Grand Prix Gold: 1982 Season Review

After Imola the mood was low. In an act of consummate petulance the bulk of FOCA had given motor racing's public the finger. This clutch of Honest-to-God "robust entrepreneurs" (to quote the silky-tongued Mr Jonathan Aitken in the House of Commons) had withdrawn its labour in best Scargill fashion. On a temporary basis, this meant only that we had a very easy-going weekend in Italy, freed of the underlying dissension which pervades the grand prix paddock of the eighties.

The aftermath, though, was downright unpleasant, and it is true to say that many friendships in the business were damaged, some perhaps irreparably. When the travellers, all of them, met up at Zolder a couple of weeks later, recriminations were rife, and much of the pitlane was a study in sullenness.

Grand prix racing was split down the middle. And it was that same weekend, under a grey and morose sky, that Gilles was killed, this reducing to trivia anything else which might have been wrong. For very many of us, racing's addictive quality was never more severely put to the test. Whatever had assailed this soi-disant sport in recent years, there had remained the spectacle of genius to balance the scale. Now there seemed to be very little left.

For me the basic addiction remains, although you could say that for the moment I'm down to 10 a day. Perhaps, with sensible racing cars apparently on the horizon again, it may revert to two packs once more, who knows? Sensible racing cars were something we most definitely lacked in 1982, as in several years past. And that is where our story begins...

The problem, of course, is that in today's grand prix world winning is essential rather than being merely desirable. Along with its cash, big business has brought its ethics. Bluntly, success is the only thing that counts, and if you want to keep your sponsor you must show him a good time. His motives for involvement are not altruistic. He sees a Formula 1 team as an advertising agency on wheels; if it delivers the goods it keeps the account. Frank Williams: "I suppose it's still a sport for a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon, but the rest of the time it's just commerce, quite honestly."

To survive today you need to be streetwise, live on your wits, think like a sharp lawyer, look for the loophole, exploit it before someone else does. This is called 'competitiveness'.

First of all, we should remember that no one in grand prix racing ever cheats. If you use that word to describe them they get very uppity, for it smacks of dishonesty. So remember that, please. They do not cheat. What they do is: a) circumvent the rules, or: b) deliberately misinterpret the rules. Entirely different from cheating, as any reasonable man can see.

In America the racing fraternity is less sensitive to speculation about its morals. The good ol' boys of NASCAR, for example, look for ways to "circumvent the rules" from the cradle on, only there they call it 'cheatin'." Everyone does it, and always has. There is almost a wholesomeness about it, too, because of a single major difference between the worlds of Paul Revere and Paul Ricard: over there if they get caught it's a fair cop, over here it's unjust.

The year began badly with the drivers' strike at Kyalami, but let us return to that later. At Rio, the second race on the schedule, there was still an unhappy atmosphere, many of the drivers bitter and indignant as they spoke of the sheer unpleasantness of sitting aboard a modern F1 car at a place like this, bumpy and abounding in high g-force corners. I well remember the sight of Nigel Mansell's swollen and bleeding shins, bounced against the steering rack for nearly two hours. Many drivers were at the end of their physical tether afterwards, and Riccardo Patrese reached his long before that, the Brabham slithering around as if driverless. But the message went unheeded, as is usually the way of things.

Nelson Piquet won in Brazil, from Keke Rosberg, with a Big Bad Turbo (Prost's Renault) following them in. It was the beginning of the 'water tank affair'. After the race, Renault and Ferrari protested Brabham and Williams on the grounds that they had raced underweight, and FISA eventually disqualified the two cars, awarding the victory to Prost and, absurdly, moving up the finishing order several other 'water tank' cars.

The FOCA establishment, which had welcomed the Renault turbo with a barely-concealed smirk five years earlier, had now decided that such engines were illegal, and that the Cosworth DFV, after holding sway for a mere 15 seasons, was in danger of being blown aside. A hitherto undetected conservative streak in their nature revealed itself: they wanted turbos banned, these same people who cried frequently that you couldn't stand in the way of progress.

No one, of course, could deny the turbos had a power advantage, and a very considerable one at that, although many chose to overlook the inherent disadvantages of running a turbo as opposed to an atmospheric engine. In 1982, though, the turbo teams for the first time showed signs of being able to build cars close to the minimum weight limit. From a power-to-weight point of view, therefore, there was every chance that the non-turbos would be outclassed. That much was obvious, and it was easy to be sympathetic. Ferrari and Renault, with all their cumbersome and weighty turbo clobber, could just get down to the 580kgs limit, whereas the likes of Williams, McLaren and Brabham found no difficulty in undercutting it - and with safety.

No one would blame them for being irked by this. They had within their power the ability to restore some semblance of equality, simply by matching lower weight to their lower-powered engines. We had this situation in Brazil, and we had a very good race.

The problem was The Law. Rightly or wrongly, all parties had put their names to the Concorde agreement (a misnomer if ever there was one!), which said among other things that the minimum weight limit was 580kgs, to be checked after the race following topping up of coolants etc.

This takes us back to the eighties, to winning at all costs. Some FOCA people actually looked you in the eye as they asserted the suddenly discovered merits of the 'water tank', stressing the value of H20 as a means of cooling the brakes. It made you wonder why they kept forgetting to take it with them. And it was perhaps this slightly holier-than-thou attitude which lost them a measure of sympathy. Frank Williams, the only man who made no bones about the aim of the water tanks, sought to justify it on the grounds of power to weight ratio - sheer competitiveness - and that was infinitely more acceptable.

But...The Law. For some time now there has been a strong argument in favour of a lower weight limit for normally aspirated cars, especially if you believe, as I do, that sport is the thing, and that anything that leads to better motor racing is desirable. Not for a second do I blame the non-turbo teams for being miffed at their horsepower disadvantage (although it was already there when they agreed to the 580 limit), but grand prix racing is a society like any other, and as such needs laws. If you permit the breaking of the rules - or the circumvention or deliberate misinterpretation of them, call it what you will - you will get dissension and, ultimately, anarchy. If the rules are unsatisfactory, change them. Taking 'circumvention of the rules' a further step, Ferrari turned up at Long Beach with ridiculous double wings - each was legal and where did it say you could have only one? - and one wonders where the tit-for-tat nonsense might have stopped had FISA not taken the frankly unexpected step of effectively banning the water tank syndrome. Thereafter cars merely qualified under weight, but that has been happening since the Dark Ages.

FISA's decision undoubtedly meant that some races would be turbo benefits during the year, but I still believe they were right - because the boundaries had to be drawn - just as I am in favour of the new, lower, weight limit.

The word came from Paris just a few days before Imola, and thus we had the strike. No other word suffices. During the drivers' strike at Kyalami, many team owners were vociferous in their condemnation, saying that problems should be sorted away from the circuits, without penalising the public, and most agreed with that. Now, three months later, they were doing exactly the same thing themselves. Boycotting the San Marino Grand prix was perhaps the biggest single mistake FOCA has ever made, a fact admitted by several members at the time, and by most since. Maybe they believed that the race couldn't happen without them. Maybe the fact that it was an Italian race influenced their decision. If so, it was a gross miscalculation: Ferrari were there, and an Italian crowd needs nothing more. Attendances were higher than the year before.

The decision not to go to Imola was certainly not a unanimous one. Even within teams - McLaren, for example - there were differing views, and much of what went on approached the farcical. Ligier adopted a week kneed position in the middle somewhere, having the guts neither to race nor to associate themselves with the boycott. They had decided, said a press release, to miss Imola in any case, for 'technical reasons.' This was a surprise to all, bearing in mind the stringent financial penalties involved in non-appearance for reasons other than force-majeure. It was also a surprise to those who saw the teams' transporter heading back to the French border the day before practice! The technical reasons for not racing had presumably been discovered in a lay-by somewhere...

More surprising than the missing teams indifference to letting down the public (Imola crowds are used to that) was their assumption of goodwill and support from their sponsors, many of whom turned up at Imola and lost no time in making their feelings known. All they knew was that the race was happening, was being televised and that their representatives would not be featuring. Internal disputes were not their concern, they said. I still find it astonishing that, as the world tried to piece together what was happening to grand prix racing, FOCA chose not to send a spokesman to Imola. Attitudes hardened that weekend, and by boycotting the race the FOCA teams lost a good deal of sympathy. As in all strikes, the public suffered, and that was unforgivable.

