Behind the scenes of Watson's landmark win

Thirty years ago John Watson won the British Grand Prix for McLaren in what was surely one of the most popular results the race has ever produced.

There were so many reasons why it was the perfect result on the day. Watson himself had endured five frustrating seasons since his only previous win with Penske in 1976, while McLaren had gone over three years without a victory and Silverstone was the first success for new team boss and co-owner Ron Dennis.

But most importantly it was the first win for John Barnard's composite MP4 chassis, a car that boldly pioneered a technology that was to transform the sport - and ultimately make it a lot safer.

The path towards Silverstone began at the end of the previous season. Dennis' plans to bring his Project 4 squad up from Formula 2 and F3 into the world of grand prix racing had been known for some time, and having hired Indycar designer Barnard to create a car, he was trying to put together the remaining pieces of the puzzle.

In the lower categories Dennis had enjoyed a long relationship with Philip Morris and Marlboro, and in the autumn of 1980 the tobacco company engineered a marriage of convenience between the fledgling new team and the struggling McLaren.

John Barnard designed the MP4 driven for Ron Dennis by Watson © LAT

The established outfit had not won a race since James Hunt triumphed in Japan in 1977 and had fallen far behind in the technology race. In 1980 Watson and impressive rookie Alain Prost struggled to make the points, and even worse, there were car failures that led to crashes and the Frenchman was so fed up that he signed for Renault for 1981. Philip Morris had faith in the ability of Dennis to turn McLaren around.

"I went to Montreal to watch, and then I went to Watkins Glen to watch," Dennis recalls. "At that point we were still going to have Prost in the car the next year! But eventually he came back and won his World Championships with us, or most of them. All I thought was there were lots of things that could be done better, but that it would take time - and it did."

Prost's seat was taken by Marlboro protege Andrea de Cesaris, who had made his F1 debut for Alfa Romeo at the end of 1980.

Former team principal Teddy Mayer and his long-time number two Tyler Alexander stayed on to work alongside Dennis. The team may have been through a bad patch, but these were guys who had won World Championships, CanAm titles and Indy 500s, and they provided valuable continuity.

Alexander says that he welcomed the new arrangements: "It meant that there was progress for a change. And it was going in the right direction. There were still various issues about how things were happening, but it was a positive thing."

The key to it all was of course the revolutionary chassis, built for McLaren by Hercules Corporation in Utah.

"John Barnard's carbon chassis was the start of something that was very important," says Alexander. "The carbon chassis was done for stiffness and other things on the race car, but in actual fact what John had introduced was something that was a hell of a lot safer, and I don't think that was part of the list of why we were doing it at the time. That was a secondary thing. But everybody soon realised that not only was this thing lighter and stiffer, but there was also a safety issue, and that was very important.

"There were a lot of people who said if that thing's going to have a shunt, it will just disintegrate, but those were people who didn't know anything about it. We were involved with the Hercules people, and they knew about it, and knew that if it was done properly, that was not going to happen."

Mayer and Alexander were kept on to smooth the switch from 'old' McLaren © LAT

Nevertheless it was something of a leap of faith for the drivers, especially Watson, who had injured his legs in the past.

"My Chuck Yeager moment," he jokes. "The first time I drove the car was when it was finally presented to the media on a cold, wet day at Silverstone. Up until that point, all I knew was what John Barnard had told us, about the car and its crashworthiness and its structural integrity. All those things were far superior to an aluminium car.

"You have to take somebody on trust. I was 34-35 at that stage, so you've been around the block a few times. You know when you have a biggie it might hurt, but what you don't want is to have the thing fall back to carbon!

"Andrea did a great job that year testing the car - he had 17 accidents or something. But the technology wasn't just carbonfibre, it was the use of carbonfibre, it was the understanding of the material, and it was the way that JB and Hercules Corporation - who made the initial chassis - used it. The material itself, if incorrectly used, was potentially lethal.

"Later some teams used it as an aluminium substitute, which it was not. It was a material on its own right, and the car had to be designed around that particular material, you couldn't just make a facsimile of an aluminium car.

