Gianfranco Palazzoli dead, goodbye to the historic voice of Formula 1 alongside Mario Poltronieri

Motorcycles, cars, ping pong and commentary. The one of Gianfranco Palazzoli, who died at 89, was a total career. “Pal Joe” – the nickname by which he was known in the paddock – died Wednesday morning at the San Carlo hospital in Milan, following complications that arose after a fractured femur. The pinnacle of success between the 1980s and 1990s, when alongside Mario Poltronieri in the news reports of Formula 1 as a “regulatory expert”.

Gianfranco Palazzoli, a life dedicated to engines

“Let’s hear Palazzoli”, a recurring motif in the commentary Rai of the Grands Prix of the nineties. Lazy people gave him the word, Palazzoli he explained and for viewers the Formula 1 rules were no longer a mystery. Before becoming a commentator, “Pal Joe” was a pilot. Born in Milan in 1934, his career began on two wheels. In the fifties he raced on Rumi, Iso and Aermacchi, but in the sixties he chose to switch to cars, starting with the Abarth 850, to then move up to the Gran Turismo and Sport Prototypes. Then the landing in Formula 1 as sporting director of the Merzario team and collaborations with Osella F1, Tyrrell, Alfa Romeo, Ptolemann And Benettons. In the eighties he devoted himself to another great passion: ping pong. As a table tennis player he has won several single and double Italian champion titles in the veteran categories. In the nineties the collaboration with Rai began, becoming the sidekick of Mario Poltronieri and working alongside journalists such as George Piola and Ezio Zermiani.