MEDIA INFORMATION
NOSTALGIA: THE DAY F1 WENT HEAD-TO-HEAD WITH F1H2O
Wednesday, May 22: May 5th, 1982: a date that will stick in the memory as the only occasion when F1 went head-to-head with F1H2O.
John Player, the global tobacco brand that was based out of Nottingham in England, began an association with Team Lotus with the Lotus 49 and Lotus 72 in Formula One in 1968 and continued through the seventies and eighties before the support package ended in 1986 with the Lotus 98T switching to Camel sponsorship. Back in 1982, British F1 legend Nigel Mansell was racing for Colin Chapman’s team with team-mate Elio de Angelis in the Lotus 87B, powered by a 495bhp, 3.0-litre V8 Cosworth engine.
At the same time, the John Player Special tobacco brand was also the title sponsor of the F1 World Powerboat Championship in a season where the late Roger Jenkins secured the world title.
Keen to promote the two motor sports through tobacco advertising, John Player had hired CSS Promotions, the London-based sports PR agency, to handle press and media activities in support of the World Championship and the JPS Johnson Team. The agency was also heavily involved in Formula One and the public relations arm devised a plan for Mansell to race the latest Lotus in a straight line against the latest of the Velden boats fitted with US-built 3.5-litre two-stroke V8 engines in the hands of the late 1985 World Champion Bob Spalding and Tom Percival.
Just 10 days before the opening round of the 1982 John Player Special F1 World Powerboat Championship, the John Player ‘Powerboat Challenge’ took place at Holme Pierrepoint, near Nottingham. JPS’s third driver – the late François Salabert – was also in attendance.
Before leaving for Zolder to take part in the fateful Belgian Grand Prix that claimed the life of Canadian legend Gilles Villeneuve four days later, Mansell got the better of Percival in the first run over the 220-yard course – the timing equipment failed to pick up the boat on run one – with the Lotus running on a bumpy section of road protected by a guard rail adjacent to the lake and the Velden boat powering up the shoreline. Mansell then used the remaining 60 yards of tarmac and a grassy area to bring the Lotus to a standstill on slick tyres!
1978 Canon Trophy winner Percival redressed the balance in the second run, two-time Canon Trophy winner Spalding beat the Birmingham racer in heats three and four but Mansell pipped Spalding to the finish line in the final run-off with a terminal speed of 116mph to Spalding’s 100mph. A gust of wind caught the tunnel of the Velden and lifted the boat out of the water slightly on the final run. The event was a major PR exercise and put the F1 World Powerboat Championship firmly on the map that season.
Speaking at the time, Mansell said: “It wasn’t really a fair match because we had to give the boat a running start. In the end, we came out even because, although the boat was quicker on initial acceleration, our JPS car was definitely faster at higher speed.”
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