"When the car finally appeared at Long Beach we didn't race it because there were a number of detailed issues, such as the bodywork being too close to the exhausts. We didn't run it in Brazil, but we ran it in Argentina, that was the first time we raced the car. It was such a big step forward. What John brought to the design table was a degree of excellence and incredible engineering.

"As good as McLaren had been in the past, this was a brand new playing field. Eventually the performance of the car began to show through. We had that third place at Jarama where [Gilles] Villeneuve won the race in a pretty ill-handling Ferrari from [Jacques] Laffite and myself. And then at Dijon, Prost won from me."

Third in Spain, second in France... The omens were good for McLaren and Watson as they headed to their home race at Silverstone. Indeed he was fastest in pre-race testing, although crucially Renault, Ferrari and top Cosworth team Brabham were absent.

Everybody recognised that the track would suit the turbo cars, and sure enough come qualifying it was a Renault one-two, with Rene Arnoux in front of Prost. Nelson Piquet was an impressive third in the Brabham, ahead of Didier Pironi's Ferrari.

Although they couldn't match the similarly-powered Piquet, the McLarens were right there in fifth and sixth, Watson just 0.01s ahead of de Cesaris, who was going well on a track he knew well from his F3 days. The red and white cars outpaced the Williams pair of Alan Jones and Carlos Reutemann, who were split by Villeneuve's Ferrari in a lowly eighth. The Canadian was not planning to stay there for long.

At the start Prost jumped into the lead from Pironi, while Villeneuve charged up to third, ahead of Arnoux, Piquet and Jones. From fifth Watson had a bad first lap, but he'd recovered to seventh by the end of it.

Villeneuve tried a little too hard to pass his team-mate and over the next couple of laps he dropped behind Piquet and Arnoux. Then at the end of lap four he overdid it in a major way, clouting the Woodcote chicane and bouncing into a lazy spin in front of the pack. Jones couldn't avoid the Ferrari, but somehow Watson slid to safe halt without making contact.

"I had that issue at the chicane with Villeneuve driving like a hyperactive child," says Watson. "It was inevitable that he was going to lose it at some point. I was the third car in that line of cars. Jones was directly ahead of me and de Cesaris behind me. I was keeping an eye on Villeneuve, because that was certainly going to get interesting. Jones locked up and got lost in Villeneuve's tyre smoke and his own tyre smoke, and they tangled.

Villeneuve crashed out, promoting Watson a spot... © LAT

"I managed to avoid Alan, and de Cesaris - who was looking at my gearbox and not looking forward - turned sharp left into the catchfencing. I had to brake so heavily I couldn't see a thing.

"How I didn't get involved with Jones is just my good fortune, but in the process, not knowing what was going on and having to brake so heavily, the engine actually stalled. I just had a little bit of momentum remaining and off it went. I had to very quickly dip the clutch and put on the mechanical fuel pump, and I just about got it bump started."

While one McLaren was still running, the other was most definitely out, to the frustration of the team.

"I was working on de Cesaris's car," Alexander recalls. "He could be quite quick, and before the race I had quite a long discussion with him along the lines of 'Stay away from Wattie!' But he didn't, did he?

"He was right up behind in the first lap when they came around. Villeneuve and Jones shunted, and he looked up, too late, slammed the brakes on, and slid off into the shunt as well. Wattie managed to avoid the thing."

Two cars that had been in front of Watson were now out, but thanks to coming to a complete halt, he came past in 10th place at the end of lap five. Leader Prost was already a long way up the road, and initially things looked pretty hopeless.

And then Watson started motoring. He soon passed the Ligiers of Laffite and Patrick Tambay and gained another spot when Bruno Giacomelli's Alfa retired. On lap 12 he moved up to fifth after Piquet crashed and he overtook Mario Andretti in the other Alfa.

On lap 13 he passed Reutemann's Williams, and a lap after that Pironi retired, putting the McLaren third behind the two Renaults. It was a remarkable turnaround.

"When all the smoke cleared I had to re-take about five or six other cars," he recalls. "I passed Reutemann twice during the race. The first time I passed him he tried to block me going into Woodcote. He's a lovely guy, but he wasn't what I call God's greatest racer. I sold him a dummy and sailed past him. I had to do him a second time.

"One of the valuable things was that the Michelin [tyre], which was a radial, didn't have the normal growth at speed that you got with a crossply. So your aerodynamic balance was more constant. It meant that anybody on a Michelin at Silverstone was marginally better off because they didn't have this inconsistency of aerodynamic change that the Goodyears had."

...and Piquet's retirement helped the McLaren driver as well © LAT

It wasn't over yet. After just 17 laps Prost fell out of the lead with engine problems, leaving Arnoux in front and Watson second. There were still 51 laps to go and plenty of time for the Frenchman to get into trouble. Sure enough, eventually his engine began to sound rough, he fell off the pace, and Watson passed him. The crowd loved it.

"Prost had a problem and retired, and then Arnoux had to slow down. Eventually I caught him with about 10 laps to go. I passed him up into Becketts. I knew he was in trouble, the performance of that car under normal circumstances was superior to my car, so clearly they had a problem, and I was the beneficiary of their misfortune. Sometimes that's what happens, and you win a race.

"Thereafter it was a matter of keeping my head down and keeping my mind focused on the race and not letting what was happening around the circuit, which I was aware of, distract me. I didn't want to assume a victory before I took the chequered flag. Once Arnoux was gone the race was relatively straightforward, it was a matter of keeping my focus.

"The other thing was that Ron was hanging off the guardrail in the pitlane to say 'slow down!'. Obviously he was naturally concerned about the victory, its importance for him and the company. Ron has always been consistent. He's never shown a great concern about drivers, he's always been concerned about the team and the company!

"What I did was back off, I went from revving to 10,500 or 10,600rpm or whatever we were doing, and I was actually changing gear at 9000 at the end of the race. The only way I could actually slow down without losing my rhythm was to back out of the engine revs.

"What it actually proved was that even losing 1500rpm, which was a substantial chunk of horsepower, it didn't really have a significant bearing on the lap time. And Ron was 'slow down, slow down,' hanging out bodily, waving two hands. It would be a picture to treasure if you could ever find one."

He could barely believe the reception he received, especially on the lap of honour after the podium: "Just to do a lap and have those tens of thousands of people come onto the circuit, it was an enormous privilege to be the beneficiary of that kind of public loyalty or support.

Watson was able to stroke it home © LAT

"I was receiving the accolades of the public. They had a contribution. I know Nigel Mansell used to talk about people power, and whether there is such a thing or not I don't know. Certainly the emotion that they exhibited as the prospect of a win looked more inevitable, that was their role, their contribution. And their reward was getting the victory.

"It was a special day on a lot of levels. Taking the team first - which is what Ron does - it was a validation of what he set out to achieve through the auspices of Philip Morris, in conjunction with John Barnard, in a reconstituted McLaren team.

"McLaren had gone from being a team that was out of time in terms of understanding technology and especially aerodynamics, into a much more contemporary and particularly groundbreaking team in terms of the use of carbonfibre. It illustrated the aspirations and ambitions of Ron, of what his vision of what his team and F1 was to become. I think what Ron has achieved in his life time is very, very significant. Sadly he may never get the full credit for it."

Dennis meanwhile says he doesn't recall Silverstone as being a huge milestone in his own career.

"What I can remember is going to look at Andrea de Cesaris's car in the barriers," he says. "At the time I was far more concerned about the fact that we had a bent car than actually winning the race. I remember that very well.

"I never doubted for one minute that we would start winning races. In fact it took a little longer than I thought, but in the end it was a great feeling. It was one win, and it was reasonably memorable. But still we were faced with a lot of races for the rest of the season, and I didn't think anything other than 'okay, great.' You drive home and the morning after it sinks in and it feels good."

But wasn't getting the first win at Silverstone something special?

"It would be easy for me to say yes, but at the time what we were doing was trying to win races, and wherever it occurred, it didn't matter. It was a race where the turbo cars failed. They were quicker, and it was a race where to finish first you first have to finish, but nevertheless the writing was on the wall that everybody was going to have to go down the turbocharged path.

"You came away having won the race, but you absolutely realised that if you wanted to win races in the future, you had to go turbocharged. So I was probably thinking more about how I was going to get a turbocharged engine than the actual race result."