Jean-Denis Délétraz

Jean-Denis Delétraz

Born	(1963-10-01) 1 October 1963 Geneva, Switzerland
Formula One World Championship career
Nationality	Swiss
Active years	1994–1995
Teams	Larrousse, Pacific
Entries	3
Championships	0
Wins	0
Podiums	0
Career points	0
Pole positions	0
Fastest laps	0
First entry	1994 Australian Grand Prix
Last entry	1995 European Grand Prix

Jean-Denis Delétraz (born 1 October 1963) is a Swiss racing driver. He participated in three Formula One Grands Prix, debuting in the 1994 Australian Grand Prix, and his short F1 career was 2 retirements and a 15th.

Before reaching Formula One, he scored two third places in the 1988 Formula 3000 season, but principally earned his three Formula One drives as a pay driver.^[1]

After Formula One, he competed in sports car racing, with two class wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Career

Pre-Formula One

Delétraz had some success in his early career, notably two wins that came while driving Formula Ford cars.^[2] He went on to compete in Formula Three between 1985 and 1987 in the French championship, finishing third in the final standings in 1985.^[3] Between 1988 and 1991, he competed in Formula 3000 and during 1990 he bought the FIRST racing team, but was never able to match the success of 1988 and scored no points.^[4] During 1991 the team was impounded by an Italian court for a time after legal action from the team's other driver, Giovanni Bonanno.^[4]

In 1992 and 1993, Deletraz competed in the French Touring Car Championship and the Porsche Supercup with little success. In 1994, Delétraz was signed as a driver for the SEAT works team in the French Touring Car Championship. His best result was fifth place in the race at Nogaro and he finished thirteenth overall in the standings.^[2]

Formula One

1994: Larrousse

Towards the end of 1994, Larrousse was like a number of other teams at the time, running short on money and resorting to pay drivers to keep the team afloat.^[5] Larrousse's number 19 car, which had started the year being driven by Olivier Beretta, was now being driven by drivers who could bring sponsorship money to the team.^[5] For the final race of the year in Australia, Larrousse let the aero-car inexperienced, physically unfit Delétraz replace Érik Comas in the team's second car for more sponsorship money in order to aid their financial situation.^[5]

During qualifying, Delétraz qualified in 25th position, ahead of Simtek's Domenico Schiattarella.^[2] However, Schiattarella overtook him during the first lap of the Grand Prix, and Delétraz gradually dropped back from the rest of the field. He retired on lap 57 with gearbox failure, after he had already been lapped ten times. He was lapping the circuit 6 seconds slower than the leaders, 2 seconds slower than his teammate Hideki Noda and 1–2 seconds slower than the next slowest driver Schiattarella. He was described by BBC commentator Jonathan Palmer as "having no business in Formula One.^[6]

1995: Pacific

Pacific Team Lotus started with shareholder Bertrand Gachot and Andrea Montermini as its drivers, but similar to Larrousse the previous year, the team needed pay drivers to continue the season and Gachot vacated his seat.^[7] It was announced that Delétraz would be competing in the final five races of the season.^[2]

During qualifying for his first round of the year, in Portugal, Delétraz was hindered by a gearbox problem which saw him qualify last, twelve seconds behind pole-position sitter David Coulthard. In the race, Delétraz, still physically not fit enough to drive a Formula One car, was 40 seconds behind Coulthard after 3 laps, and was lapping the circuit 12 seconds slower than the leaders and 6–7 seconds than the next slowest driver Roberto Moreno in a Forti and 7–8 seconds slower than his team-mate Montermini. He was lapped by the leaders after seven laps of the race, and after fourteen he retired from the race with cramp in his left arm. This drew criticism as Estoril is a clockwise circuit, which requires more work from the right arm, and leading English F1 journalist Nigel Roebuck, not known for making unsavory comments about F1 drivers made scathing comments about Delétraz's performance in the race. In his second race at the Nürburgring, he qualified just over nine seconds behind pole-position, and he finished the race in fifteenth place as the last finisher, seven laps behind the winner.

At the next race, he was replaced by Bertrand Gachot after planned replacements were denied superlicenses. It had been expected that Delétraz would be competing until the end of the season, but he defaulted on payment and Keith Wiggins, principal of the Pacific team stated, "On ability alone, we are not willing to keep him."^[2]

The slow qualifying speeds of drivers like Delétraz resulted in the introduction of the 107% rule for the 1996 season.

Sports Car Racing

After his rather interesting tenure in Formula One, Delétraz focused on endurance racing, running in the 24 Hours of LeMans and the BPR Global GT Series in 1995. 1996 saw Delétraz move to the FIRST Racing operation he now co-owned with fellow driver Fabien Giroix. Two years in the BPR Global GT Series in a McLaren F1 GTR was followed by a move to the FIA GT Championship in 1997, with FIRST running the works Lotus Elise GT1s. After a couple of years away, FIRST and Delétraz returned to the FIA Championship in 2000 with a Ferrari 550 Maranello. In 2002, he took four wins in the series with team-mate Andrea Piccini in a BMS Scuderia Italia-run 550, and the pair finished fifth in the championship. They then drove a works Lister Storm in 2003. He has also scored two class wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, in 2001 and 2002 in the LMP675 class. He was also one of the drivers of the Chevrolet Corvette C6.R that won the 2007 Spa 24 Hours.

Jean-Denis's son, Louis, won Swiss karting championships in 2009 and 2011 before moving to Formula BMW (2012) and Formula Renault (2013, 2014).

Racing record

Complete International Formula 3000 results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete Formula One results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position)

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1995	Giroix Racing Team	Fabien Giroix Olivier Grouillard	McLaren F1 GTR	GT1	290	5th	4th
1996	Kokusai Kaihatsu Racing Giroix Racing Team	Fabien Giroix Maurizio Sandro Sala	McLaren F1 GTR	GT1	146	DNF	DNF
2000	Racing Organisation Course	Ralf Kelleners David Terrien	Reynard 2KQ-LM-Volkswagen	LMP675	44	DNF	DNF
2001	ROC Auto	Jordi Gené Pascal Fabre	Reynard 2KQ-LM-Volkswagen	LMP675	284	5th	1st
2002	Noël del Bello Racing ROC Compétition	Christophe Pillon Walter Lechner, Jr.	Reynard 2KQ-LM-Volkswagen	LMP675	317	19th	1st
2004	Barron Connor Racing	Mike Hezemans Ange Barde	Ferrari 575-GTC	GTS	200	DNF	DNF
2007	Swiss Spirit	Marcel Fässler Iradj Alexander	Lola B07/18-Audi	LMP1	62	DNF	DNF
2012	Gulf Racing Middle East	Keiko Ihara Marc Rostan	Lola B12/80-Nissan	LMP2	17	DNF	DNF

Footnotes

Pacific Racing
Founder Keith Wiggins Drivers Bertrand Gachot Paul Belmondo Andrea Montermini Giovanni Lavaggi Jean-Denis Délétraz Formula One cars PR01 PR02