Stefano Modena

Modena in his Tyrrell overalls (1991)

**Stefano Modena** (born 12 May 1963) is an Italian racing driver, currently driving for Tyrrell in Formula One. Modena has competed in Formula One since 1988 and previously driven for Brabham and EuroBrun.

## Early Life and Career

Modena was born in Modena. A former 125cc Junior Karting Champion in Italy, he spent two seasons in the Italian Formula Ford national series before joining Euroracing in his domestic Formula 3 series in 1985, placing 15th in an Alfa Romeo engined Ralt. For 1986 he switched to Team Seresina's Reynard chassis and scored three wins to finish 4th overall, also placing 2nd at the Monaco support race and winning a round of the European series at Imola. In 1987 he joined Onyx for the Formula 3000 series, winning three rounds and being crowned as champion.

## Formula One

### EuroBrun (1988)

In 1988 Modena would get his first opportunity in Formula One, driving for EuroBrun and being partnered with experienced fellow Italian racer, Andrea DeCesaris. For the first half of the season Modena would qualify for the first 7 rounds, but poor qualifying and race results for the team meant they would go into pre-qualifying and as a result he would have only 2 further outings in 1988, at the Belgian Grand Prix and Italian Grand Prix. His best result this season was 17th at the French Grand Prix, but he performed well in comparison to his more experienced team mate and he would test for Brabham at the end of the season to see would he be awarded a race seat with the team for 1989. At post-season testing at Estoril, Modena would perform well, just 1 second behind Martin Brundle and 0.6 seconds faster than Willy Ribbs, thus securing the second Brabham seat for 1989.

### Brabham (1989–1990)

With a new team for 1989 and an experienced team mate in Brundle hopes were high for 1989 that Modena would make a step forward in performance. However, despite a strong performance at the San Marino Grand Prix, finishing 9th, the rest of the season offered no better performance and he would not score any points. Modena would in fact fail to qualify for 3 races in 1989, the only comfort being that Brundle did not fair much better. As the season had progressed it was clear there would not be much prospect of improved performance for 1990 and Brundle would sign for Arrows. Modena would not have a better prospect for a drive for 1990 as so would remain at Brabham.

The Brabham-Judd would not be competitive in 1990 and Modena and new team mate David Brabham faced the prospect of pre-qualifying for the 1990 season. Qualifying would be a challenge and Modena only qualified for Brazilian Grand Prix, finishing 16th. This performance did not compare favorably Brabham, who at least managed to qualify for 5 races. It was a surprise then when it was announced that they had signed Modena for the 1991 season and it was believed substantial sponsorship had persuaded Tyrrell to sign him.

### Tyrrell (1991–present)

The 1991 Tyrrell-Honda was a much stronger package than anything he had raced up to this point and with new team mate Satoru Nakajima he had someone he could perform well against. Modena immediately showed the promise of the Tyrrell Honda, securing 3rd at the season opening USA Grand Prix. Reliability would deny him a number of scoring opportunities until he would again score a 6th place at the French Grand Prix. At the German Grand Prix he would just miss out on another podium, finishing 4th just behind Nakajima. These would be the last points Modena or the team would secure in 1991 and the team would soon be disappointed to discover that Honda would pull out of the sport at the end of the season. Modena would at least have his first classified finish in Formula One, placing 11th with 8 points and 1 podium from the season, just 1 point behind Nakajima.

After losing the works Honda engines Tyrrell would make do with Mugen-Honda power for the 1992 season. Modena would not have the same success as in the previous season, and while there were good performances no points would come. His best result was two 9th place finishes and he would twice fail to qualify in the season. Nakajima had stayed on at Tyrrell and he too would fail to score in 1992, leaving Tyrrell pointless for the first time since 1988.

## Personal life

Modena is known for being an eccentric character with bizarre habits verging on the obsessive, including not wanting to have his car parked on the left side of the team garage, and not allowing anyone to touch his race car once he was inside other than the team member who helped him with his safety belts. It is not unusual to see Modena get out of his car after being strapped and get back in before the warm-up lap if he had seen someone else touch the car. Modena was also known to race with his gloves inside out. However, as he has claimed, this wasn't due to superstition.

## Formula One Statistical Overview

### Formula One Record

 **1989** |  Motor Racing Developments Ltd.
 **1992** |  Tyrrell Racing Organisation
 **1993** | 0

Notes

* \* – Season still in progress.

### Complete Formula One results

(key)

Notes

* \* – Season still in progress.