Formula 1

About the season

At the South African Grand Prix at Kyalami, Tom Pryce was unable to avoid young marshal Frederik Jansen van Vuuren, who had run onto the track to fight a fire; the marshal was killed instantly, and the fire extinguisher he was carrying flew up and struck and killed Pryce too - the same race in which Lauda scored his first win of the season. A few weeks later, Brazilian driver Carlos Pace was killed in a light aircraft crash. Lauda's relationship with Ferrari had soured since his refusal to race in the wet at Fuji the previous year; after clinching his second World Championship at the United States Grand Prix, the team nonetheless entered a third car for the inexperienced Gilles Villeneuve at the Canadian Grand Prix - in response, Lauda walked out on Ferrari two races before the season ended, with Villeneuve driving his car at the season-closing Japanese Grand Prix. Lauda signed with the Parmalat-backed Brabham-Alfa Romeo team for 1978, closing out a Ferrari chapter that had brought him two World Championships. Niki Lauda won the 1977 Drivers' Championship with 70 points (Ferrari), 15 points ahead of the runner-up. Ferrari won the Constructors' Championship with 84 points, 22 points ahead of the runner-up. Across 17 completed races this season, there were 203 retirements. 8 different drivers won a race this season. Mario Andretti took the most race wins, 4 in total. Scheckter won the season-opening race, the Argentine Grand Prix. The closest finish of the season came at the United States Grand Prix West, with a gap of just 0.773 seconds. Lunger made the biggest gain of the season at the Spanish Grand Prix, from grid position 28 to finishing 10 (up 18 places). The season's biggest upset win came from Jones at the Austrian Grand Prix, starting from grid position 14. The Canadian Grand Prix saw the most retirements of the season, with 19 drivers failing to finish. The most dominant win of the season came at the Japanese Grand Prix, with a margin of 62.5 seconds. Hunt won the Japanese Grand Prix, the final race of the season.