1981 USA West Grand Prix
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1981 USA West Grand Prix
The 1981 United States Grand Prix West (officially the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach) was a Formula One motor race held on March 15, 1981, at Long Beach, California. It was the opening race of the 1981 Formula One World Championship. Summary Defending World Champion Alan Jones finished nine seconds ahead of teammate Carlos Reutemann, and won his first Long Beach Grand Prix, as the 1981 season finally began after a winter of controversy and legal battles. It was the third consecutive Grand Prix win for Jones, and his second consecutive in the United States, after seizing the 1980 Drivers' title with season-ending wins in Montreal, Canada and Watkins Glen, New York. The off-season had seen FISA (La Federation Internationale du Sport Automobile) and FOCA (the Formula One Constructors' Association) in conflict, ostensibly over FISA's scheduled ban of aerodynamic skirts on the cars, but also over financial control of the sport. After threatening to institute their own championship, ...
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Long Beach, California
Long Beach is a city in Los Angeles County, California. It is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 466,742 as of 2020. A charter city, Long Beach is the seventh-most populous city in California. Incorporated in 1897, Long Beach lies in Southern California in the southern part of Los Angeles County. Long Beach is approximately south of downtown Los Angeles, and is part of the Gateway Cities region. The Port of Long Beach is the second busiest container port in the United States and is among the world's largest shipping ports. The city is over an oilfield with minor wells both directly beneath the city as well as offshore. The city is known for its waterfront attractions, including the permanently docked and the Aquarium of the Pacific. Long Beach also hosts the Grand Prix of Long Beach, an IndyCar race and the Long Beach Pride Festival and Parade. California State University, Long Beach, one of the largest universities in California b ...
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Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world's most populous megacities. Los Angeles is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Southern California. With a population of roughly 3.9 million residents within the city limits , Los Angeles is known for its Mediterranean climate, ethnic and cultural diversity, being the home of the Hollywood film industry, and its sprawling metropolitan area. The city of Los Angeles lies in a basin in Southern California adjacent to the Pacific Ocean in the west and extending through the Santa Monica Mountains and north into the San Fernando Valley, with the city bordering the San Gabriel Valley to it's east. It covers about , and is the county seat of Los Angeles County, which is the most populous county in the United States with an estim ...
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Alain Prost
Alain Marie Pascal Prost (; born 24 February 1955) is a French retired racing driver and Formula One team owner. A four-time Formula One World Drivers' Champion, from 1987 until 2001 he held the record for most Grand Prix victories until Michael Schumacher surpassed Prost's total of 51 victories at the 2001 Belgian Grand Prix. In 1999, Prost received the World Sports Award of the Century in the motor sport category. Prost discovered karting at the age of 14 during a family holiday. He progressed through motor sport's junior ranks, winning the French and European Formula Three championships, before joining the McLaren Formula One team in 1980 at the age of 24. He finished in the points on his Formula One début – at the San Martín Autodrome in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he took his first podium a year later – and took his first race victory a year later at his home Grand Prix in France, driving for the factory Renault team. During the 1980s and early 1990s Prost ...
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McLaren (racing)
McLaren Racing Limited is a British motor racing team based at the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking, Surrey, England. McLaren is best known as a Formula One constructor, the second oldest active team, and the second most successful Formula One team after Ferrari, having won races, 12 Drivers' Championships and 8 Constructors' Championships. McLaren also has a history of competing in American open wheel racing, as both an entrant and a chassis constructor, and has won the Canadian-American Challenge Cup (Can-Am) sports car racing championship. The team is a subsidiary of the McLaren Group, which owns a majority of the team. Founded in 1963 by New Zealander Bruce McLaren, the team won its first Grand Prix at the 1968 Belgian Grand Prix, but their greatest initial success was in Can-Am, which they dominated from 1967 to 1971. Further American triumph followed, with Indianapolis 500 wins in McLaren cars for Mark Donohue in 1972 and Johnny Rutherford in 1974 and 1976 ...
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Andrea De Cesaris
Andrea de Cesaris (31 May 19595 October 2014) was an Italian racing driver. He started 208 Formula One Grands Prix but never won. As a result, he holds the record for the most races started without a race victory. A string of accidents early in his career earned him a reputation for being a fast but wild driver. In 2005 and 2006 he competed in the Grand Prix Masters formula for retired F1 drivers. De Cesaris died on 5 October 2014 after losing control of his motorcycle on Rome's Grande Raccordo Anulare motorway. Driving career Pre-Formula One A multiple karting champion, he graduated to Formula 3 in Britain, winning numerous events and finishing 2nd in the 1979 British Formula Three Championship, as runner up to Chico Serra. From Formula 3, he graduated to Formula 2 with future McLaren boss Ron Dennis' Project 4 team. Formula One Alfa Romeo (1980) :''Related article: Alfa Romeo in Formula One'' In 1980, de Cesaris was picked up by Alfa Romeo for the final events of th ...
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Kevin Cogan
John Kevin Cogan (born in Culver City, California on March 31, 1956) is a former race car driver who drove in Formula One from to . Driving a RAM Williams in the 1980 Canadian Grand Prix, he failed to qualify, suffering the same result driving for Tyrrell at the 1981 US GP West. He then moved over to Indy cars in 1982 but his career was cut short by a series of accidents. Racing career Cogan made his Indycar debut at the 1981 Indianapolis 500, driving the No. 32 Sugaripe Prunes Phoenix PR-01-Cosworth DFX for Jerry O'Connell Racing, as part of the USAC Gold Crown Championship. Cogan qualified in 12th place and finished the race in fourth place with 197 laps completed. Despite this Cogan lost the Rookie of the Year Award to Josele Garza. Cogan then competed in the rival CART/PPG World Series for O'Connell. In his debut, the Gould Rex Mays Classic at the Milwaukee Mile, Cogan qualified in seventh place and finished in second. After the race, he was ranked fifth in points ...
