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!
1971 Le Mans - winning Porsche 917 - flag por Louis Galanos
Por Flickr:
Ho, Ho, Ho. My Christmas present to you is this slightly modified photo of the winning Martini 917 K Porsche (#053) at Le Mans in 1971. Drivers Helmut Marko and Gijs van Lennep took the checkered flag (maybe not this one) for this victory. This victory would be the second one in a row for Porsche after their historic victory with a 917K in 1970 driven by Richard Attwood and Hans Herrmann. Hope all of you have a safe, happy and healthy New Year.
