Welcome to another week of TheJudge13 F1 Bar Exam. As many of you would have heard I am away for a few weeks however, The Hippo is stepping into the breach and will be running the exam in my absence. However, he will not be sending emails so you will have to wait until the next one is posted for the answer. (JM)

Last week’s question(s): Can you name the driver, team, race and track where the photo was taken. Can you also name the car (type) and where the driver finished in the race?

The answer(s) I was looking for were: The driver in the photo is British driver Nigel Mansell driving for Lotus in their Lotus 91 – Ford during the 1982 Brazilian Grand Prix held at Jacarepagua. In this race Mansell qualified 14th and managed to finish in 3rd.

Two months had passed since the 1982 South African Grand Prix had been gripped by a drivers strike and the teams arrived in a sweltering Rio De Janeiro with renewed hope for the future.

In a manner reminiscent of the dominant Mercedes this year, the turbo-charged cars had finally reached a performance level that put them beyond the reach of the Cosworth powered brigade and it was most clearly visible along the back straight when the turbos ate their aspirated competition alive.

Renault’s Alain Prost took pole position from the Ferrari of Gilles Villeneuve followed by the Williams of Keke Rosberg and Rene Arnoux’s Renault fourth. Nelson Piquet qualified merely seventh just behind the Argentinian legend Carlos Reutemann who was taking his final Grand Prix start – before leaving the Williams team – as a confrontation between Argentina and Britain was escalating towards war in the Falklands.

The Cosworth brigade had been dealt a blow when the FISA outlawed the flexible side skirts – thereby reducing their downforce and effectively their competitiveness and several of the teams looked for loopholes within the regulations.

Several of the normally aspirated teams began running water-cooled brakes with additional water tanks built into the chassis. The idea being the tanks would empty very quickly at the start of the race due to the fluid evaporating, thereby allowing the cars to run up to 55kgs below weight. Towards the end of the race they would stop and fill them up once again and would be back up to the minimum weight as required by the regulations.

Incredibly, although running underweight was illegal in any other FIA-sanctioned championships it had never been written into the F1 regulations. In effect this allowed the cars to compete with the far more powerful turbo.

The Race

Villeneuve took an early lead after a tardy start from Alain Prost with Arnoux following close behind. Piquet had moved up to sixth before passing Rosberg for fifth position. Two laps later Prost made a mistake which gained the Brazilian another place.

Slowly he made his way through until on lap 17 he lay second to the French Canadian and reeled him in and begun to apply pressure. Uncharacteristically Villeneuve spun off and Piquet eased away from the pack.

Rosberg had also navigated his way forwards and followed Piquet through the remainder of the race. From early on Piquet could be seen resting his head on the inside cushioning of his cockpit as heat exhaustion started to play a part. Rosberg had worn a primitive ice-vest that kept him cooler for a while longer but Ricardo Patrese had succumbed and spun out. He made his way to the pits and had to be lifted from the car.

By the end Prost had recovered some ground and took third behind the leading duo but as ever in Formula One – the story wasn’t finished yet. Renault protested the top two finishers but interestingly none of the other aspirated cars and the scrutineers agreed. The top two were disqualified and Prost inherited the lead. The team naturally appealed but it was dismissed by the FIA some weeks later.

So after two races of the season, Prost had a 100% score of 18 points (9 per race win) with John Watson trailing on 7. Eventual champion, Rosberg, had just the 2 points from a fifth place finish in South Africa and would survive a destabilising season to secure the title with just one victory.

Well done Glyn, Cassius42, Simon, Johnny, Milestone11 and Mike.

This week’s question(s): Can you name the driver, team, race and track where the photo was taken. Can you also name the car (type) and where the driver finished in the race?

Please provide your answers in the field below: