Alfa Romeo 177

Alfa Romeo 177

mid-engined, longitudinally mounted
Transmission	Hewland-Alfa Romeo 6 manual[2]
Power	493 brake horsepower (500 PS; 368 kW) @ 9,700 rpm 377 newton-metres (278 lbf⋅ft) @ 3,900 rpm
Weight	610 kg (1,344.8 lb)
Fuel	Agip
Tyres	Goodyear
Competition history
Notable entrants	Autodelta
Notable drivers	35. Bruno Giacomelli 36. Vittorio Brambilla
Debut	1979 Belgian Grand Prix
Races Wins Poles F/Laps 3 0 0 0
Constructors' Championships	0
Drivers' Championships	0
n.b. Unless otherwise stated, all data refer to Formula One World Championship Grands Prix only.

The Alfa Romeo 177 was a

The car was constructed by Alfa Romeo's racing department Autodelta, and featured a Carlo Chiti designed Alfa Romeo flat-12 engine which had been used earlier in the Alfa Romeo 33TT12 and 33SC12 sports cars. In 1976 this engine was supplied to Brabham and the deal continued until 1979.

The 177, the designation of which was derived from the fact that its design was commenced in 1977,^[4] was a bulky car finished in the handsome dark red colour adopted by Autodelta. The 177 featured a riveted aluminium chassis, with front suspension by upper rocking arms, lower wishbones and inboard-mounted coil spring/damper units. The rear suspension featured parallel lower links, single top links, twin radius rods and outboard coil spring/damper units.^[5] Bruno Giacomelli had won the 1978 European Formula Two Championship in a March^[6] and was hired to drive the new Alfa Romeo 177; he used this car at Belgian and French Grands Prix.

The Alfa Romeo 179 with a new V12 engine was ready for the Italian Grand Prix at Monza so Giacomelli drove the new car while the 177 was raced by Vittorio Brambilla. Both drivers raced the 179 thereafter.

Giacomelli qualified the car strongly at

The team missed the Monaco Grand Prix a fortnight later, but returned in France for the race at Dijon-Prenois. Giacomelli's qualifying pace was not so strong, and he started the race in 17th place, nearly 3.5 seconds behind Jean-Pierre Jabouille's pole time in the Renault. Another poor start put him 20th at the end of lap 1, although he quickly passed Jan Lammers's struggling Shadow. He once again slowly picked up places as others fell by the wayside, and by lap 20 he had regained 17th. However the car seemed to suffer from a lack of pace in the next phase of the race, and Giacomelli was passed by Riccardo Patrese and Jochen Mass of Arrows, Héctor Rebaque in the Lotus and his old foe de Angelis in quick succession, dropping to 20th by lap 26. He slowly started to pick up the pace again, and was able to finally re-pass de Angelis on lap 51, and the pair moved up the order as other cars fell out, eventually lying 16th and 17th. The two Italians continued to fight for the remainder of the race, being lapped five times by leader Jabouille in the process. With Jabouille already having crossed the finish line, lap 75 would be their last lap, and de Angelis passed Giacomelli with mere yards of the race remaining to take 16th place from him at the death.

After the disappointments of the team's first two races, Alfa Romeo skipped the next four and arrived at

The 179 would take over permanently as the team attempted a full campaign in 1980, so these three races remain the 177's only impact on the F1 record books.

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