F1 racing driver Philippe Streiff - abrupt career end before great success
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Summary
Few people remember the F1 racing driver Philippe Streiff, who was certainly not lacking in talent. His career came to an untimely end in a serious training accident with unnecessary complications, meaning that he was never really able to show what he was really made of. This racing driver portrait summarizes his monoposto career and shows him in historical footage.
This article contains the following chapters
- Drama on the race track
- Deployed for safety
- A promising start to his career
- From Formula 2 to Formula 1
- Successes with Ligier
- Points with Tyrrell
Estimated reading time: 4min
Preview (beginning of the article)
It happened on March 15, 1989 in Jacarepagua in Rio de Janeiro. Like every year, Formula 1 was in Brazil for a week of testing for the upcoming season. Philippe Streiff was there with the AGS team and was sitting in the new car when the left rear suspension broke in a fast bend and the car plunged into the crash barrier without braking, then rolled over several times and finally came to a standstill behind the barriers. The roll bar was shaved off and Streiff sat in the car with serious, but not life-threatening, vertebral injuries. But then the big drama began. It took ages, even hours, for Streiff to finally arrive at the medical center, which was located around 20 kilometers from the track. Despite emergency surgery, the lack of first aid and the endlessly long ride in an ambulance on extremely bumpy roads with presumably unprofessional stabilization of his spine could not save the Frenchman from paraplegia. His promising career came to an abrupt end in a wheelchair. Along with Clay Regazzoni and Frank Williams, he became the third victim of back injuries.
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