International motorsport mourns the loss of former Formula 1 driver Jean-Pierre Jabouille. The two-time Grand Prix winner died on Thursday at the age of 80, his family confirmed to French news agency AFP. Jabouille wrote Formula 1 history in 1979 with his first success in a race in the premier class of automobile sport: His victory in the home race at the French Grand Prix meant the first triumph in a race for the Formula 1 World Championship for his French Renault team also the first victory for a car with a turbo engine.
In the following season, the Paris-born racing driver won the Austrian Grand Prix again. From 1975 to 1981, Jabouille drove a total of 49 Formula 1 races. Apart from Renault, he also started for Williams, Tyrrell and Ligier-Talbot. Shortly after the end of his Formula 1 career in 1981 due to the consequences of a broken leg in a serious accident a year earlier at the Canadian Grand Prix, Jabouille returned to motorsport for several years as team boss of the Ligier racing team.
Jabouille also earned merit as a long-distance driver
As head of sports at Peugeot, the “big blonde”, who had meanwhile tried his hand at running a restaurant in the French capital, was even temporarily active in Formula 1 again in the 1990s. Jabouille Meriten also earned himself as a long-distance driver. In the legendary 24-hour race of Le Mans, the veteran didn’t win, but he did climb onto the podium four times.
For the French motorsport scene, Jabouille’s death means the third loss of a well-known personality with a Formula 1 past in just a few weeks. At the beginning of December last year, two-time Grand Prix winner Patrick Tambay died at the age of 73 before the Grand Nation had to say goodbye to Philippe Streiff for Christmas.
