Jean Pierre Jabouille

[The Brummie]

The great man has left us today.

A lovely man & a very very good race driver.

[LukeBrown66]

He was apparently almost an engineer/driver, hence so highly valued by Renault.

he won races, and was probably responsible for getting the turbo era onto it's feet. He also did very well at Le Mans i gather.

[nickfrog]

So sad. Such a multi talented individual. His name alone resonates with the original turbo era. There is a Motorsport interview somewhere that is full of insight and humoristic anecdotes...

Found it

https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/article...

Edited by nickfrog on Thursday 2nd February 20:47

[coppice]

I remember watching him drive the Renault RS 01 at its debut , at Silverstone in 1977. I thought , as I watched it drone around not especially fast, 'these
turbos won't catch on on F1' .Showing my great insight in to the sport again.

And how infuriating it must have been for J-P J for people to wang on endlessly about Dijon 1979 , but not about his ground-breaking win , the first in F1 by a turbocharged car , but about his teammate's entertaining battle for second with that Canadian guy ...

[LukeBrown66]

I get that, but he still won, in a Renault in France, and for those in the know that is actually a big deal, and it would have been for him, the French, Renault and Michelin, no-one can ever take that away from him, thankfully, and how deserved after all the work.

He was actually also magnificent in the Matra Ligier aswell later in life.

[Hammersia]

He also did some of the terrific stunt driving in the original French “Taxi” film.

[Simes205]

Also first win in a turbo F1 car.

[rdjohn]

coppice said:

I remember watching him drive the Renault RS 01 at its debut , at Silverstone in 1977. I thought , as I watched it drone around not especially fast, 'these
turbos won't catch on on F1' .Showing my great insight in to the sport again.

And how infuriating it must have been for J-P J for people to wang on endlessly about Dijon 1979 , but not about his ground-breaking win , the first in F1 by a turbocharged car , but about his teammate's entertaining battle for second with that Canadian guy ...

I was also there and believed Porsche when they assured everyone that a 0.5 engine equivalence for a turbo car ensured that Renault could never win a race. It did seem a very tall order.

But 3-years later there were Renault Fuegos and 5s available with Turbo engines and suddenly turbocharging looked like the future. Then the Quattro came along and the rest is history.

[Hammersia]

Hammersia said:

He also did some of the terrific stunt driving in the original French “Taxi” film.

And some of the interminable Le Mans film as well apparently.

[coppice]

rdjohn said:

I was also there and believed Porsche when they assured everyone that a 0.5 engine equivalence for a turbo car ensured that Renault could never win a race. It did seem a very tall order.

But 3-years later there were Renault Fuegos and 5s available with Turbo engines and suddenly turbocharging looked like the future. Then the Quattro came along and the rest is history.

Although , to be fair, Renault had already won in sports cars with the A 442 in 1975 , and took pole at Le Mans in 1976. We already had the BMW 2002 turbo and Porsche 930 turbo road cars . But as you say , what blew everyone's mind was the fact that the equivalence formula in F1 meant a turbocharged engine would be only half the capacity of an NA engine like the DFV .

[entropy]

Hammersia said:

He also did some of the terrific stunt driving in the original French “Taxi” film.

Not seen it in years but I'd always thought it was Paul Belmondo who did most of the driving.