1981 Brazilian F1 Grand Prix Race Report & Results

Event: Brazilian Grand Prix
Track: Autódromo Internacional Nelson Piquet

Weather: wet, intermittent rain throughout

Carlos Reutemann won his 11th F1 World Championship race at the 1981 Brazilian Grand Prix. The Williams-Ford Cosworth driver started from 2nd on the grid and won on the Jacarepagua circuit for the 1st time. It was also his 1st win of the season and the 13th win for the Williams F1 team.

Reutemann breaks the contract

The 1981 Brazilian Grand Prix at Jacarepagua was a wet, two-hour race that became famous for the lap-56 pit board: “Jones-Reut”. Reutemann was leading Jones by under seven seconds; per his Williams contract he was supposed to let his teammate past for the win. He didn’t. He set fastest lap on lap 61 to make the point and took the chequered flag four seconds clear. Jones stormed out of his car without going to the podium. “The war is declared,” he said.

The race

Piquet had taken pole position with the Brabham’s controversial hydropneumatic suspension, then gambled on slicks in the wet from the start and never recovered. Riccardo Patrese took an excellent third for Arrows; Marc Surer fourth for Ensign in the drive of his career; de Angelis fifth, Laffite sixth despite team orders to swap with Jarier.

Pironi and Prost tangled on lap 21 lapping Pironi. Villeneuve’s Ferrari 126CK retired with turbo wastegate damage. Surer’s fastest lap of the race for Ensign, their only ever, was the day’s other heroic note. Reutemann and Jones now shared the championship lead, but the relationship between them was broken.

Classification 1981 Brazilian F1 GP

Pos	#	Driver	Team	Time	Laps	Grid	Pts
1	2	Carlos Reutemann	Williams	2:00:23.660	62	2	9
2	1	Alan Jones	Williams	2:00:28.100	62	3	6
3	29	Riccardo Patrese	Arrows	2:01:26.740	62	4	4
4	14	Marc Surer	Ensign	2:01:40.690	62	18	3
5	11	Elio de Angelis	Team Lotus	2:01:50.080	62	10	2
6	26	Jacques Laffite	Ligier	2:01:50.490	62	16	1
7	25	Jean-Pierre Jarier	Ligier	2:01:53.910	62	23	0
8	7	John Watson	McLaren	+1 lap	61	15	0
9	20	Keke Rosberg	Fittipaldi	+1 lap	61	12	0
10	33	Patrick Tambay	Theodore	+1 lap	61	19	0
11	12	Nigel Mansell	Team Lotus	+1 lap	61	13	0
12	5	Nelson Piquet	Brabham	+2 laps	60	1	0
13	4	Ricardo Zunino	Tyrrell	+5 laps	57	24	0
NC	3	Eddie Cheever	Tyrrell	Not Classified	49	14	0
NC	23	Bruno Giacomelli	Alfa Romeo	Not Classified	40	6	0
DNF	27	Gilles Villeneuve	Ferrari	Turbo	25	7	0
DNF	6	Hector Rebaque	Brabham	Spun Off	22	11	0
DNF	15	Alain Prost	Renault	Collision	20	5	0
DNF	30	Siegfried Stohr	Arrows	Accident	20	21	0
DNF	28	Didier Pironi	Ferrari	Collision	19	17	0
DNF	8	Andrea de Cesaris	McLaren	Engine	9	20	0
DNF	16	René Arnoux	Renault	Collision	0	8	0
DNF	22	Mario Andretti	Alfa Romeo	Collision	0	9	0
DNF	21	Chico Serra	Fittipaldi	Collision	0	22	0
DNQ	9	Jan Lammers	ATS	No Time	0		0
DNQ	32	Beppe Gabbiani	Osella	No Time	0		0
DNQ	31	Miguel-Angel Guerra	Osella	No Time	0		0
DNQ	18	Eliseo Salazar	Osella	No Time	0		0
DNQ	17	Derek Daly	March	No Time	0		0
DNP	14	Ricardo Londoño	Ensign	Car raced by Surer	0		0

Fastest lap: 1:20.901 min by Alan Jones (Williams FW07B) in lap 31

✅ Check out 1981 F1 Championship Standings
✅ Check out 1981 F1 Teams & Drivers

✅ Check out All Time F1 Drivers Rankings
✅ Check out All Time F1 Driver Records
✅ Check out All Time F1 Teams Rankings

About the author

Leopold

Leopold Pleijsier founded F1-Fansite.com in 2001 and has followed Formula 1 since the early 1980s. He writes about daily F1 news, race weekends, drivers and the sport’s history.

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