It is perhaps a reflection of the muddied world in which we live that more than one FOCA man suggested that the attitudes of some British journalists (including this one) had been financially modified by Renault. There again, these accusations were made soon after the attitude of some small teams toward going to Imola had been financially modified by FOCA, so perhaps the concept was fresh in their minds.

Hence the prevailing atmosphere at Zolder. Perhaps everyone overreacted a little. In the paddock former friends and colleagues looked through each other; some were openly resentful and hostile, while others quietly said they agreed with all the criticism which had been laid at FOCA's door - off the record of course. In time the frostiness began to thaw, but in some cases it took many weeks, and it was sad that differing viewpoints had to be accompanied by personal animosity. In a civilised society, surely, it should be possible to disagree, without the suggestion that all one's views should be coloured by jingoism, by the blind belief that if the Brits wanted something it had to be supported. This suspicion that one's opinions had been shaded by money - foreign or otherwise - was hard to take, harder still to forget.

All things considered that period of motor racing life was perhaps the most unsavoury I can recall. Only Ken Tyrrell had broken FOCA ranks at Imola, and he made his presence felt by protesting all the turbo cars, claiming that the turbo-charged engines were illegal in their present form because they involved the use of a turbine, which was really an auxiliary engine, which took the capacity to over 1500cc, which... This protest could have been entered at any race since the 1977 British Grand prix, but somehow no one had got round to it. Cynics suggested that that its foundations may have been laid in Northampton, rather than Ripley. Whatever its origins, it was thrown out.

Thereafter, the anti-turbo movement began to melt away as, one by one, the FOCA muscle men's own turbo plans took shape. People from the lesser teams emerged from FOCA meetings telling scurrilous tales of the 'I'm alright Jack' attitudes suddenly prevalent among the leading lights. "They make us miss Imola because it suits them," said one, "and then when it suits them, they put us out on the street..."

The FOCA president, of course, was in the happy position of having a foot in both camps. Having missed Imola Bernie's team arrived in Zolder - with turbocharged engines! It reminded me of Sam Goldwyn's immortal line: "I was always an independent, even when I had partners..."

Some time before the Imola fracas, more than one leading FOCA man was beginning to doubt the association's worth any longer, claiming that membership was really valuable only to struggling teams. By the end of the season it was these hard-pressed who spoke bitterly of being let down. FOCA's previous togetherness was not in evidence during 1982.

Perhaps the most sinister and disreputable aspect of the entire season was the way in which certain people sought to 'use' the accidents to Gilles and Didier Pironi. Even before the French-Canadian had reached hospital there were those in the Zolder paddock speaking glibly, and with world-weary mock sadness, of Ferrari's inability to build safe cars. Later, after Hockenheim, Nelson Piquet would describe the products of Maranello as "criminal," which was both hysterical and irresponsible. In both accidents, the cars somersaulted at over 150mph, and we have no way of knowing how any other car would have stood up to such forces.

In neither case was car failure the cause of the accident. Over the years many drivers have lost their lives as a result of suspension failures, yet little public criticism has been voiced against the teams or cars concerned. As the invective against Ferrari poured forth, I felt considerable sympathy for Harvey Postlethwaite, who designed the 162C2. He after all, is a member of the 'English design school' - that is why Ferrari decided to employ him - and the cynic in me wondered if the vilification would have been as intense had Villeneuve and Pironi been driving cars with Hesketh, Wolf or Fittipaldi badges on them. It is interesting, is it not? that Didier himself had no words of condemnation for his car or team, and that it is his intention to rejoin them next year.

Speeds increased alarmingly in 1982. After Brabham had ignored the 'no skirts' rule early in 1981, FISA had weakly given in, ratified the (legal) hydraulic suspension and (illegal) skirts package, thereby forcing all the other teams to follow suit. If the sport were not to become a complete laughing stock, the governing body had to take steps against a second season of press-button-ride height adjustment, so they gave in completely. Skirts were back, albeit in fixed form, and suspensions were solid. Thus we had cars that were unexciting to watch, unpleasant to drive. The battle for sheer, crude downforce was maintained. As Nigel Mansell said, of his suddenly competitive Lotus 91 in Austria, "A driver has to work like mad to find a couple of tenths, and yet a tiny change - I mean a tiny - to ride height or skirts can give you a second and a half, just like that. It's not exactly rewarding for a driver..."

