One of the best drivers in the history of F1 during the 1980s was the Brazilian driver Nelson Piquet, who has won three world championship titles, driving Brephem and Williams. Piquet was a crowd favorite and one of the people who marked the era of turbo engines in Formula 1.

He was born on August 17, 1952 in Rio de Janeiro as Nelson Souto Maior. He grew up in the Brazilian capital, Brasilia, because his father was a politician and minister of health for the Brazilian government. In his youth he showed a great passion for the sport of racing, but this did not meet with the approval of his father. He spent a year in college in California, where he completed a course in auto mechanics. After returning to Brazil, he began to compete in the Brazilian Karting Championship. At a Formula 1 race held in Brazil in 1976, which was not aimed at earning championship points, Pike found his first job in Formula 1. He washed car parts at the Brabham team. At that time no one could imagine that he would later become Formula 1 world champion at the wheel of that team.

He entered the championship in 1978. That year, Pike became British Formula 3 champion, and was quickly noticed by Bernie Ecclestone, who owned the Brabham team.

Soon Nelson Pike won the first championship in 1981. Two years later he won his second title also driving for Brabham. That second title of 1983 was significant in that Pike became the first driver to win the title with a turbocharged engine. Turbo engines have marked the rest of the decade.

In the late 1980s, Pike moved to the Williams team, with which he won the championship in 1987. At the time, there was a great rivalry between him and his teammate, English driver Nigel Mensell. The two of them, and MekLaren drivers Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna, marked the second half of the 1980s in F1 history.

He retired from competition without major incident, although he has participated in more than 200 races. In 1992 at the Indy 500 race in Indianapolis he had an accident in which he seriously injured his legs.