1982
SEASON

Championship

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 1958 . 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 fro... No driver classified in more than eleven points-scoring positions, so no drop-rounds applied for this season. Points were awarded in the following system:

Team changes

All teams and constructors who had competed in 1981 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, 1980 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, [ a ] 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 , ... 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. Following Reutemann's retirement, Williams hired 1978 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 qua... 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 replace...

Calendar

The Australian Grand Prix was a reserve race to be held in Ravenhall on the outskirts of Melbourne , with a date of 3 October. 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.

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 (FIA)... 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 (Renault, Ferrari, Alfa Romeo and Talbot-Ligier ), together with Osella and Toleman were aligned with FISA. [ d ] 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.

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. [ e ] 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...

Technology

In the years leading up to 1982, two major technological developments had shaped Formula One: the turbocharged engine and " ground effect ". In 1977 , 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 und... 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... 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 ... Alfa Romeo retained what motorsport writer Doug Nye called the most powerful three-litre engine seen in Formula One at that time, with 548 bhp (409 kW). They tested their turbocharged V8 engine during practice for the Italian Grand Prix , but did not race with it until 1983 . Most FOCA teams still relied upon the Cosworth DFV engine, which had been introduced by Lotus in 1967 . 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 ...

Pre-season

The week before the first Grand Prix weekend of the season in South Africa, teams gathered for a test session which was conducted at the Kyalami circuit. Prost set the fastest time during testing, at 1:05.71, almost eight seconds quicker than the previous track record. Surer, driving for the Arrows team, broke his feet in an accident and had to be replaced by Tambay. Mass also crashed in his March 821, but escaped uninjured. Ferrari did not have their new car, the 126C2 , ready for testin...