Testing at Paul Ricard early in the year, Didier Pironi had a mammoth accident, his car finally coming to rest in a spectator area. Afterwards the manager of this 'safe' circuit expressed anxiety: if Ricard was no longer capable of containing a Formula 1 accident, where was safe? The incident should have sounded alarm bells somewhere, but it did not.

In the dreadful aftermath of Villeneuve's fatal accident, one fact largely overlooked was that the somersaulting Ferrari came within a few feet of the crowd.

At Paul Ricard, during the French Grand prix, Jochen Mass and Mauro Baldi touched at the ultra fast Signes right-hander, and this time the German's March finished up beyond catch fencing and Armco, several spectators being injured. It is almost beyond belief that no lives were lost.

Clearly, it was a matter of time before members of the public would die in a racing accident, and now we were subjected to another propaganda campaign, an attempt by some to lay all the blame at the door of turbocharging, to associate the very word 'turbo' with doom and destruction. Nobody with half a brain was taken in. Of course turbocharging had greatly increased straightline speeds, and of course there was inherent risk in some cars having much more power than others (I can still remember the colossal difference between the original Cosworth DFV and most of its rivals in 1967). But... what of cornering speeds and more particularly, of corner approach speeds? Take a look at Ricard, where Mass's accident occurred, and study a few qualifying times. The French Grand prix has been held there on seven occasions between 1971 and 1982, with the 1976 race the middle one and also the last at Ricard without any ground effect cars.

The fastest Cosworth-engined car in '71 was Stewart's Tyrell, on 1m50.71s. By 1976 this was down to 1m47.89s (Hunt's McLaren), a reduction of 2.82s. In 1982 Rosberg's Williams lapped in 1m37.78s, more than 10 seconds quicker yet... All three used Keith Duckworth's engine. Yes, over the years more horsepower has come from it, but bear in mind that ground effect slows a car on the straight - and that the Mistral at Ricard is more than a mile long.

The point of this digression is to illustrate just how much cornering speeds have advanced in recent times. After the Ricard accident, some were quick to say that the accident would have been much worse if turbo cars would have been involved. That claim may well have been accurate, but in this case it seemed largely irrelevant. Turbos, as it happened, were not involved, and the accident was quite bad enough. The real point, surely, was that Signes, taken in 1976 at 140mph, was now all but flat out, and that the trackside safety measures, originally held up as an example to all, were no longer adequate. And turbocharging had nothing to do with that.

Formula 1 straightline speeds per se are no more than those routinely averaged by Indy Cars; the danger of grand prix racing recently has been the lateness to which that speed could be maintained, the extraordinary pace of turning into corners which has been permitted by massive down force. Hence I am delighted to see ground effect minimised, and look forward to the new season more than for a very long time. With luck, the era of jerkiness is behind us, and the joy of flowing car control will return. A great tragedy, though, is that the new rules have come too late for the man who fought for them strenuously than anyone else.

Gilles was also a central figure in the drivers strike at Kyalami, one of a few who had troubled actually to read the controversial new super license application forms, which had been sent out a few weeks before the race. He, like Lauda, Pironi and Laffite, saw this as the thin edge of a wedge, a way of subjugating the drivers, effectively putting them in the 'ownership' of their team bosses. He had seen the same thing happen to Ice Hockey in Quebec, he said, and he wanted no part of it

The constructors, for their part, claimed that the purpose of the form was simply to stop drivers from breaking contracts, walking out on a team in search of richer pastures, as when de Angelis left Shadow for Lotus, or Prost McLaren for Renault.

And so we had the famous 'lie in', in which the drivers cut themselves off from the world, communicating by telephone with President Pironi, who was up at the track negotiating. A full day's practice was lost, and emotions ran high. Guerrero's Ensign was withdrawn, and Piquet - the world champion - was forbidden to run in an untimed test session, his boss judging him 'unfit to drive' after a night on the floor. The intense mutual dislike between Villeneuve and Ecclestone nearly brought them to blows, Gilles arguing that the fans came to see the drivers, rather than the cars, Bernie the reverse. In a day of track inactivity, of course, the biggest loser was again the public.

