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Old 11-07-2005, 12:47 AM   #1
sameerrao
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OK I am basing my opinion on dim memories of articles read long back but as far as I know, there was a gearshift and a clutch in use till Ferrari came up with a sequential clutchless shift and it took a season or so before the remaining teams went for it as well. Williams were late adopters as can be seen in the link posted by SPEEDCORE.

I cant remember whether it was 91 or 90 when Ferrari started up with a paddleshift. You might remember an old Top gear test where Tiff took out Alain Prost's Ferrari and he was talking thru the paddleshifting process.

The clutch pedal remained for a couple years more and was primarily used for standing starts. Eventually the clutch migrated to the steering wheel. This was due to the needs of the engineering team who wanted to narrow up the pedal box area for aero efficiency.

So 80s were the true period when all the cars had a proper gearbox (H gate) and clutch. But even then if you were really good at shifting (Michele Alboreto was considered supreme in this aspect), you didnt need to use the clutch on any of the upshifts and most of the downshifts if you timed the revs correctly. 8)
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