This is the review of the 1972 Grand Prix Season - Fittipaldi's Year - which saw Emerson Fittipaldi crowned as the 1972 F1 Drivers Champion.
It was 1972 and all eyes were on the defending champion Jackie Stewart and expectations were high that he would repeat the total domination of the previous year.
He made his intentions clear with an emphatic win in the 1st GP – cruising home half a minute ahead of the chasing pack. However, there was another driver intent on stealing his crown: Emerson Fittipaldi, a whirlwind of talent and youthful arrogance in his iconic black and gold Lotus 72.
And it turned out to be a thrilling season of on-the-limit action that climaxed at Monza – Fittipaldi’s spiritual home. Stewart’s broken clutch put him out of the race, ensuring Fittipaldi’s place in the record books: at just 25 years of age, ‘Emmo’ became the youngest-ever World Champion.
The action wasn’t confined to the track. The season was full of behind-the-scenes politics, pit-lane rivalry, tyre-wars and battles for aerodynamic supremacy. The superb pit-lane footage and driver interviews featured in this review get right to the source of the intrigue.
Brunswick Films were one of the few producers filming Formula One in the days before global TV coverage, multi-camera angles and official season review DVDs and videos. The previously unseen footage from their famous archive has been utilised to create a review packed with on-the-limit driving (including an in-car lap of Brands Hatch), great close-ups of the major personalities and intriguing paddock-side discussions that give the sense of a story unfolding as the season progresses – the story of ‘car wars’ and the battle between set-up, streamlining and engine power. It's very much a film of its time.