But we had a race. In the high altitude of Kyalami it was a turbo benefit, of course, but both of Frank Williams's cars finished in the points, and Keke Rosberg, fifth, started his campaign for the world championship. It ended successfully at Las Vegas eight months later.

For years Rosberg had been hamstrung by his cars, although his talent and courage were never obscured. I remember practice at Brands Hatch in 1980, all that effort and fearlessness which nonetheless failed to get the Fittipaldi into the race. When Rosberg signed with Frank he had driven in 37 grands prix, and had precisely five world championship points on his record.

The ways of the world are strange. If Alan Jones and Carlos Reutemann had not dithered over their futures at the back end of 1981, it is quite safe to say that Keke would never have been offered a Williams drive. Given reasonable notice of his stars' intentions, Frank would have signed Pironi or Piquet, but it was too late.

Rosberg, in the meantime, had made a decision. With nothing else firmly in view, he had nevertheless severed all ties with the Fittipaldi team, wisely figuring that there was no point continuing like that. Better to be a free agent a while and hope that something worthwhile would come up.

It did. For years Keke's talent and aggression and boundless self confidence had been bottled up, and Frank's offer uncorked them. Rosberg was quick in a Williams from the first test on, and he was signed without delay. His early remarks about the legendary FW07 said a lot about the man: 'How does it feel? Horrible, quite honestly, but all these solid cars feel like that. It's not much nicer to drive than the Fittipaldi. The difference is that when you try hard in this car you're up at the front of the grid instead of struggling to get onto the back...'

So there was no question of being overawed by joining the most successful team of recent years. Nor was he too concerned about the specification of current cars. He liked them no more than anyone else, but in 1982 that was irrelevant. What mattered was that, for the first time, his car was competitive, an opportunity to be seized.

Over the entire season Rosberg did a better job than anyone else. Having watched his kerb-hopping over the years, I was not alone I wondering whether he would scupper himself by being too forceful, but these doubts were soon forgotten. Keke made only one mistake of consequence in a race (at Monte Carlo) and that, bearing in mind his intense competitiveness and the go-kart nature of the cars, was a considerable achievement.

It is always satisfying to see the world championship - for all its overblown importance - go to an out-and-out racer, and Rosberg is certainly that. In 16 races his only 'percentage' drive was at Las Vegas, where the title was his for the taking and the Williams not ultra-competitive. That race apart he always went for it.

People have said that Keke is not a true world champion because he only won one race during the year, but that is surely nonsense. No driver had more than two victories in 1982, and none of his rivals, with the possible exception of Rene Arnoux, displayed Rosberg's race-for-race determination and commitment. When a man leaves motor racing, there should be something more than mere statistics by which to remember and judge him. Keke, I trust, will drive for many more years, but already he is in the mind as a charger, one of those always worth watching, ready to make his pitch.

Rosberg went to Williams as number two, to Reutemann, who had decided finally to forget about retirement and accept Frank's very considerable financial inducement to return. Now, at last, Carlos was an unequivocal number one again, as he had been at Ferrari in 1978, his most successful season.

At Kyalami, the Argentine was at his magnificent best, and finished second, between the Renaults. For a man beginning his 11th season of Formula 1, however, the drivers strike - and its attendant unpleasantness - was all very disagreeable, and the cars, which hardly lent themselves to the kind of artistry of which Reutemann was capable, were not to his taste. After an unsatisfactory race in Brazil he said he had no wish to continue, after all, and this time the decision was final. Jones, Andretti and Reutemann, three men central to grand prix racing for a very long time, were now gone within the space of a few weeks. Mario made a disappointing one-off appearance for Williams at Long Beach, but Frank needed to find a permanent replacement for Carlos, and finally chose Derek Daly.

In the space of a couple of months, therefore, Rosberg went from being unemployed to leader of the world championship team, and this coincided with the introduction of the new car, the first from Williams for three years.

FW08 looked 'right' from the beginning, small, neat and agile. Almost immediately its testing times were startling. Before the car had been seen at a race Jonathan Palmer, for all his very limited experience, had shattered the Silverstone record with it.

