lot of serious testing. We have decided to put Project X on ice for a while and concentrate on the March 721g, which is the name of the Formula 2 and Formula 1 combination.
Anderstorp is gonna be a great track
But aside of me being able to relax for a few days in Anderstorp — is there anything beating a Swedish summer? — it was also exciting to drive at the Anderstorp-track with the March. It was actually the first time a Formula 1-racer drove there. I think Anderstorp will make a great Formula 1-track — it is actually meant to host the Swedish Grand Prix down here in Småland (part of southern Sweden) next year.
My only remark is the guard rails, which are placed a bit too high. There is a gap between the guard rails and the ground which might not matter much if you smash a roadcar into there. But a Formula 1 car can slide under the rails which will then hit the driver in head height. I am sure you can imagine that that is not rather healthy. But this thing with the guard rails is a trifle to solve.
As a Formula 1-track, Anderstorp is quite slow. There was no problem for me to beat Leo Kinnunen's three year old lap record with three seconds. Leo drove a three-liter Porsche 908 sports cars prototype that time and to drive faster with a modern Formula 1-car is not that hard.
My laptimes were at around 1.28, with an average speed of around 168 km/h. When the times matter more next year I believe they can go down to 1.24. That means an average speed of around 172 km/h.
You might think it sounds like a lot, but compared to most of the other tracks it is not. But of course the demands of drivers and cars do not get less just because you drive on a short track with lots of turns keeping the average speed down.
The throttle got stuck — to the floor!
By the way, my show drive almost got totally ruined. I was supposed to drive ten laps, but after a few laps the throttle started getting stuck. So it was almost that Peterson would have to retire during some simple show laps when he was for once showing off to his home crowd! That would not have looked good at all!
There is this special little security measure on our cars just to manage situations like that. It is a short circuiting button on the steering wheel. And by playing around with it I could get my car to slow down before the turns.
After a few days home in Örebro I had a less pleasant task. Barbro and I traveled to Stockholm to follow Joakim Bonnier on his last journey. It was not easy for any of us. But the same night we flew to England to test my new Formula 1-car. To drive racing cars is my job after all.
Wasted flight to England
The testing was for nothing since the fuel cells in the fuel tank were acting up. I did not really get a feeling of what the new car does well or bad. And then up in an airplane away again to the next race. This time it was the sports cars-world championship at Zeltweg in Austria, where Ferrari competed with no less than four cars.
Ferrari has already taken home the world championship a long time ago and the competition was not that intense on paper. Neither Alfa Romeo or Matra wanted to compete. But Derek Bell and Gijs van Lennep drove John Wijers Mirage and Gerard Larrousse and Vic Elford competed with a Lola — Ecurie Bonnier still works even with Joakim gone.
It rained during practice and Ferrari had trouble with all the cars. That led to both the Mirage and Lola being faster. Somehow they both missed the start so Ferrari took the lead in the first laps. When the Lola and Mirage started catching up it became a fantastic fight for the lead, a fight I had to watch from the pits since Tim Schenken drove the first session.
In the end the Lolas throttle stopped working and the Mirage also had some technical problems. That led to Ferrari taking the four front places. That was quite surprising. Earlier this year we only drove with three cars and usually crossed the finish line with two. Now we added another one to get a triple win — and all four cross the finishing line!
Tim and I were happy with the third place since our car struggled a lot. We had the wrong rubber blends in the tires — as it turned out it was way hotter during the race than during practice. The rubber wore off and the car got understeery and was hard to control. Then the clutch started slipping and it was a wonder that we managed to pass the finish line.
Jackie is having problems with his new car
Now I am going back to Silverstone again to test the new March 721g for the French Grand Prix in Clermont-Ferrand. It is gonna be really interesting to see how good the car is. But I know that Tyrell also has had problems and that the times at Silverstone have not been that good. It takes a while to test a new car.
That is especially true for the March 721x, which will have to rest for a while. If only we coule figure out what was wrong with it! It is ‘practically’ an fenomenal car, according to the technical experts. It is just something that is wrong with it. When we find out what it is it will be amazing..
You can find the original chronicle (in Swedish) here.
Yes Ronnie it is ‘not rather healthy’ to hit the crash barriers with your head… Absolutely awful foreshadowing. Anderstorp fixed that problem quite quickly thanks to Jackie Stewart inspecting the track and also removing several other risk factors. But I know several other tracks did not/only fixed it partially when they had the same problem.
Also I got an absolute heart attack when editing the last details. I was gonna press ‘edit’ but accidentally presses ‘queue’ instead. Thought I had deleted it when it was ready to post! Woke me up properly that’s for sure.
Thank you for reading, if you notice anything wrong or have anything I can improve on please tell me!
