Constructors Who Have Won In F1 - Tyrell

[teabagyokel]

Tyrell (23)

Though Ken Tyrell had run Jackie Stewart's cars for a couple of years, the first Tyrells rolled onto the tracks for the North American rounds of the 1970 season, with retirements from the front row in each. Their first finish was in the first race of 1971 with Stewart in 2nd position, and the Scot was to win the next two races in Barcelona and Monte Carlo.

There would be three consecutive wins for Stewart at Paul Ricard, Silverstone and the Nurburgring, and Stewart won the title when Jacky Ickx failed to finish at the Österreichring, and François Cevert's third place (a whole 0.09s down) in Monza gave Tyrell the Constructors' Championship. Stewart won the Canadian GP before Cevert won his only race at Watkins Glen.
Stewart won the opener in Buenos Aires in 1972, but Tyrell found themselves competing with Lotus, McLaren and Ferrari. He was able to take advantage of Chris Amon's typical misfortune in Clermont, but found himself more than 30 points down on Emerson Fittipaldi at the start of the penultimate Grand Prix in Canada. Promisingly, however, he won the last two.

After two podiums to start 1973, Stewart qualified 16th in Kyalami but led by lap 7 and did not relinquish that lead. He retired in Jarama before back-to-back wins in Zolder and Monaco, with another pair of back-to-back wins following at Zandvoort and the Nurburgring later in the season, both one-twos. Stewart had the title, and planned to retire following his 100th race at Watkins Glen. Cevert's death at the circuit he won his sole race at two years previously meant Tyrell pulled out and Stewart stayed on 99.

So Tyrell needed two new drivers for the newly enumerated cars #3 and #4 for 1974. They were Patrick Depailler and Jody Scheckter. The season didn't start well, but they'd recovered to take a dominant one-two at Anderstorp. Having won that race, Scheckter also won at Brands Hatch, but Tyrell finished 3rd in the Constructors' Championship. In 1975 they were down to 5th, their high point a one-three finish at Kyalami as Scheckter won his home Grand Prix. 1976 saw Tyrell go six-wheeled, scoring their 20th win as a Constructor at Anderstorp with their final one-two. 1977 was their first year without a win as Scheckter left for Wolf and Ronnie Peterson joined the six-wheeler team. For 1978 they improved from 6th to 4th in the Constructors' Championship with a sole victory for Depailler in Monaco, partnered now by Didier Pironi.

There would be 3 podiums between Pironi and Jean-Pierre Jarier in 1979, and Derek Daly and Jarier were to share just 12 points in 1980. 1981 saw only 10 points and 10th in the Championship with Michele Alboreto and Eddie Cheever at the wheel.

Thus 1982 was much better for Tyrell. Brian Henton didn't score a point all year, but Michele Alboreto secured himself 8th in the Drivers' Championship and Tyrell 6th in the Constructors' race. There was to be a victory at the final race of the season at the Caesar's Palace car park in Las Vegas, his first win. 1983 was generally poor, with only three points gathered from all the races bar Alboreto's surprise win in Detroit. It was Tyrell's last win.

Tyrell's fuel was illegal in 1984, and they were thrown out of the Championship and disqualified from every race in the season. They were to score just 34 points from 1985-88. They came 5th in the Championship in 1989 and 1990 with Michele Alboreto returning Tyrell to the podium in Mexico City in 1989, a full 6 years since he himself had stood on the top step at Detroit. Jean Alesi would be in second place twice in 1990, too. There'd be two podiums left for Tyrell; Stefano Modena's second place in Montreal in 1991 capitalising on Nigel Mansell's misfortune, and Mark Blundell's 3rd place in Barcelona in 1994. They would score 61 points in the decade, scoring none in 1993 and in their final year, as BAT took over, in 1998.

In truth, Tyrell were constantly downhill, but it was still sad to see them bowing out fighting Minardis for 19th place.

 

[siffert_fan]

Brilliant stuff, as usual, TBY

Tyrell's demise was very sad to me, as it was always one of my favorite teams. I think one of the main contributing factors was the massive increase in costs, and he never could find another driver of Stewart's stature (although, to be honest, there have been precious few drivers with Stewarts ability through the entire history of F1). That made finding adequate backing far more difficult as money was always attracted by success, which then could capitalize on the added money to ensure MORE success. A vicious circle.

Personally, I was surprised that Peterson wasn't able to win in the 6 wheeler, as I was a great fan of Ronnie. It should also be noted that the Tyrell effort in 1972 was hindered by Stewart missing some races with an ulcer.

 

[Pyrope]

Very interesting TBY, thanks! For a team that started in a woodshed, Tyrrell were a surprisingly engineering-led bunch. Ok, so 001 was more than a bit of a lash-up, but 003 was one of F1's all-time greats, and the 005/006 series were a case study in how to design a car to suit one driver's preferences. The fact that Cevert managed to keep up with JYS in those hyper-twitchy cars (and many in the team thought he was actually the faster of the two in the second half of 1973) shows just how good he could have been. I think his loss at the end of 1973 ripped a hole in Ken's team that was never really healed. Him as team #1 and Jody as #2 in 1974 would have been a much stronger pairing than Depailler made, and might have given them that crucial base from which to build. P34 should have scored more than it did, but Scheckter's ambivalence to its design and the lack of tyre development scuppered that, too. With the team losing all of its results in 1984 it is easy to overlook just how good the 012 was. Most of the time Martin and Stefan were mixing it with the lower turbo teams, and Bellof was third in Monaco and Brundle second in Detroit. How much of that was due to Uncle Ken's special "heavy water" I don't know, but the FIA's handling of that incident still smells more like a stitch-up than a real infringement. How little times change. Anyway, I think their last really interesting car was the 019, which Harvey Postlethwaite used to introduce the high nose concept to F1. Alesi made very good use of that, but yet again Ken wasn't able to build on it and the team was dead a few years later.

I have always wondered whether Tyrrell's demise wasn't actually because of Ken, rather than despite him as many seem to think. All of the other major players of the late '60s and early '70s were able to stay competitive right into the 1980s, yet Tyrrell withered fairly fast after Stewart left. It does lead you to wonder who it was that was the effective motivational force in reality.

 

[teabagyokel]

I think that Tyrell's success in their first few years was largely due to one of the best men ever to take the wheel of a Formula One car, who distracted himself by taking on the "No Safety" establishment. Sir John Young Stewart.

 

[Pyrope]

Three championships in five years, and he was distracted?

 

[teabagyokel]

Three championships in five years, and he was distracted?

Testament to his supreme skill, I think!

 

[RasputinLives]

Great article TBY!

Ross Brawn very nearly put the Tyrell name on the Brawn team in 2009 and always think its a massive shame he didn't. Lets not forget that the current Mercedes team is an evolution of the original Tyrell team and still have staff that date back to the Tyrell days.

 

[teabagyokel]

Ross Brawn very nearly put the Tyrell name on the Brawn team in 2009 and always think its a massive shame he didn't. Lets not forget that the current Mercedes team is an evolution of the original Tyrell team and still have staff that date back to the Tyrell days.

That would have been a fitting and awesome tribute.