8 replies to this topic

[Graham Clayton]

Fellow NF members,

In terms of actual driving distance covered, which driver holds the unusual record of having the "shortest" F1 WC Grand Prix career?

The following 2 drivers only managed less than one lap in the only GP that they started:

Graham McRae - 1973 British GP, Silverstone - Williams - sticking throttle
Miguel Angel Guerra - 1981 San Marino GP - Imola - Osella - crash

Are there any other examples?

[Richard Jenkins]

marco Apicella - 1993 Italian GP - 300 yards - which I believe is the shortest.

[jgm]

Riccardo Paletti's GP career also lasted about 300 yards. At the start of the 1982 Canadian GP Pironi stalled his Ferrari on pole position and Paletti, starting his Osella from twenty-third place, ran into the back of the Ferrari with fatal consequences.

[Rob G]

Originally posted by jgm
Riccardo Paletti's GP career also lasted about 300 yards. At the start of the 1982 Canadian GP Pironi stalled his Ferrari on pole position and Paletti, starting his Osella from twenty-third place, ran into the back of the Ferrari with fatal consequences.

Paletti raced in the 14-car 1982 San Marino GP, retiring on the eighth lap.

[Nikos Spagnol]

Paletti was also on the grid in Detroit that year, but his Osella failed to start there.

If you consider drivers who actually started GP's, then I guess Apicella's is unbeateble the shortest carreer.

But considering all the drivers who were entered to a GP weekend (including DNQ's), then Gary Brabham would be the man to be beaten. In 1990, he only managed a handful of laps in Pre-Qualifying in his dreadful slow Life, in Phoenix, and some yards in Interlagos, just to found out that the mechanics had not filled that thing with oil.

BTW, there's another thread on this very same subject.

[Zawed]

Originally posted by Nikos Spagnol
Paletti was also on the grid in Detroit that year, but his Osella failed to start there.

If you consider drivers who actually started GP's, then I guess Apicella's is unbeateble the shortest carreer.

But considering all the drivers who were entered to a GP weekend (including DNQ's), then Gary Brabham would be the man to be beaten. In 1990, he only managed a handful of laps in Pre-Qualifying in his dreadful slow Life, in Phoenix, and some yards in Interlagos, just to found out that the mechanics had not filled that thing with oil.

BTW, there's another thread on this very same subject.

Perry McCarthy got f-all laps in with the Andrea Moda squad in 1992, famously barely got out of pitlane in pre-qualifying for one GP.

[Nikos Spagnol]

Originally posted by Zawed


Perry McCarthy got f-all laps in with the Andrea Moda squad in 1992, famously barely got out of pitlane in pre-qualifying for one GP.

Yeah, but he was present in more GP's than poor Gary. I'm pretty sure he completed more laps.

And the GP his car failed to get out of the pitlane was in Barcelona, Spain.

[Nikos Spagnol]

OK, not exactly the same subject, but almost:

Tragic GP debuts

[dmj]

Shouldn't it be Tom Jones???