“you should be at the club” i should be by the sea. i should be in the mountains. i should be awestruck and rendered speechless by the majesty of the natural world. if you even care
“The Swedish Mafia” consisting of Ronnie Peterson, Joakim Bonnier and Reine Wisell during various racing events.
TW Drivers Death: In this chronicle Ronnie talks about the death of his friend Joakim Bonnier. He does not describe the accident much or go into detail but if you don’t want to read Ronnies thoughts about his friend’s passing you might want to skip this chronicle.
The Swedish Maffia, not to be confused with the band ‘Swedish House Maffia’ or the actual Swedish maffia, consisted of three of Swedens most prominent Formula 1 drives. Ronnie Peterson, Joakim Bonnier and Reine Wisell. Due to the nature of this chronicle I decided to choose three pictures of them all together and not just of Ronnie alone to honor them all. All of them dearly missed.
Do excuse any grammatical errors, English is not my first language. “(italics)” is my explanation of things.
Chronicle 13 below:
“Before the start came a message: Joakim is dead!”
(Mid June, Örebro, Sweden)
“Right before the start at Hockenheim outside of Frankfurt we got a message: — Joakim Bonnier has passed awat at Le Mans!
I did not grasp the full extent of those words and I wonder if I ever will. Joakim was racing in a way. He was already a big name when I was young, competing against Fangio and Moss already during the mid 50’s. And he succeeded with what I have yet to do: win a Grand Prix.
It is unimaginable for me that just he, the most experienced and astute of us all, would perish in such an accident. And it feels infinitely pointless when you know he was starting to dismantle his racing career and gradually slowing down.
Joakim's last Formula 1-race was the Italian Grand Prix last year. Then he hung up his McLaren with all the other artworks on the wall in his villa. He was only supposed to drive a few sports car races. Everyone knew he would have properly retired soon.
I am happy I did not have to race Le Mans
I did not have to race at Le Mans. I am particularly happy about that, especially now. Ferrari pulled out at the last second when they calculated that the motors would not last 24 hours. Le Mans is a scary race. We do experience Bonniers faith all the time, the mix between faster and slower cars, in all the sports cars races.
But at Le Mans everything goes awfully fast. The Ferrari Joakim collided with, a Daytona GT-car, has a big motor and goes quite quickly on the straights. But it is big and heavy, goes slow in the turns and accelerates slower. The difference in speed at the place the accident happened must have been large.
It is things like that that creates the risks. I have myself collided with slower cars several times and know how dangerous it is. When you like in Le Mans even let standard cars compete you are going down a dangerous path. Sports cars races would be safer if you removed the slower cars and only allowed the real sports cars. But if you did that the starting grid would probably not be big enough…
Take away Le Mans from the world championship series
I sincerely doubt you can stop Le Mans. The race is way too big in France. But I hope! Take away Le Mans in the world championship series and at least the interest will cool. This is the first time a proper close friend of mine has perished on track and I think it is one of the worst things that can happen to you.
I did not sit down in my Formula 2-car at Hockenheim with much enthusiasm— none of us did. But we are professionals and have to drive, it does not matter if we want to or not. Joakim would have done the same. I drove and came third after Fittipaldi and Jean-Pierre Jassaud. It was rainy as usual, almost impossible to pass.
The weekend before I drove in the Belgian Grand Prix — a new disappointment. My March 721x drove horribly and I had to be happy crossing the finishing line at ninth. I had great expectations about this car before, but now I have given up my hope. A car acting a little weird in the beginning is normal, but in this case it is a serious problem.
My car is helplessly poorly constructed
The March 721 x is simply poorly constructed and we do not know where. You simply cannot get it working properly; the constructor Robin Herd is completely inconsolable and even more sad than me over this unsuccessful project. The car has cost extreme amounts of money — and it is such a flop!
The car is constructed so the center of gravity is as close to the midpoint as possible. It is to give it good turn properties. Unfortunately this also means the car is very motion-sensitive longitudinal. It rises with the acceleration and curtsys strongly when braking. And in the turns it sways like a Citroën. In Belgium it lifted on the straights.
A hopeless case. We will just have to figure out something else. Project X to the trash heap.
Now we are investing for Formula 2 in Formula 1!
We got an idea from Mike Beuttler. He is driving a March Formula 2 with a Formula 1-engine. I borrowed the car from him for a test drive at Silverstone. And it actually worked!
Even though it was the first time I drove it I was only a second slower than Fittipaldi's lap record — and two seconds faster than my best times with the horrible x-car. Concerning Beuttler is that he does not have access to the best motors.
This hybrid is very well managed and I could drive fast in the turns — that would never have worked with the understeering 721x. So now March is building a copy of they car for me. If this with two seconds of time saved still works on other tracks, I am counting on being around fifth during pracfices in the future — and then you always do a little extra in the race itself.
