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Carlos Reutemann

Carlos Alberto "Lole" Reutemann (12 April 1942 – 7 July 2021) was an Argentine racing driver and politician, who competed in Formula One from 1972 to 1982 and served as the Governor of Santa Fe from 1999 to 2003. Reutemann was runner-up in the Formula One World Drivers' Championship in 1981 with Williams and—at the time of his retirement—held the record for most podium finishes (45); he won 12 Grands Prix across 11 seasons. A member of the Justicialist Party, he was a National Senator for Santa Fe from 2003 until his death in 2021.

As a racing driver, Reutemann was among Formula One's leading protagonists between 1972 and 1982. He scored 12 Grand Prix wins and six pole positions. In 1981 while driving for Williams he finished second in the World Drivers' Championship by one point, having been overtaken in the last race of the season. Reutemann also finished in third overall three times for three separate teams, 1975 for Brabham, 1978 for Ferrari, and 1980 for Williams. To date, he is the last Argentine driver to win a Grand Prix.

In terms of race wins, Reutemann's final Ferrari season in 1978 was his most successful with four wins, but he fell short to the consistency of the Lotus team with Mario Andretti and Ronnie Peterson and was not in championship contention to the final race. He finished third, just behind Peterson, who had died in an accident at Monza earlier that autumn. In 1981, Reutemann instead relied on consistency, but narrowly lost out to Nelson Piquet for the title. He became the second Formula One driver after Leo Kinnunen to be at the podium of a World Rally Championship event, when he finished third in the 1980 and 1985 editions of Rally Argentina. He was also for three decades the only Formula One driver to score drivers' championship points in both F1 and WRC, until Kimi Räikkönen's eighth place at the 2010 Jordan Rally.

As a popular governor and a senator, Reutemann was considered by some, on several occasions, to be a worthy candidate for president of Argentina. While he considered running for president in the 2011 Argentine general election, he ultimately declined to do so. Reutemann died in a medical facility in Santa Fe, Argentina, on 7 July 2021 after suffering from issues relating to a haemorrhage as well as other health issues.

Descended from a Swiss-German grandfather, an Argentine father and an Italian mother, Reutemann was the first successful Argentine Formula One driver to come along since the retirement of five-time World Champion Juan Manuel Fangio in 1958. He first raced in 1965 in a Fiat saloon car. After racing touring cars and Formula 2 in Argentina, he moved to Europe in 1970 to drive a Brabham for the Automobile Club of Argentina Team in the European Formula 2 series. He immediately received attention when he took out Austrian Formula One driver Jochen Rindt (that year's eventual posthumous World Champion) on the first lap of his first race at Hockenheim, but carried on to finish fourth. The next season, he finished a close second in the series to Sweden's Ronnie Peterson.[citation needed]

Brabham F1 team boss Bernie Ecclestone signed Reutemann to drive alongside veteran and two-time World Champion Graham Hill for the 1972 season. At the first race, in front of his home crowd at Buenos Aires for his first Grand Prix, Reutemann qualified his Brabham BT34 on pole position. This was a feat previously performed only by Mario Andretti, and since matched only by Jacques Villeneuve; his teammate Hill qualified 16th. He finished the race in seventh after having to pit to replace his soft tyres, and the main highlight for the rest of the year was his win in the non-championship Interlagos Grand Prix.[citation needed]

Teamed with Brazilian Wilson Fittipaldi Júnior for the 1973 season, Reutemann scored two podium finishes and seventh in the Drivers' Championship in the tiny but radical Gordon Murray-designed BT42. For 1974, Murray designed the BT44, which was a further improvement and the team finished a close fifth in the Constructors' Championship. Reutemann, who very much liked the BT44 took the first three victories of his F1 career at South Africa, Austria, and the United States. He might have won the first race of the year in Argentina, too, but the Brabham team apparently failed to properly fuel his car and he ran out of fuel with less than two laps to go while safely in the lead. Though he matched Drivers' Champion Emerson Fittipaldi's win total, inconsistent performances in the other races left Reutemann sixth in the season standings.[citation needed]

Five podium finishes in 1975, including a win in Germany at the old 14-mile Nürburgring allowed Reutemann to place third in that year's championship. The Brabham team switched to the Alfa Romeo flat-12 engine for 1976 and suffered from serious reliability problems. After seven retirements and only one finish in the points (fourth place in Spain) in the first twelve races, Reutemann negotiated a release from his Brabham contract to sign with Ferrari, who was looking for a temporary replacement for the injured Niki Lauda. Lauda's unexpected speedy recovery resulted in Reutemann racing only once for the team, in a third car at Monza, and then sitting out for the final three races.[citation needed]

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Argentine racing driver and politician
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