Bengt Ronnie Peterson

Peterson was born in the borough of Almby in Örebro, Sweden. His father Bengt was a baker. He developed his driving style through karting, winning two Swedish karting titles in 1963 and 1964 before moving to car racing.

For his first season in Formula Three, Peterson drove the Svebe — a 1-litre, Brabham-derived car he co-designed with his father and Sven Andersson. His results quickly attracted the Italian Tecno company, who signed him in 1968. Peterson won the 1969 Monaco Grand Prix Formula Three support race and the FIA European Formula 3 Championship that same year. He subsequently won the 1971 European Formula Two Championship driving for March.

Peterson made his Grand Prix debut at the 1970 Monaco Grand Prix, driving a March 701 for Colin Crabbe's Antique Automobiles Racing Team. The team operated on a limited budget; Peterson qualified 12th out of 16 cars and was the only March driver to finish, in seventh place.

In 1971 he moved to the full March factory team. Five second-place finishes earned him the runner-up position in the World Championship behind Jackie Stewart. During 1971 Peterson also drove in the World Sports Car Championship, winning the Watkins Glen 6 Hours in an Autodelta Alfa Romeo.

For 1973, Peterson signed for John Player Team Lotus to partner defending champion Emerson Fittipaldi. His first Grand Prix win came at the 1973 French Grand Prix at Paul Ricard in a Lotus 72. He won three further races that year — in Austria, Italy, and the United States — but poor reliability restricted him to third in the championship with a career-best 52 points.

For 1974, Team Lotus introduced the Lotus 76, which proved a failure disliked by both Peterson and new teammate Jacky Ickx. The team reverted to the older Lotus 72. In the elderly car Peterson claimed three victories: the French, Italian, and Monaco Grands Prix.

The 1975 season was difficult. Peterson and Ickx were again forced to race the ageing Lotus 72. Peterson had signed for Shadow but Colin Chapman persuaded him to stay with Lotus with a promise to accelerate development of the Lotus 77.

Peterson drove the first race of 1976 in the Lotus 77 before rejoining March Engineering. Driving the March 761, he won the 1976 Italian Grand Prix — his last victory for that team.

Peterson also maintained a busy sports car programme in these years, particularly for BMW in 1974 and 1975, frequently paired with Hans-Joachim Stuck. The pair competed across Europe, Africa, and North America. At the "Wynn's 1000" in South Africa in November 1975, Peterson and Stuck started on pole but finished second after multiple stops with engine vibrations and spark-plug problems.

For 1977 Peterson raced with Tyrrell, driving the six-wheel Tyrrell P34B. The season was troubled: he retired from the first four races (Argentina, Brazil, South Africa, and the United States West), his best result was a third-place finish in a rain-affected race in Belgium, and in Japan he collided with Gilles Villeneuve's Ferrari in an accident that killed a marshal and a photographer who were standing in a prohibited area.

Peterson surprised observers by returning to John Player Team Lotus for 1978 as the designated number two driver to Mario Andretti. He won the 1978 South African Grand Prix with a last-lap victory over Patrick Depailler, and the Austrian Grand Prix in the innovative "ground effect" Lotus 79. Andretti won the Drivers' Championship; he and Peterson scored four 1-2 finishes with Andretti leading every time. Contemporary observers debated whether team orders were in place; Peterson consistently dismissed such speculation, stating that Andretti had simply turned the faster time. Others attributed Andretti's edge to his superior car development skills, which had brought the recalcitrant Lotus 78 and 79 to full potential. During the 1978 season Peterson was offered a seat at McLaren for 1979.

The 1978 Italian Grand Prix at Monza began badly: in practice Peterson damaged his Lotus 79 beyond immediate repair and bruised his legs. The spare Lotus 79 had been built for Andretti and the much taller Peterson could not fit comfortably inside. The team's only other car was a Lotus 78 that had been maintained minimally.

Many drivers later stated the starter lit the green light too early, while cars in the rear rows were still rolling. The resulting accordion effect bunched the field tightly approaching the first chicane. Peterson, starting from the third row, made a poor start and was immediately passed by Alan Jones, Jacques Laffite, and John Watson. Jody Scheckter and Riccardo Patrese moved across to the right; Patrese moved back just ahead of James Hunt, who feinted left and collided with Peterson, triggering a multi-car accident that also involved Vittorio Brambilla, Carlos Reutemann, Hans-Joachim Stuck, Patrick Depailler, Didier Pironi, Derek Daly, Clay Regazzoni, and Brett Lunger.

Peterson's Lotus hit the barriers, caught fire, and bounced back into the middle of the track. Hunt, Regazzoni, and Depailler freed him from the burning wreck before he suffered more than minor burns. Brambilla was struck on the head by a flying wheel and was slumped comatose; at the time he was of greater concern than Peterson. The injured were taken to the Ospedale Niguarda Ca' Granda in Milan. Peterson's X-rays revealed approximately 27 fractures in his legs and feet. His condition worsened overnight; he was diagnosed with fat embolism. By morning he was in full kidney failure and was declared dead at 9:55 am on 11 September 1978.

Andretti clinched the championship at the same race. He later said: "It was so unfair to have a tragedy connected with probably what should have been the happiest day of my career. I couldn't celebrate, but also, I knew that trophy would be with me forever. And I knew also that Ronnie would have been happy for me." Peterson was posthumously awarded second place in the 1978 Drivers' Championship.

Peterson competed in 123 Grand Prix races, winning 10. He is considered by many to be one of the best Formula One drivers never to win a championship, and the best racing driver from Sweden. A 2016 academic study using mathematical modelling ranked him 21st best Formula One driver of all time and sixth best among those who never won a title.

At his funeral, pallbearers included Åke Strandberg, James Hunt, Jody Scheckter, John Watson, Emerson Fittipaldi, Gunnar Nilsson, and Niki Lauda.

Riccardo Patrese, blamed by several members of the Grand Prix Drivers' Association — principally by James Hunt — for causing the first-lap accident, was banned from the 1978 United States Grand Prix. Criminal proceedings in an Italian court charged Patrese with manslaughter and race director Gianni Restilli with contributing to Peterson's death by giving a premature start signal; both were cleared on 28 October 1981.

In 1979, George Harrison paid tribute to Peterson with a song and music video titled "Faster". Peterson's widow Barbro (née Edwardsson) never recovered from his death and committed suicide on 19 December 1987; she was buried alongside Ronnie in the Peterson family grave in Örebro. The couple had a daughter, Nina Louise, born in November 1975 and named after Jochen Rindt's wife. A statue of Peterson stands in Örebro, and the official Ronnie Peterson Museum opened there on 31 May 2008, though it closed in October 2009 due to a lack of government funding. In 2014 and 2022, Swedish driver Marcus Ericsson wore a special helmet modelled on Peterson's design — in 2022 en route to victory at the Indianapolis 500.

This article is based solely on the supplied corpus. No external sources were consulted; claims that could not be substantiated against the corpus were omitted under the drop-the-claim rule.