The new decade brought a record number of entries for the start of the season. Although Sheckter and Ferrari were reigning champions, the end of the previous season set the tone for 1980: the impressive performance of Williams and Alan Jones continued into early part of the new season. When Jones’s momentum faltered Nelson Piquet in the Brabham BT49 took advantage and pushed Jones hard taking three wins to finish runner-up but suffering from more inconsistency than his Williams rival. Whatever Piquet’s reliability woes, they were as nothing to the annus horribilis for Jody Scheckter and Ferrari, which ended with the South African retiring from the sport at the close of the year.