Now I have hope again. If everything goes to plan I am gonna start with the new car in the French Grand Prix the second of July.
Two suspensions broke at Silverstone
But it is of course not that easy to just put in a new motor in a lighter car. The testing at Silverstone was quite dramatic and for example I accidentally drove two wheel suspensions into breaking. The car has to be strengthened both here and there. But it should not get heavier than the 721 x.
The world championship seems to be quite far away since I until now only has scored three points, so the future does not look too bright for Peterson. But if the new project actually works I should be able to get a decent finishing position.
The favorite for the world championship right now is of course Emerson Fittipaldi and I am wondering if anyone can ever threaten him. He is in a horribly good shape and also has a car that is practically perfect. He flew away way too easily in Belgium.
Directly after Hockenheim I went home to Örebro to rest a little. Then it was a demonstration race and I got to show off my car at Scandinavian Raceway — it is gonna be very fun to see how fast you actually can drive with a Formula 1-car there.
This Midsummer weekend (20-22 of July) I am driving the in the sports cars-world championship in Austria and then it is time for the French Grand Prix. In July I shall for example go to USA and drive in the sport cars-world championship at Watkins Glen. I actually won there last year together with de Adamich in an Alfa. Now I just have to try repeating that success for Ferrari.
You guys are keeping your fingers crossed for me, right?”
You can find the original chronicle (in Swedish) here.
I was waiting for this chronicle. I knew it was coming but it still hurts reading about Joakim. Well liked and loved by practically everyone. He was supposed to settle down properly but never got the chance to, like so many others.
I would not say I am mad but more irritated of it all. Ronnie feeling so helpless with the safety, being afraid of Le Mans and even saying it several times, not being able to choose when to drive… Really should not have been like that, should never be like that!
Thank you for reading, if you notice anything wrong or have anything I can improve on please tell me.
Ronnie Peterson and Reine Wisell before the Formula 1 Grand Prix at Oulton Park, England.
Sorry for the late post, I broke my index finger (just like Reine..)this Sunday so I have had to resort to translating and formatting everything on my mobile phone instead of my laptop. Because of this the chronicles take significantly longer to translate so you will have to excuse my lateness and eventually problems with the formatting.
The last part, the one under the “••••••••” is a comment someone wrote on this chronicle in Teknikens Världs online page. I thought it was way too hilarious to not add.
Do excuse any grammatical errors, English is not my first language. “(italics)” is my explanation of things.
Chronicle 12 below:
“I flew high up into the air, landed with a crash”
(Late May, unspecified location in England)
“As a racing driver you have quite the dramatic life, but for me the most sensational thing for me is when you suddenly have a weekend off in the middle of the season. That is exactly what happened after the Monaco Gran Prix.
Barbro and I took the opportunity to go home to Örebro. Guess if it was nice to relax with moms meatballs and all that… I had not been home since January. You do not exactly wear down your home soil.
But then the seriousness started again. The weekend after I had a double program with the 1000 km-race at Nürburgring, apart of the sports cars world championship, during the Sunday and a Formula 1-race at Oulton Park in England the next day.
Rain, rain, rain. It is amazing how bad the weather is at almost every race this year. It was the same at Nürburgring, it poured down during the entirety of practice.
Fastest in the soap-like conditions
Nürburgring, with its hundreds of curves and many hills, is a difficult track even when it is dry. To manage 400 horsepower when the track is drenched does not make it easier, trust me! I do not know how it happened but I managed to slide myself into the best practice-time so me and Tim Schenkens Ferrari got the best starting position.
We in the Ferrari team gambled with rain tires even though the rain was supposed to end shortly before start while Alfa and Mirage put on intermediate tires, they are like a compromiss between rain- and dry tires.
The first four-five laps we Ferrari drivers managed to drive way ahead, but when the track dried our competitors gained on us. The Mirage went alarmingly fast — it was Derek Bell and Gijs van Lennep who drove — and even went up into the lead for a while when we were forced to pit for extra time to change the rain tires.
Regazzoni crashed — and I won
My teammates Jacky Ickx and Clay Regazzoni went past the Mirage after a while and I followed. But we were still threatened so I got ordered to catch up with Regazzoni, who apparently felt threatened. Either way he drove off the track and crashed the car!
That was not really the point of the team order, but at least there was still a Ferrari in the lead. The Mirage threatened us for most of the race but near the end got an engine failure. Instead the third Ferrari with Brian Redman and Arturo Merzario as its drivers went up to second place ahead of Alfa Romeo. Joakim (‘Jo’) Bonnier was sixth in his Lola.
Tim and I could not celebrate our victory for long. We had to go directly to England and the next race. I just had a shower and some food at the hotel, then we drove to Köln for the next part of the trip with a private plane to Manchester.