And Rosberg, testing at a variety of tracks, was blindingly quick. Perhaps Niki Lauda was right: 'The problem with the whole water tank thing was that Frank's new car was too quick too soon, and its times frightened people. If it had been maybe 20 kilos under the 580 limit, perhaps nothing would have been said, but it was much more than that...'

In fact, the FW08 had been designed by Patrick head to have a racing weight of around 540kgs (the new legal minimum for 1983), and there were occasions during qualifying when it was considerably lighter than that. But the protest by Renault and Ferrari at Rio changed everything. FISA clarified the rules regarding the minimum weight limit, for that, Jean Sage and Marco Piccinini maintained, was the reason for their protest. If water tanks were kosher, then Renault and Ferrari would spend more millions in the quest for lightness. In future, said FISA, the cars would be weighed as they came in directly after the race.

Nothing could be added in the way of coolants, fresh brake pads etc. And that, contended the FOCA heavyweights, was a new rule and clarification of an existing one. Routine topping up had always been allowed, a time-honoured custom, if not actually a rule. If nothing could be added before the weight check, then the limit was effectively being increased. On that basis they felt justified in giving Imola a miss, needing "more time to prepare cars to meet the new rules" (although Tyrell managed it in a day or two). If the Rio results had been allowed to stand, perhaps their reaction would have been less trenchant.

Whatever, Head and his colleagues had a new problem, that of making their car competitive in its new 'heavy' state. It took time. Although the FW08, in Rosberg's hands, led most of its maiden race, at Zolder, it was not an easy car to drive, it's short wheelbase 'nervousness' making full demand full demand of Keke's terrific reflexes - just as the Tyrell 006 of a decade past needed a Jackie Stewart to get the best from it.

Underbody and skirt changes improved the car steadily through the season, and the Williams team began to devote more and more of the now farcical 'qualifying days' to seeking an optimum race day set-up. They played around with tyre pressures, sacrificing some early race speed to have a car which came into its own as the afternoon wore on. Thus, Rosberg was in perfect shape in the closing laps at the Osterreichring and Dijon.

Frank also spent a lot on engines, in terms of development as well as quantity. "Don't get too upset" John Judd told a despondent Roberto Guerrero during practice at Dijon. "Apart from chassis differences, remember you're 40 horsepower down on Rosberg before you start..."

And, of course, there was always the remarkable Williams reliability. Perhaps the team did win only once in 1982, whereas McLaren for example had four victories. The fact remains that their overall competitiveness was greater - they were never, unlike McLaren on occasions, flat off the pace, and their finishing record was bettered only by Ferrari. Rosberg won the world championship, despite winning just once, and that says everything about his team's standard of preparation. He was nearly always there at the end, in the points on 10 occasions (excluding Rio), and could have taken the title without the Dijon victory.

Reutemann's retirement gave Derek Daly his big opportunity, and Williams personnel stress that he played a big part in the development of the FW08, but somehow the results never came together, and the open faced Irishman was replaced by Jacques Laffite at season's end.

Sometimes Derek looked excellent. He convincingly led the non-turbo race in the opening laps at Paul Ricard, and had a very strong, if unrewarded, drive at Hockenheim. With the same tyre combination as Rosberg at Dijon he might well have been up there at the end. But in the races he rarely looked on par with Keke, and there are differing opinions as to whether he had the same equipment. Frank says yes, Derek no. All told though, Daly did a far better job than eight points might suggest, and it is sad that he is out of work at present.

Before the start of the season Williams said that his great ambition was to win the constructors cup for a third consecutive season, a feat never before achieved. In this he failed, and perhaps it is one of those hat ricks - like winning Indy - which is just not meant to be. The title this year went to Ferrari, for the tenth time, and the result was just. Consider the grief at Maranello this year, that four different drivers scored points for them, that they won despite missing two races and running but a single car in others, and the reliability and sheer pace of the 126C2 come sharply into perspective.

I was always sure that Gilles would be world champion in 1982. We knew all about his unequalled talent, and about the strength and increasing reliability of Ferrari's turbo V6. With an 'English' chassis from Harvey Postlethwaite, the triangle seemed complete, and I saw no realistic rivals.

