French Grand Prix

Paul Ricard, 4 Jul 1971

All cars are 3-litre F1 unless noted.

Sources

Note that the identification of individual cars in these results is based on the material presented elsewhere in this site and may in some cases contradict the organisers' published results.

3-litre Formula 1 World Championship events 1966-1985

These 1966 to 1985 results were initially compiled by Allen Brown, but these were in the very basic form required to track individual car histories. Since then further details, such as laps completed, qualifying times and so on, have been added from Rob Ryder's extensive database.

All comments, clarifications, corrections and additions are most welcome. Please email Allen at allen@oldracingcars.com if you can help with our research.

Individual sources for this event

Autosport 8 Jul 1971 pp16-23 (by Patrick McNally). Motoring News 8 Jul 1971 pp12-14 (by 'MGD' Mike Doodson). Motor Sport August 1971 pp793-795 and 'Notes on the Cars' p795 (by 'DSJ' Denis Jenkinson). Autocourse 1971-72 pp84-89 (by David Phipps). The Motor Racing Year No 3 (by Anthony Pritchard) pp64-71.

There were only slight changes to the entry from previous races. Lotus, Brabham, McLaren, Tyrrell, Matra, Surtees, Ferrari and Williams entered two cars, BRM entered three, and March entered four, so that was one fewer Ferrari than usual as Andretti had USAC commitments, one extra March for Nanni Galli and a second Frank Williams entry for Jean Max. Added to this was a March 701 entered by Jo Siffert Automobiles for Francois Mazet, to bring the total to 24. March did not have enough engines for the fourth car, so Galli did not start. Spare cars were Andretti's usual 312B2 for Ickx, Tyrrell 001 for Stewart, the narrow P160 for Rodriguez, a Matra MS120B with the new MS71 engine for Amon, and a brand new TS9 for John Surtees, so 29 cars were present. Motor Sport said that Regazzoni used the spare Ferrari and that Peterson used Soler-Roig's 711. Autosport indicated that 20T was originally MS120B-06 and then became MS120B-06 in the second and third session. He raced MS120B-06 with the new MS71 engine.

Jenks' 'Notes on the Cars' reproduced weights for all the cars issued by the organisers, showing the BRMs - shockingly - to be the lightest, followed closely by Stewart's Tyrrell 003. Heaviest, apart from the two dreadfully overweight March 701s, were the latest McLaren M19A and the Brabham BT33. The Tyrrells were startlingly fast in a straight line, even though only Stewart had the new full-width sports car nose which would be so widely copied over the next two years.