Fast out of the gate

It’s strange, because in the world of racing, Ferrari never was a great innovator. Look at all the really big breakthroughs – mid-mounted engines, disc brakes, monocoque chassis, engines as stressed chassis members, ground effect and so on – Ferrari was never first. Often it was one of the last.

Indeed the only real exception to the rule was the robotised manual gearbox. At the opening round of the 1989 Formula 1 season at the sweltering Jacarepaguá circuit in Rio de Janeiro few would have bet on Nigel Mansell’s Ferrari 640 even finishing the race, let alone winning it. And that includes Nigel himself who’d booked himself an early flight out of town. But win it he did. Which was lucky, because of the 12 remaining races he started that season, he was classified as a finisher in just five. Which was reliability personified to his team-mate Gerhard Berger who played 15 but retired in no fewer than 12.

The car’s primary, if not only problem was unlike any previous Ferrari F1 car, it contained a ground-breaking piece of technology: a gearbox that took its instructions not from a lever, but paddles attached to the steering wheel behind the driver’s fingers. By the start of the 1997 season, every single car on the grid, and every one ever since, has been so equipped.