Philippe Alliot

Philippe Alliot (born 27 July 1954 in Voves, Eure-et-Loir, France) is a former racing driver who participated in Formula One from 1984 to 1990 and from 1993 to 1994. He raced for RAM, Ligier, Larrousse and McLaren.

Prior to his career in Formula One he competed during 1976 and 1977 in Formule Renault, and won the championship in 1978, in the BP Racing team. With said team he also won the French Formula Renault championship and went on to French Formula Three. He finished third in his first race and moved to the European Formula 3 Championship in 1980. By 1983 he moved to Formula Two but hit the headlines that year when he finished third in the Le Mans 24 Hours with Michael and Mario Andretti in a Kremer Porsche.

In 1984 he joined the Skoal Bandit RAM F1 team, but did not enjoy much in the way of success. After Jacques Laffite was injured at the 1986 British Grand Prix, Alliot took his place at Ligier, where he showed an improvement. He moved to Larrousse for 1987, but returned to Ligier in 1990, gaining a reputation for accidents. This led to heavy criticism from team members, other drivers and even sports commentators, such as James Hunt calling Alliot "one of the worst Grand Prix drivers ever to drive a Grand Prix car" He left F1 for sports car racing in the early 1990s and enjoyed considerable success with the Peugeot team, run by Jean Todt. He made another attempt at F1 with Larrousse in 1993, before undertaking a testing role with McLaren the following year. This role led to one race for the team while Mika Häkkinen was suspended.

After announcing his retirement from Formula One in 1995, he decided to try a career in politics, also did some TV commentary and competed in ice racing and the Paris-Dakar Rally, but ended running his own GT racing team.