ALL ABOUT FORMULA 1
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NIKI LAUDA, THE COMPUTER
Niki Lauda began his career in the late 60s in Touring cars and in 1969 he moved to Formula V, but without much prominence. In 1971, he decided he had to continue in motorsport and took out a £30,000 loan from the bank to fund his career.
In 1971, with the loan money, he raced and won the 1971 John Player Special F2 with 31 points and Ronnie Peterson was runner-up with 27 points. In the European F2 championship, Peterson was champion, Reutemann was runner-up, Wilson Fittipaldi was 6th and Lauda came in 10th place.
In mid-1971, he bought a place in the March F1 team for £2,000 and raced alongside Ronnie Peterson, this time as a teammate.
Lauda Touring Racing Lauda debuted in F1 in the March 711 Ford in 1971
In 1972, he took out another loan from the bank to race the entire European F2 season, placing 5th in the championship. That season he had good duels with James Hunt, who would become his rival in F1 in 1976. That same year, he returned to racing in F1 with the March team alongside Ronnie Peterson, but this time he didn't have a very friendly relationship with the Swede.
In 1973, he raced in BRM, lost to Jean Pierre Beltoise, but was ahead of Clay Regazzoni. What caught the Swiss driver's attention was Lauda's ability to convey information about the car. In 1973 Regazzoni had been invited to return to Ferrari in place of Jack Ickx who would not race for the team, so the Swiss driver recommended the Austrian to be his teammate at Ferrari. Little did he know, that Lauda would become his executioner at Ferrari...
In 1974, Lauda began to pass on information and make recommendations for improvements to the car, Ferrari showed a clear improvement in performance compared to previous years, rivaling McLaren, which had hired Emerson Fittipaldi, another good at setting up the car, who also showed improvements in 1974. Lauda took 9 poles and was only not champion, because of the accidents he was involved in (England, Germany and Canada) which took away important points in the championship.
In 1975, Lauda "exploded" as a driver in F1, took no notice of anyone and became F1 champion with extreme ease. To give you an idea, Clay Regazzoni came 5th in the championship and the runner-up was Emerson Fittipaldi in McLaren. The precision of his driving and his coolness on the tracks led the media at the time to nickname him "COMPUTER".
In 1976, he was leading the championship when he suffered a very serious accident at the German GP, at Nurburgring, which almost killed him because of the carbon monoxide he inhaled. Niki was in the fire for 55 seconds, was hospitalized and only returned to racing in the Italian GP, finishing in 4th place.
James Hunt, Lauda's old rival in F2, was scoring points and reached the Austrian's points at the end of the year. In the last race of the season, at GP Japan 76 in the rain, Lauda refused to race for safety reasons. Hunt came in 3rd place and became champion. Today I wrongly see many people criticizing James Hunt, but we can NEVER take away the merits of the English driver, who was not to blame for Lauda not racing.
Accident at Nurburgring 76 almost took his life Lauda at Ferrari in 1976
In 1977, Ferrari itself had put Niki Lauda's talent in check, and did not believe that he could deliver good performances, but the Austrian shut up his critics, was again F1 champion with extreme regularity and scored 72 points (a record in the F1) and that's because he ran three fewer races (Esp, Can, Jap). To give you an idea, his teammate was Carlos Reutemann, who was an excellent driver, he came in 4th place in the championship.
In 1978 and 1979, he moved to Brabham and had good performances, but the car was not capable of making him fight for the title against Lotus and Ferrari. In 1979, a newcomer called Nelson Piquet, a future promise of F1 genius, appeared in the team, started to outrun the Austrian, and this made Niki Lauda lose heart and temporarily retire from F1.
Lauda at Brabham 1979 Lauda at McLaren 1984
In 1982, Ron Dennis convinced Niki to return to F1, he won two races, but the car was not champion and he was beaten by John Watson in 1982 and 1983.
In 1984, McLaren, powered by the TAG-Porsche engine, dominated the season, with two brilliant drivers and good car choices: Niki Lauda and Alain Prost. They never touched wheels on the track and won 12 races, with Lauda always coming from the middle of the grid and arriving at the front, with incredible consistency. He became champion by half a point, equaling his 1977 points record (72 points), but helped by the fact that Alain Prost scored half the points of the 1984 Monaco GP and the Frenchman lost more points due to retirements than the Austrian. It was a stroke of luck for the Austrian, but LUCK helps great champions.
CURIOSITY: In 1984 he competed in the Celebrity Race with the Mercedes 190E with several former F1 drivers and Senna took the place of Emerson Fittipaldi who was unable to attend. After training, Lauda complained that Senna's car was better than his, so the event organizers had both cars changed. In the race Senna won with the car that Lauda and Lauda came second with Senna's car (See photo below).
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Piquet, Lauda and Prost: 3 geniuses Lauda champion in 1984, 3 geniuses on the podium
In 1985, McLaren was no longer the dominant car and Prost simply "destroyed" Lauda who was at the end of his career and he decided to retire from F1 for good. Like Piquet in '79, Prost was responsible for Lauda's retirement.
Analyzing what happened in the 70s, everything suggests that the improvement in Ferrari's performance was driven by the feedback that Lauda gave the team and the work led by Mauro Forghiere. Ferrari clearly evolved its car in the years with Lauda, and broke the 11-year drought without titles, when Lauda won the trophy in 1975 and 1977.
The same happened when Jackie Stewart and Fittipaldi joined Tyrrell and McLaren respectively, a strong evolution of these cars was noticed, as in those days the driver needed to provide good information about the car's behavior. And in this, Stewart, Fittipaldi and Lauda were above all other F1 drivers.
The only negative point in Lauda's career is that he lost to 5 teammates (Peterson: 1971 and 1972, Beltoise: 1973, Regazzoni: 1974, Watson: 1982 and 1983, and Prost: 1985), but regardless of that, Lauda is at the level of the GREAT GENIUS of F1, for his example of perseverance and for his technical ability in F1.