05/10/2014
NEWS STORY
A sad day for motorsport gets a little sadder with the news that former F1 driver Andrea de Cesaris has died in a motorbike accident.
The Roman-born racer held the unfortunate record of being the driver to participate in the most Grand Prix (208) without ever winning a race, while his record in terms of incidents was to earn him the soubriquet, Andrea de Crasheris.
A kart champion in Italy, he subsequently moved to Britain to participate in F3, finishing runner-up in the 1979 championship. He then moved up to F2, driving for Ron Dennis' Project 4 outfit.
In late 1980 he made his F1 debut, aged just 21, replacing fellow-Italian Vittorio Brambilla at Alfa-Romeo, who himself was replacing Patrick Depailler who had been killed in a testing accident.
His maiden race, the Canadian Grand Prix ended after just 8 laps when he suffered an engine failure, whilst at the subsequent American Grand Prix he crashed out after just two laps.
And so began a career that was to span 15 seasons, with Alfa-Romeo, McLaren, Ligier, Minardi, Brabham, Rial, Dallara, Jordan, Tyrrell and finally Sauber, where, in 1994 he was drafted in to replace Karl Wendlinger who had crashed heavily at Monaco just weeks after Ayrton Senna's fatal crash at Imola. Indeed, Andrea has participated in the notorious San Marino race with Jordan, replacing Eddie Irvine who was serving a three-race ban.
In all those races, de Cesaris achieved just one podium finish, scored 59 points and started from pole once, and whilst it was said that it was his family ties with Philip Morris, of Marlboro cigarettes fame, that kept him in the game, many felt there was a genuine talent which he had failed to capitalise on. Indeed, in the latter stages of his career, the Italian was seen as something of a cult figure in F1 and as a result a fan club was set up, much to his delight.
Following his retirement from F1 he became a successful currency broker based in Monte Carlo, returning to motorsport in 2005 with the ill-fated Grand Prix Masters series. In three races, his best result was fourth at Kyalami.
Tonight, as race fans around the world waited on news of Jules Bianchi, it was revealed that de Cesaris had died when his motorbike hit a guardrail in Bufalotta in Rome.
Picture: McLaren/Twitter