Gilles Villeneuve

Joseph Gilles Henri Villeneuve (born 18th January, 1950 in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, Canada) is a Canadian former racing driver best known for his career in Formula One from 1976 to 1986. Due to his stint at Williams in the early 1980s, with his car number 5 painted in red to distinguish between the two cars, Villeneuve was known as the "Original Red 5".

His son, Jacques also drove in Formula One - winning the Driver's Championship in 1997 and racing as recently as 2014.

The Île Notre-Dame Circuit was renamed the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in his honour in the mid-1980s.

Formula One

1976-1977: Kojima

Villeneuve made his Formula One debut at the 1976 Japanese Grand Prix for the unfancied Kojima Engineering squad alongside Masahiro Hasemi.

In the wet of Fuji Speedway, the KE007 proved a worthy steed for both drivers - with Villeneuve taking an eleventh place finish in the race.

Villeneuve rejected a bid to race full-time in F1 from American outfit Team Penske and returned to Formula Atlantic in 1977.

Villeneuve entered the BRDC International Trophy in 1977 with the Kojima squad and impressed even further - taking a fifth place in the race after running ahead of the two works Renault cars before they retired.

1977-1978: Ferrari

His Kojima heroics impressed those at Maranello, who saw fit to put him in one of the four works Ferrari cars at the inaugural Trofeo Dino Ferrari. In a solid outing, he would be denied a 3rd place finish after suffering mechanical failure on the last lap. This performance, along with his Kojima drives, put Villeneuve at the top of Enzo Ferrari's shortlist to replace Patrick Depailler for 1978. In direct competition with young Italian driver Elio de Angelis, Villeneuve would make his World Championship debut at the 1977 Canadian Grand Prix, replacing Depailler. Although Mario Andretti would get pole for the race, Villeneuve shocked the racing world and held a charging Andretti behind for the final 20 laps to take a win on his second F1 start and debut for Ferrari.

This performance was enough to convince Ferrari of his talents, and as a result the Canadian driver was signed by them for the 1978 season alongside Jody Scheckter. Villeneuve continued his fine run of form by taking pole for the first race of the season in Argentina. He would win one Grand Prix, the Swiss GP at Dijon; however, a string of poor performances in the second half of the season, where he only finished in the points twice, would derail his season. This notably included tearing his suspension apart at Hockehneim whilst trying to get his car out of the grave. The true lowlight of his season would come in the season finale at Watkins Glen where, with Scheckter still in contention for the championship, Villeneuve tangled with him, giving Scheckter's car terminal damage. Villeneuve too would fail to finish after hitting mechanical trouble, whilst a Lotus 1-2 scuppered Ferrari's dreams of both the drivers' and constructors' championships. Villeneuve was blamed by Enzo Ferrari for costing the team both championships and thus promptly fired, to be unexpectedly replaced by Ferrari's main rival in 1978: World Champion Mario Andretti.

Career Results

Formula One World Championship

Year	Entrant	Chassis	Engine	#	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	WDC	Points
1976	Kojima Engineering	Kojima KE-007	Ford Cosworth DFV 3.0 V8	51	ARG	RSA	USW	ESP	BEL	MON	SOV	FRA	GBR	GER	AUT	NED	ITA	CAN	USA	JPN 11		NC	0
1977	Scuderia Ferrari SpA SEFAC	Ferrari 312T2	Ferrari 015 3.0 F12	2	ARG	RSA	USW	ESP	BEL	MON	FRA	TUS	SOV	GBR	NED	GER	AUT	ITA	CAN 1	USA	JPN	13th	9
1978	Scuderia Ferrari SpA SEFAC	Ferrari 312T3	Ferrari 015 3.0 F12	6	ARG 13†	RSA Ret	USW 5	ESP 2	BEL 3	MON Ret	SUI 1	TUS 2	GBR Ret	FRA Ret	NED 2	GER 19†	AUT Ret	ITA 3	CAN Ret	USA Ret		5th	37
1979	Saudia Williams Racing Team	Williams FW07	Ford Cosworth DFV 3.0 V8	27	ARG Ret	BRA Ret	RSA Ret	USW Ret	ESP 3	BEL 1	MON 4	EUR Ret	SMR 1	FRA 16†	GBR 4	GER 1	AUT 2	NED C	ITA Ret	CAN Ret	USA 4	4th	46
1980	Saudia Williams Racing Team	Williams FW08	Ford Cosworth DFV 3.0 V8	2	ARG 2	BRA 1	USW Ret	ESP Ret	BEL 3	MON 1	MEX 3	SMR 1	FRA 1	GBR 2	GER 1	AUT 3	ITA Ret	CAN Ret	CPL 3	DUB 2		2nd	75 (79)
1981	Saudia Williams Racing Team	Williams FW08B	Ford Cosworth DFV 3.0 V8	5	ARG Ret	RSA Ret	BRA Ret	USW 2	ESP WD	BEL Ret	MON 1	SMR 2	MEX Ret	FRA Ret	GBR Ret	GER Ret	AUT 6	SUI 2	ITA Ret	CAN 1	CPL 1	3rd	46
1982	Canon Williams Honda Team	Williams FW09	Honda RA162E 1.5 V6t	5	RSA Ret	BRA 3	USW Ret	SMR Ret	BEL 4	MON 3	MEX 3	DET Ret	FRA 3	GBR 4	GER Ret	AUT Ret	EUR Ret	ITA 1	CAN Ret	CPL 2		5th	37
1983	Canon Williams Honda Team	Williams FW09B	Honda RA163E 1.5 V6t	5	RSA Ret	BRA 1	SMR 1	BEL ENT	ESP ENT	MON ENT	MEX ENT	DET ENT	FRA ENT	GBR ENT	GER ENT	AUT ENT	ITA ENT	EUR ENT	CAN ENT	NYC ENT		1st*	18*