Thoughts on Elio de Angelis?

Never mind your mum MUDD, I fancied him meself at the time and I wasn't even gay back then.

BTW. A certian Nigel Stephney ( later of Ferarri fame ) was his cheif mechanic.

CHIEF..CHIEF...FFS

No h in Stepney (RIP) either. Sorry Irish

welshy

must admit the JPS s of the early 80s were the main reason i became addicted to F1 mainly because my father had a ridiculous looking lotus road car of the same livery that initially kick started my enthusiasm for the sport

for me EDA was a very understated driver of that era , very quick and very intelligent with mechanical sympathy for the fragile early 80s JPS he drove and for me a more complete driver than mansell who he partnered in his JPS days and hence by definition he would have also been better than the big name at the time who was piquet -

logically EDA could never exist at lotus after senna decimated him in the 85 jps , from what i gather peter warr did him no favours either -

was he worthy of a WDC title , not quite sure as his career stagnated after 85 and he was only ever going to achieve that goal had he been able to force himself into the williams"s of the early 90s
--------- unfortunately the incompetent clowns that masqueraded as marshal"s at paul ricard saw to it that he was never given the chance --

So your father had a Black and Gold LOTUS Europa MA. I loved that car, but preferred the later Esprit S3, which they also produced in LOTUS F1 colours, both John Player Special Black and Gold, and Essex colours which if I remember rightly was British Racing Green.

EDA was a better driver by far than Mansell and if as you say he had managed to get into a Williams I think he would have been Champion.

Correction, not BR Green.

comment by go-cellino-go (U6730)
posted 2 minutes ago
So your father had a Black and Gold LOTUS Europa MA. I loved that car, but preferred the later Esprit S3, which they also produced in LOTUS F1 colours, both John Player Special Black and Gold, and Essex colours which if I remember rightly was British Racing Green.

EDA was a better driver by far than Mansell and if as you say he had managed to get into a Williams I think he would have been Champion.
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my father had an early esprit turbo which if i can recall was effectively an S3 with a big turbo , at the time i thought it looked very dramatic which it did with the wedge looks and the slated rear window ,
must admit as i have got older i just think it probably looked a bit ridiculous on a public road ,

yeh- i was a big fan of EDA and to be honest it took me a long time to forgive the marshals at paul ricard as i believed at the time he was worthy of a WDC ,

ironically peter warr never got along with mansell but is was there animosity that in effect was the catalyst for mansell"s success --

I remember watching the 1982 Austrian GP and was convinced Rosberg would get him. So much so in fact, that evening my Dad was watching the highlights and asked me (as always), "who won"? I replied a little sharply , "Rosberg, of course!" He was convinced I told him wrong deliberately.

I was watching some 1985 GP's recently and was surprised how quick he seemed. I do recall seeing him drive a Shadow at Silverstone in 1979 and got a nice couple of shots of him in it wearing his "Star Wars" helmet.
I walked past him signing autographs at the 1985 test sessions, the morning was soaking wet and nobody went out until very late. I didn't collect autographs in those days though so took a photo and walked on.
He and Senna were there. Lotus did a press call to get pictures of Senna in the car in all his gear but didn't do that with De Angelis.
I have plenty of photographs of Senna out on the track that day but as far as I remember none of De Angelis driving. Although it is not unusual at test sessions to have only one driver a day, just as they do now.

""BTW. A certain Nigel Stepney (later of Ferrari fame) was his chief mechanic.""

Now there's another who met with a strange and unexpected (and as yet still unexplained to any satisfaction) end.

Looking through Autocourse for 1985 I was surprised to see De Angelis actually ahead of Senna in the championship right up to the Belgian Grand Prix which was in the middle of September. Even at the end of the season he was still 5th (33 points) in the standings with the much vaunted Senna only 4th,(38 points). Well, who would have thought that?