MARLBORO

Marlboro is well known for its association with motor racing. This started in the 1972 season with the sponsorship of Formula One team BRM. The first win for a Marlboro-sponsored F1 car was achieved at the 1972 Monaco Grand Prix by Jean-Pierre Beltoise driving for BRM. In 1973 and 1974, the cigarette giant backed Frank Williams Racing Cars team, whose cars were registered as Iso-Marlboro.

In the 1974 season, Marlboro became famously associated with the McLaren team, which brought it its first Constructors' Championship and its drivers title for Emerson Fittipaldi in the very first season of the partnership between McLaren and Marlboro. The team won another drivers title in 1976 for James Hunt. Following that, the partnership went through a dry patch until Ron Dennis's Project Four Organization took over the team in 1981. Marlboro-sponsored McLaren dominated F1 for much of the 1980s and early 1990s, with Niki Lauda, Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna between them winning the Drivers' Championship all but one year from 1984 to 1991. After the departure of Ayrton Senna at the end of the 1993 season, Marlboro McLaren never won a race again. Marlboro ended their sponsorship of the team in 1996, which ended the famous red and white McLaren livery. McLaren was sponsored by West from the start of the 1997 season onwards. McLaren and Marlboro had the longest sponsorship deal between a team and its title sponsor in F1 history which lasted for 23 consecutive seasons (1974–1996).