After the first three races, though, my opinions were wavering. Gilles himself was as remarkable as ever - in Brazil he qualified a second and a half faster than Didier Pironi, and led the first half of the race, his team mate nowhere - but the new car was falling short of expectations, very slow through tight corners and with inordinately heavy steering. Gilles was sure that the basic problem was rigidity, and he was right. Suspension changes (strengthening at the rear, the adoption of pull-rods at the front) transformed the car into the most impressive and efficient Ferrari for many years, no longer a wonderful engine pushing an unwilling chassis. It was tragically ironic that the changes came too late for Gilles.

In common with many of my colleagues, I think back to that day at Zolder with sadness and also anger at the sheer unjustness of it all. It was infuriating to hear people talk of "a typical motor racing accident," because it was anything but that. It was a set of circumstances which was always eventually going to produce a catastrophe. Too many drivers - of widely differing experience and ability - out on the circuit together, with too restricted an opportunity (thanks to the absurdity of qualifying tyres, and the further absurdity of limiting each driver to two sets) of going for a time.

Gilles himself was acutely aware of the problem of driving flat-out while other traffic cruised around - "It's like going over a narrow humpback bridge without lifting off, hoping there's nothing coming the other way" - but he never compromised his quite fantastic competitiveness, and it cost him his life. Afterwards Jochen Mass said that Gilles could have lifted off, but that is no answer in itself. By the same token, Jochen could have kept to one side road or the other, rather than steering a middle course. Gilles needed a way through, and Jochen wanted to give him room. He moved right, but by then the Ferrari driver was already committed that way himself.

A colleague and I went to the scene of the accident. At that stage there was no official word, but I think we knew as we approached that we were in the presence of death. Racing journalists inevitably become hard-bitten as time goes by, but in the press room there was no mistaking the genuine sorrow and grief this time. Gilles had been, for so many, the core of our business for a long time, and the thought that this wonderful little man was gone seemed too much to take in.

Ironically, he had almost collided with Mass the day before, the March driver moving across his bows on the approach to the first corner, and his remarks afterwards now took on a surrealistic quality. In the days following there was a lot of talk, from Jean-Marie Balestre and others, about changing the qualifying procedure, banning qualifying tyres, but now, 11 races later, nothing has altered. Any number of times we have since come close to a repeat of the Zolder accident. So the greatest driver was lost, and some claimed that the tragedy had its roots at Imola, where Pironi's duplicity robbed Gilles of victory before an Italian crowd. Prior to that, the French-Canadian had always looked upon Ferrari as a team, with everyone pulling the same way. After Imola his perspectives were different. Bearing in mind what lesser mortals achieved with the Ferrari later in the year, I cannot doubt that Gilles would have walked the championship.

While Villeneuve was around, Pironi was inevitably in his shadow. There is no doubt that when Didier went to Ferrari, after some electrifying drives with Ligier, he quietly believed that he would be as quick - or quicker - than Gilles. This proved not to be the case. Although he never appeared to resent his team mate, perhaps when the opportunity to 'beat' Villeneuve arose, he was unable to resist. Only he knows the answer to that. I will never accept, however, that he believed Gilles to be racing seriously with him at Imola.

After Zolder Pironi, now the team leader, really came to the fore, and some saw it as 'rising to the occasion', as with Jo Siffert, after the death of BRM colleague Pedro Rodriguez. Perhaps there was an element of this, but more important, I believe, was the introduction of the new suspension, which suddenly made the 126C2 a great car. By Montreal, which abounds in tight corners, it was good enough to take the pole, and at the next race, Zandvoort, it was a very comfortable race winner.

And it finished everywhere, that was the point. Pironi could go into every race with the virtual certainty of points. After Brands Hatch he had a five-point lead in the championship, and looked unstoppable. But then came the Hockenheim disaster, so eerily reminiscent of that in Zolder exactly 13 weeks earlier. Pironi had been easily fastest on the first day of practice, a man apparently striding confidently towards the title.

"When Gilles was alive," Mauro Forghieri has said, "he was so obviously the best that perhaps we underestimated Didier a little. Perhaps all along he was the second best, but we didn't realise it because he was usually beaten by a man with the same car. After Gilles I think Didier was best..." That view, interestingly, accords completely with the opinion of Alan Jones, when assessing his rivals in 1981.

