The nation that delivers F1 classics: five of the best Brazilian GPs

The Sao Paulo native was a hero in his home country, and his day of days came when he won the 1975 Brazilian GP in front of his adoring fans.

Qualifying sixth, the Brabham driver moved into third at the race start behind poleman Jean-Pierre Jarier’s Shadow and early race leader team-mate Carlos Reutemann.

The latter would soon fall back with blistering tyres, and with eight laps to go Jarier’s Shadow failed too, allowing Pace to claim a famous win.

He would tragically die in a plane crash two years later, meaning it would be his only GP victory.

1982: Piquet wins – then doesn’t

Seven years later and another Brazilian came home first after a classic contest – but wasn’t given the race victory.

Held in searing temperatures at Jacarepaguá – in scenes reminiscent of the recent Qatar GP – several drivers suffered from heat stroke, with the ‘winner’ Nelson Piquet fainting on the podium.

At the race start Alain Prost’s Renault bogged down and Gilles Villeneuve leapt into the lead in his Ferrari.

With the naturally aspirated Williams and Brabham cars soon getting in on the action too, Keke Rosberg harried Villeneuve in the opening exchanges before Piquet closed in too as the tension reached fever pitch.

“For various reasons one of the rarest sites in F1 racing is racing cars actually racing each other,” commented TV critic and racing fan Clive James at the time. “The crowds like it, but it makes team managers nervous.”

The nerves might have been fraying down at the Scuderia – the charismatic French-Canadian clung onto the lead until lap 29, when he was pressured into a mistake by Brabham’s Piquet and span off.

Riccardo Patrese went almost delirious with the heat, blacking out and spinning by himself in a straight line before he retired. Piquet had to rest his head on the side of the cockpit during the closing laps.

The Brazilian then collapsed during the post-race ceremony but his efforts were in vain as he and second-placed finisher Rosberg were disqualified for using ‘water-cooled brakes’ – a device which allowed cars to reduce their minimum weight by releasing water stored in the car during the race.

1989: Mansell thrills on Ferrari debut

No-one had given Ferrari much hope heading into 1989. The conservative Italian press hated John Barnard’s revolutionary semi-automatic gearbox, and its challenge looked futile regardless against the almighty McLaren combination of Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost.

Then, on the season-opening race at Jacarepaguá, Mansell and co ripped up the form book. The soon-to-be-dubbed Il Leone qualified sixth but shot to third on the race start.

By lap 13 he was in the lead, before it all started to go slightly wrong, as John Barnard told Motor Sport last year.

“Having been ‘Happy Nigel’ up to that point, he suddenly came on the radio in hysterics, saying the steering wheel was falling off!” he remembered. “I said, ‘Christ Nigel, come in!’ It turned out two of its three bolts had come out. This was pretty crucial. All the electronics for the gearbox went through the steering wheel.

“There was a tiny little multi-pin plug in the centre of the steering column which communicated the signals from the paddle shifts. Nigel came in, we got the spare which we hadn’t even tested, just jammed it on and he drove off! Myself and my chief mechanic looked at each other: ‘There’s just no way that’s going to work straight off the bat, without being tested!’ But it did, and we won!”

The Ferrari 640 would never finish lower than third – but it struggled to actually complete a race due to reliability issues, which were eventually found not to be due to the gearbox. Barnard would leave at the end of the year.

1993: Senna’s last home win

1993 is often framed as a season of struggle for Ayrton Senna, but with five wins against the dominant Williams-Renault team in an underpowered McLaren-Ford MP4/8, it stands as one of his finest years in F1.

Not that it was easy to even get him to drive. The Brazilian had been reluctant to return to Woking after a potential ’93 Williams move was vetoed by Alain Prost.

He was eventually persuaded to campaign again for McLaren, on a race-by-race agreement – for $1m a GP.

As former McLaren team manager and close friend of Senna Jo Ramirez told Motor Sport earlier this year, the tension would rise before each race as the team waited to see whether the Brazilian would even deign to be there – even at his home race for Interlagos.

“We still didn’t know if he was going to show up,” he said. “Eventually he came into the paddock and did qualifying. He finished third behind the Williams, but with Michael Schumacher in the Benetton behind – with the works Ford engine [McLaren had customer units] – it wasn’t easy.”

Senna made it into second on the start, but a stop-go penalty for passing under yellows dropped him back in the pack.

Then the heavens opened, and some Senna brilliance began in earnest.

Prost span off, and the McLaren man was left second by Williams back-up Damon Hill when the resulting safety car ended.

Senna then went back to dry tyres before Hill and pulled off a brilliant overtake on the wet track offline at Ferradura, sending the home crowd wild.

He was greeted by Juan Manuel Fangio – Senna’s only hero, according to the three-time champ – on the podium, and partied with Pele after the race – not a bad way to celebrate.

2003: Jordan’s final F1 victory

2003 truly signalled the beginning of the end for Jordan as a force in grand prix racing, but it still managed one final flourish early on that year.

A miserable start to the season had left the team with no points after two races, but an eighth-place starting spot for Giancarlo Fisichella gave the team hope for a decent finish at what would be its 200th race.

“I’ve always said that the best times for me were firstly surviving 1991, our first season, and after that, of course, the race wins, particularly our 1-2 at Spa in 1998,” said team principal Eddie Jordan before the race. “Any team boss who’s been up there with his driver on the winner’s rostrum will tell you, once you’ve felt the thrill, you’re addicted. I can’t wait for that to return.” Prescient.

The race began behind the safety car – and Fisichella’s engineer Rob Smedley decided to gamble with Bridgestone’s intermediate tyre. By bringing in the Italian early under yellow and fuelling the car to the end, Smedley reckoned ‘Fisi’ could outrun the rest of the field.

Smedley had to persuade technical director Gary Anderson of the merits of the strategy, and then lay the law down over team radio with Fisichella, who didn’t want to pit from a points-paying position.

“I can remember being very young and thinking, ‘Oh my God, if this doesn’t go right, then I’m gonna get an almighty bollocking at the end of the race!’” Smedley said to Motor Sport.

When the race restarted, cars ahead gradually either pitted or fell off the road in a chaotic event. Fisi diligently moved up the order until, after 53 long laps, he brilliantly snatched the lead from Kimi Räikkönen’s McLaren. And then it was over.

Mark Webber suffered a huge crash at the final corner, which Fernando Alonso then piled into, bringing the race to a premature end.

Jordan had won on its 200th event – or had it? An incorrect count-back handed the race to Räikkönen, but the resulted was righted a few days later.

Fisichella finally had his first grand prix victory – and Jordan had its last.