Pedro Diniz

Pedro Diniz

Nation:	Brazil
Formula 1 world championship
First start:	1995 Brazilian Grand Prix
Last start:	2000 Malaysian Grand Prix
Constructors
1995  Forti  • 1996  Ligier  • 1997–1998  Arrows  • 1999–2000  Clean
statistics
World Cup balance:	WM-14. ( 1998 , 1999 )
Starts Victories Poles SR 98 - - -
World Cup points :	10
Podiums :	-
Leadership laps :	-

Pedro Paulo Diniz (born May 22, 1970 in São Paulo ) is a Brazilian entrepreneur and former racing driver . From 1995 to 2000 he was active in Formula 1 .

Racing career

Beginnings in motorsport

Diniz started karting in 1987 and therefore unusually late . His extremely wealthy family financed the young Brazilian hobby. Diniz joined the South American Formula 3 through Formula Ford in 1990 , before he decided to do professional motorsport and go to Europe for it. In 1991 he switched to British Formula 3 in England . His compatriot Rubens Barrichello became champions in this series in the same year, while Diniz was quite unsuccessful. After another year in Formula 3, he decided to switch to Formula 3000 . Here, too, he was unsuccessful for two years before he paved the way from Formula 3000 to Formula 1 for the Italian Forti team with his father's sponsorship millions . In return, Diniz received one of the two racing cockpits and thus made the leap into the highest motorsport class.

formula 1

Forti (1995)

At the 1995 Brazilian Grand Prix , Diniz made his Formula 1 debut with the yellow Forti car. The car, however, was too slow and unreliable for the Brazilian to achieve any success with it - let alone get into the points. At the beginning of his F1 career, Diniz was ridiculed by the international press as a " pay driver " who owes his place on the grid only to his father's bulging wallet. However, after he was able to leave his experienced team-mate Roberto Moreno behind him time and again, the criticism of Diniz also decreased.

Ligier (1996)

Since he did not see a successful future at Forti, Diniz bought a cockpit from the traditional French team Ligier for the 1996 season with the help of an Italian dairy product manufacturer , which at the time belonged to the British racing tycoon Tom Walkinshaw . There Diniz drove the JS43 alongside the Frenchman Olivier Panis, who is known to be fast and reliable . In the rainy race in Spain Diniz achieved his first world championship point with a sixth place. However, experts classified the Brazilian’s performance as a stroke of luck, which was due to the fact that there were many failures. The critics received additional confirmation from the fact that Panis was always the faster Ligier driver, who even managed a sensational victory in Monaco .

Arrows (1997-1998)

After the Ligier team had been sold to the former world champion Alain Prost , who wanted to form a French national team from it, there was no room for Diniz. He moved with his previous team boss to Arrows , where Walkinshaw had done his shopping. In addition to the Japanese engine partner Yamaha , Walkinshaw won over the reigning world champion Damon Hill , who was no longer welcome at Williams , to drive for him with a lot of money . While Hill almost won the Hungarian Grand Prix in 1997 , Diniz achieved fifth place at the Nürburgring as the best performance of the season.

Although Hill left the racing team after only one year and Yamaha withdrew from Formula 1, Diniz stayed on board for the 1998 season and was joined by the fast Finn Mika Salo as a teammate . Arrows bought the previous year's engines from Yamaha and developed them further on their own. Diniz scored just as many with three World Championship points as his team-mate Salo, who was rated more strongly.

Clean (1999-2000)

Diniz, Sauber, Canadian GP 2000

For the following year he moved with his sponsor Parmalat to the Swiss racing team Sauber , where he met the former Ferrari driver Jean Alesi . While Alesi was only able to score two points, Diniz achieved the small sensation: He finished sixth three times and thus had three World Championship points at the end of the year - one more than the highly rated Alesi.

Diniz's last season brought him back together with his old teammate Mika Salo in the 2000 season at Sauber. This time, however, the Brazilian didn't succeed against the Finn. Salo scored six championship points and thus distanced Diniz, who failed to score. After the season, Diniz withdrew from active motorsport to devote himself to management.

Career after active motorsport

In 2000 the Diniz family bought 40 percent of the Prost racing team and Pedro Diniz subsequently took over management of the team. After the team was dissolved at the end of 2001 due to financial difficulties , the name Diniz also disappeared from Formula 1 for good.

Since then, Diniz, whose family owns the Pão de Açúcar supermarket chain and is one of the richest families in Brazil, has been trying to promote the South American Formula Renault .

statistics

Statistics in the Formula 1 World Championship

general overview

season	team	chassis	engine	run	Victories	Second	Third	Poles	nice Race laps	Points	WM-Pos.
1995	Parmalat Forti Ford	Forti FG01	Ford ED 3.0 V8	17th	-	-	-	-	-	-	21st
1996	Ligier Gauloises Blondes	Ligier JS43	Mugen-Honda 3.0 V10	16	-	-	-	-	-	2	15th
1997	Danka Arrows Yamaha	Arrows A18	Yamaha 3.0 V10	17th	-	-	-	-	-	2	16.
1998	Danka Zepter Arrows	Arrows A19	Arrows 3.0 V10	16	-	-	-	-	-	3	14th
1999	Red Bull Sauber Petronas	Clean C18	Petronas 3.0 V10	16	-	-	-	-	-	3	14th
2000	Red Bull Sauber Petronas	Clean C19	Petronas 3.0 V10	16	-	-	-	-	-	-	18th
total				98	-	-	-	-	-	10

Single results

season	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	11	12	13	14th	15th	16	17th
1995
	10	DNF	15th	DNF	10	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	13	9	16	13	17th	DNF	7th
1996
	10	8th	DNF	10	7th	DNF	6th	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	6th	DNF	DNF
1997
	10	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	8th	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	7th	DNF	13	5	12	DNF
1998
	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	6th	9	14th	DNF	DNF	DNF	11	5	DNF	DNF	DNF
1999
	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	6th	DNF	6th	6th	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	DNF	11
2000
	DNF	DNS	8th	11	DNF	7th	DNF	10	11	9	DNF	DNF	11	8th	8th	11	DNF

Legend
colour	abbreviation	meaning
gold	-	victory
silver	-	2nd place
bronze	-	3rd place
green	-	Placement in the points
blue	-	Classified outside the point ranks
violet	DNF	Race not finished (did not finish)
	NC	not classified
red	DNQ	did not qualify
	DNPQ	failed in pre-qualification (did not pre-qualify)
black	DSQ	disqualified
White	DNS	not at the start (did not start)
	WD	withdrawn
Light Blue	PO	only participated in the training (practiced only)
	TD	Friday test driver
without	DNP	did not participate in the training (did not practice)
	INJ	injured or sick
	EX	excluded
	DNA	did not arrive
	C.	Race canceled
		no participation in the World Cup
other	P / bold	Pole position
	SR / italic	Fastest race lap
	*	not at the finish, but counted due to the distance covered
	()	Streak results
	underlined	Leader in the overall standings

Web links

Commons : Pedro Diniz  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Pedro Diniz at StatsF1

Individual evidence

1. ^ “The Diniz Family buys into Prost” (Grandprix.com on November 30, 2000)