Rather racecar than plane
It was surely a trip! I had hoped that I would have time to relax with a comfortable planerise after a thousand kilometers of driving — and it starts blowing a full storm! We had head-wind the entire time and the wind strength was up to 27 meters per second. The plane almost stood still sometimes and the trip took double the time planned. At least we arrived. But it might be calmer driving a racecar…
A few hours of sleep and then up early so I could practice before the race. Rain as usual! I drive a new car, a modified copy of the car I drove in Monaco. It has a Hewland gearbox and a new rear suspension with standing shock-absorbers instead of ones lying down. It went fantastic and since I have never been to Oulton Park before, nobody was more surprised than me when it turned out I had driven fastest out of everyone.
But the others had driven on the track while it was dry, so I still ended up in the fourth starting row. But I am an optimist. In front of me stood Reine Wisell in his Marlboro-BRM. When the flag fell I accelerated past him and was a nose-length in front when we reached the first turn. Then it happened.
Reine broke his finger when we collided
Do not ask me how it happened — everything went so fast. Reine somehow got his front wheel in between my left wheels — maybe he got touched by someone else — and we collided into each other.
My car flew high into the air, landed with a crash and spun around several times in the middle of the racing cars before it stopped in the middle of the track with a cracked rim and punctures. Other than that there was not a scratch on the car and it did not flip, like they said in a newspaper
At first it looked like Reine also had gotten out of the crash somewhat fine — since he continued his lap into the pits. But he had gotten a nasty hit and broken an index finger that had to be casted. I feel really bad for Reine, who will probably be gone for a month or so and now will miss both the Belgium Grand Prix and Le Mans.
I hope he gets better before July because then he will drive a Bonnier-Lola at Watkins Glen in the USA. It is the CanAm-series and that means large money.
When I have finished this chronicle Barbro and I will go into London to shop and run some errands. It is important to use your time wisely when you have some time off. Then it is away to Belgium for the nexy world championship-race in Formula 1.
Peterson — the incurable optimist
I have been optimistic before most of the F1-races this year — and been bitterly disappointed after. But I still believe my luck shall change. Because the car went so nicely during the practice at Oulton Park I believe I have a good chance in Belgium.
The track we drive at has never been driven with Formula 1-cars. It is called Nivelles and is quite short which I believe will fit my driving style. Unfortunately I have not been able to practice there yet. Us F1-drivers, excluding Jacky Ickx, are quite happy to not have to drive the dangerous Spa-Francorchamps track.
After Nivelles it is time for the 24 hour-race at Le Mans. I cannot exactly say I am looking forward to Le Mans with enthusiasm. It is a boring and quite dangerous race for us drivers. But it is an important race to win, even though Ferrari has already secured the sports cars world championship.
The problem will be to get the cars to actually last. The so called sports cars we drive are practically overbuilt Formula 1-cars. A F1-car is built to last around two hours. In the sports cars the motors are shaved down so the bits will last for six hours. Now the cars have to last for 24 hours!
Ferrari and Alfa Romeo are quite reliable but Lola and Mirage usually do not even last a usual six hour race. Let us see if the constructors know magic.
Me myself believe the Matra cars are gonna be hyper-dangerous. I know they have been tested intensively and they are investing extremely hard to win Le Mans specifically.
Imagine to start in the Swedish Grand Prix!
Then it is back to Sweden again — but not to race. I am going to show off the March at Anderstorp and at the same time get to feel the track a little. Anderstorp is hopefully getting a Grand Prix next year. Guess if me and Reine are excited about showing us in Sweden's Grand Prix!”
••••••••
“Lovely to read Ronnie's old chronicles. A driver with both heart and brain.
But sometimes he was a bit crazy.
I remember that he wrote in a chronicle about the problems with gravity in the turns. One track especially caused a lot of overexertion in the neck muscles. Before the race he drilled a hole in the helmet and a hole in the cars body. Then he screwed a chain between the helmet and body to keep his head still and relieve the muscles.
‘Lucky for me that I did not crash and got thrown out of the car in that race’ was his comment.”
You can find the original chronicle and comment (in Swedish) here.
Again with the ‘soap-like conditions’.. It’s not even the translation that makes it sound weird, it is genuinely what he writes in Swedish too.
Also Ronnie, why was he the most stereotypical Swede ever?? Him loving his mother’s meatballs. I am once again stunned by the realization that he was just a normal guy. Like I get he is not some otherworldly being but I never expected him to be so relatable! Him being so excited for Anderstorp… Ugh my heart!
And insane. Why did he chain his helmet to his car. Not just getting thrown out, what if he crashed at all?? The car caught on fire?? In one of the notoriously dangerous eras of F1 too! No wonder people describes him as slightly insane all the time.
Thank you for reading, if you notice anything wrong or have anything I can improve on please tell me!
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