Just read that he has passed away after being ill for some time. He won Monaco F3 race in 1975 and raced a total of seven Grand Prix's, scoring one point by finishing 6th in 1977 Brazilian Grand Prix.
He is probably also remembered because his car caught fire in the very next race at Kyalami, leading to fatal accident of Tom Pryce.
Quite a few rejects have died on this day, as you might tell from my signature. Elio de Angelis also died on this day, so perhaps Renzo is not in bad company. It still saddens me though to hear that he will be added to that list. He was not too shabby in F3, winning the Monaco race in 1975, and also went on to win the 1000 km of Monza, which I suppose shows that even if he didn't cut it in F1, he could still do well in other machinery.
Although I didn't start watching F1 properly until the early 80s, I'm pretty sure that my first exposure to it of any kind must have been through the Top Trumps F1 pack that I had - they featured the 1977 cars and I remember being excited as much by the names as by the cars. There were people called 'Teddy Pilette', 'Hans-Joachim Stuck' and 'Gunnar Nilsson' and this was amazing to the young me.
Inevitably Renzo Zorzi was another of those thrilling racing names and one which I never forgot even though I wouldn't have seen footage of him racing at all until a few years ago. So for playing a part in helping to get me into F1 in the first place, thankyou Renzo, and RIP.