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Eddie Cheever
Edward McKay "Eddie" Cheever Jr. (born January 10, 1958) is an American former racing driver who raced for almost 30 years in Formula One, sports cars, CART, and the Indy Racing League. Cheever participated in 143 Formula One World Championship races and started 132, more than any other American, driving for nine different teams from 1978 through 1989. In 1996, he formed his own IRL team, Team Cheever, and won the 1998 Indianapolis 500 as both owner and driver. The team later competed in sports cars. His younger brother Ross Cheever, nephew Richard Antinucci and son Eddie Cheever III also became racing drivers. Early life Though born in Phoenix, Arizona, Cheever lived in Rome, Italy, as a child and attended St. George's British International School. He was introduced to motorsports at age eight when his father took him to a sports car race in Monza. He soon began racing go-karts and won both the Italian and European Karting Championships at age 15. He worked his way up throug ...
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Tyrrell Racing
The Tyrrell Racing Organisation was an auto racing team and Formula One constructor founded by Ken Tyrrell (1924–2001) which started racing in 1958 and started building its own cars in 1970. The team experienced its greatest success in the early 1970s, when it won three Drivers' Championships and one Constructors' Championship with Jackie Stewart. The team never reached such heights again, although it continued to win races through the 1970s and into the early 1980s, taking the final win for the Ford Cosworth DFV engine at Detroit in 1983. The team was bought by British American Tobacco in 1997 and completed its final season as Tyrrell in 1998. Tyrrell's legacy continues in Formula One as the Mercedes-AMG F1 team, who is Tyrrell's descendant through various sales and rebrandings via BAR, Honda and Brawn GP. Lower formulae (1958–1967) Tyrrell Racing first came into being in 1958, running Formula Three cars for Ken Tyrrell and local stars. Realising he was not racing dri ...
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Alfa Romeo (Formula One)
Italian motor manufacturer Alfa Romeo has participated many times in Formula One. It currently participates as Alfa Romeo F1 Team Orlen while being operated by Sauber Motorsport AG. The brand has competed in motor racing as both a constructor and engine supplier sporadically between and , and later as a commercial partner since . The company's works drivers won the first two World Drivers' Championships in the pre-war Alfetta: Nino Farina in 1950 and Juan Manuel Fangio in . Following these successes, Alfa Romeo withdrew from Formula One. During the 1960s, although the company had no official presence in the top tier of motorsport, several Formula One teams used independently developed Alfa Romeo engines to power their cars. In the early 1970s, Alfa provided Formula One support for their works driver Andrea de Adamich, supplying adapted versions of their 3-litre V8 engine from the Alfa Romeo Tipo 33/3 sports car to power Adamich's McLaren () and March () entries. None of the ...
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Mario Andretti
Mario Gabriele Andretti (born February 28, 1940) is an Italian-born American former racing driver. One of the most successful drivers in the history of motorsports, Andretti is one of only two drivers to have won races in Formula One, IndyCar, the World Sportscar Championship, and NASCAR (the other being Dan Gurney). He has also won races in midget car racing and sprint car racing. During his career, Andretti won the 1978 Formula One World Championship, four IndyCar titles (three under USAC sanctioning, and one in CART), and IROC VI. To date, he remains the only driver ever to win the Indianapolis 500 ( 1969), Daytona 500 ( 1967) and the Formula One World Championship, and, along with Juan Pablo Montoya, the only driver to have won a race in the NASCAR Cup Series, Formula One, and an Indianapolis 500. As of 2021, Andretti's victory at the 1978 Dutch Grand Prix is the last Formula One win by an American driver. Andretti had 109 career wins on major circuits. Andretti had a long ...
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Gilles Villeneuve
Joseph Gilles Henri Villeneuve () (January 18, 1950 – May 8, 1982) was a Canadian racing driver, who spent six years in Grand Prix motor racing with Ferrari, winning six races and widespread acclaim for his performances. An enthusiast of cars and fast driving from an early age, Villeneuve started his professional career in snowmobile racing in his native province of Quebec. He moved into single seaters, winning the US and Canadian Formula Atlantic championships in 1976, before being offered a drive in Formula One with the McLaren team at the 1977 British Grand Prix. He was taken on by reigning world champions Ferrari for the end of the season and drove for the Italian team from 1978 until his death in 1982. He won six Grand Prix races in a short career at the highest level. In 1979, he finished second by four points in the championship to teammate Jody Scheckter. Villeneuve died in a crash caused by a collision with the March car driven by Jochen Mass during qualifying ...
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Scuderia Ferrari
Scuderia Ferrari Società per Azioni, S.p.A. () is the racing division of luxury Italian auto manufacturer Ferrari and the racing team that competes in Formula One racing. The team is also known by the nickname "The Prancing Horse", in reference to their logo. It is the oldest surviving and List of Formula One Grand Prix winners (constructors), most successful Formula One team, having competed in every world championship since the 1950 Formula One season. The team was founded by Enzo Ferrari, initially to race cars produced by Alfa Romeo. However, by 1947 Ferrari had begun building its own cars. Among its important achievements outside Formula One are winning the World Sportscar Championship, 24 Hours of Le Mans, 24 Hours of Spa, 24 Hours of Daytona, 12 Hours of Sebring, Bathurst 12 Hour, races for Grand tourer cars and racing on road courses of the Targa Florio, the Mille Miglia and the Carrera Panamericana. The team is also known for its passionate support base, known as the ...
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