motorsport rewind – 1971 Rome GP F2 from Vallelunga

Posted on April 22, 2011 by thatconsultantbloke

F2 began to lose its way a bit towards the second half of the 1970s perhaps, but in 1971 it was still thriving, and you could still find a crop of Grand Prix drivers turning out and plenty of dicing all down the grid. It was still possible to turn up at Brabham, March, Lotus, Tecno or wherever with a bag of cash and buy a competitive car if you had the funds and you too could be part of the fun.

Thanks to Roy Pagliacci, here’s some home made cine film of the 1971 Rome GP, a qualifying round of the European championship, and marvel at how close the racing was. Here you have two future World Champions, 1 current GP winner, 6 future GP and 3 future Le Mans winners amongst the entry.

Look down the list of drivers below and see just how cosmopolitan it all was. There are drivers from many parts of Europe, plus North and South America and Australia taking part. This was still in the 1600cc powered era with the Cosworth FVA as the power unit of choice for most, although the BMW unit was still a competitive option as evidenced by Questor’s second place.

Note also the race time of 1 hour 26 minutes for winner Ronnie Peterson, just 10 minutes less that Lewis Hamilton took to win in China last week in F1. These people earned their money, even if they did do it over two heats sometimes.

Along the way in Roy’s film you’ll also see the F850 cars (Italy’s answer to Formula Ford) racing. The winner of that race? One Lella Lombardi, the only lady grand prix driver to finish in the points so far, and sadly no longer with us.

Lella’s half point for the shortened 1975 Spanish GP is sometimes regarded as a bit of a fluke, but the lady could drive; she was only tiny, but managed 7th in the German GP at the Nurburgring, no mean feat, handled F5000 with aplomb and later qualified 29th (of 43) for the NASCAR Firecracker 400 at Daytona in 1977, being classified 31st after retiring with transmission problems.

Here are the results of the 70 lap 1971 F2 Rome GP race:

Pos	No	Driver	Entrant	Car – Engine	Race Time
1	1	Ronnie Peterson	Smog – March Engineering	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	1:25’57.2″
2	5	Dieter Quester	Eifelland Caravans	March 712M – BMW M11	1:26’07.8″
3	2	Carlos Reutemann	AC Argentina – YPF	Brabham BT36 – Cosworth FVA	1:26’38.9″
4	33	Mike Beuttler	Clarke Mordaunt	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	1:26’51.2″
5	10	Gerry Birrell	J. & J. Stanton	Lotus 69 – Cosworth FVA	1:27’07.7″
6	13	John Watson	John Watson	Brabham BT30 – Cosworth FVA	1:27’10.0″
7	8	Niki Lauda	Bosch Racing Team	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	1:27’15.3″
8	12	John Cannon	John Cannon	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	1:27’40.5″
9	25	Carlos Ruesch	AC Argentina – YPF	Brabham BT36 – Cosworth FVA	1:27’44.9″
10	29	Claudio Francisci	Racing Team IRIS Ceramiche	Tecno TF71 – Cosworth FVA	69 laps
11	28	Giovanni Salvati	Scuderia Ala d’Oro	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	69
12	22	Freddy Link	Jolly Club Switzerland	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	68
13	26	Carlos Pace	Frank Williams Motul	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	68
14	14	Silvio Moser	Silvio Moser	Brabham BT30/36 – Cosworth FVA	67
15	11	Peter Westbury	F.I.R.S.T.	Brabham BT36 – Cosworth FVA	66

NC	7	Jean-Pierre Jaussaud	Shell – Meubles Arnold Team	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	63
NC	38	Henri Pescarolo	Frank Williams Motul	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	61
NC	36	Emerson Fittipaldi	Team Bardahl	Lotus 69 – Cosworth FVA	37
NC	6	Wilson Fittipaldi	Team Bardahl	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	11
NC	4	Francois Cevert	Equipe Tecno Elf	Tecno TF71 – Ford BDA	6
NC	3	Tim Schenken	Rondel Racing	Brabham BT36 – Cosworth FVA	6
NC	39	Derek Bell	Frank Williams Motul	March 712M – Cosworth FVA	3

Filed under: Circuits, Drivers, NASCAR, Retro Moments | Tagged: autoracing, F1, F2, formula one, lemans, NASCAR, racecar |

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