Piercarlo Ghinzani

Interesting facts

In 1977, driving a March chassis for Euroracing, he won the European Formula Three Championship - March Engineering's first title in the category. His F1 debut came on 17 May 1981 at the Belgian Grand Prix, called up by Enzo Osella to replace the injured Miguel Ángel Guerra. At the 1984 South African Grand Prix warm-up he crashed into the wall with a nearly full 220-litre fuel load, and his car burst into flames, leaving him with burns to his hands and face that forced him to sit out the race. That same year, at the Dallas Grand Prix - run in scorching heat on a crumbling track marked by heavy attrition - he finished fifth, his only points finish in F1. In qualifying for the 1987 British Grand Prix he ran out of fuel in front of the pits; his mechanics illegally refuelled and push-started him, getting him excluded from the rest of the weekend. With 111 entries and 74 starts, he holds the record for the most Formula One starts without ever qualifying inside the top ten. Piercarlo Ghinzani raced in Formula 1 from 1981 to 1989, across 8 seasons as an Italian driver. He scored a total of 2 championship points over his career.