Following Villeneuve's death, Ferrari made representations to FISA, asking that the number 27 be dropped from the entry list - at least for the balance of the 1982 season - as a memorial to the great driver. Sentiment is in short supply these days, however, as we had seen at Zolder on raceday, there being no minute's silence, no gaps on the grid, no mention of his name at any stage. The Ferrari request was turned down, and when Patrick Tambay appeared in Gilles's stead, his car bore 27 on its nose and flanks. Ah well...

Tambay faced a big test. On the one had, it was the big opportunity of his racing life; on the other, he had the invidious task of 'replacing' Gilles, who had been one of his closest friends. All in all, he did the job remarkably well, most notably in Germany. To win there in the Ferrari was not in itself the most taxing of labours, but the circumstances under which the victory was achieved say a great deal about Patrick's composure. Pironi had crashed the day before, and the team was almost pleadingly dependant on him. He did not let them down.

More impressive, in its way, than the win was they way he had driven the Ferrari in the wet after his team mate's accident.

Hockenheim apart, Tambay put in a striking comeback drive in Austria and made a terrific effort, in considerable pain, to finish second at Monza. With his neck and arm problems, merely getting into the cockpit at Dijon and Vegas showed tremendous courage. He is a cultured man and an elegant driver. It should be a paradox to say that these estimable qualities could well militate against his ultimate success, but I fear not. "I don't see why you should have to be a bastard to succeed," Patrick has said, and I hope he proves himself right. So far, anyway, he is doing fine.

The fourth, and last, Ferrari driver of the year was Mario Andretti. In the Williams at Long Beach, Mario was frankly off the pace, and there was a lot of scoffing when Ferrari called him up for Monza. A joke, they said. Andretti's past it, an old man. Well, perhaps Mario is not quite the grand prix driver he used to be, but only a toerag insults fading majesty. I will listen to that from another with Andretti's racing record, but I can't offhand think of anyone who fits the bill.

And there did not seem that much wrong with the old boy at Monza, I thought, watching him plant the Ferrari on Pole. More sneering. It just showed how good the car was, that was all, if he could do it. After a troubled race Mario finished third, hero-worshipped by the crowd as never before. The weekend served to remind us of the meaning of star quality. Andretti brought a bit of glamour back to Formula 1, which perhaps explains the resentment of some of his more colourless 'colleagues'.

At Las Vegas, Mario's rear suspension broke, and that, quite astonishingly, was the first time a Ferrari had retired for mechanical reasons since Kyalami, the opening race of the season. They deserved their title.

Despite missing the last five races of the year, Pironi nonetheless finished second in the world championship, equal on points with John Watson, who had the most successful season of his long career.

McLaren was the wildcard of 1982, sometimes up in the clouds, out of sight, then suddenly swooping for a raid, devastating and sure. From weekend to weekend, the form of the MP4B was unsettled. You watched Niki Lauda humble the field at Long beach, and felt sure of a repeat at Monte Carlo. Instead, the Austrian had a wretched race in the midfield, admitting that for the fist time in his life he was baffled. He had tried everything he could think of, but the car remained drastically short of grip.

In part, McLaren fortunes were imponderable because only they, of all the leading Cosworth teams, were with Michelin, who usually had a bewildering range of compounds available. Goodyear would turn up with four or five compounds - from glue to wood - and Williams, Lotus and Tyrell would be approximately in the same boat, with Brabham and Ferrari a little more conservative. But the French company was a different matter, often producing something new "which might be worth gambling on." Quite often these were in short supply. Watson took such a gamble at Detroit, and the result was the best victory of the year.

This is how John qualified in 1982: 9th, 12th, 11th, 10th, 10th, 17th, 6th, 11th, 12th, 12th, 10th, 18th, 11th, 12th, 9th. Only once, at Montreal, was he further forward than row five. Yet after the race in Canada he led the world championship by 10 clear points.

Quite often Michelin qualifiers were worth literally nothing to the McLaren team, and the cars would be nowhere on the grid, yet Wattie would quietly say that he 'felt confident of a good race day set-up.' And times without number he was proved right. The Sunday morning warm-up - in these days the only practice session which actually means anything - invariably saw car number 7 among the very quickest. His frequent problem was that a poor out-and-out qualifying time left him with so much dross to get through in the early laps.

And that was the most impressive aspect of John's driving this year, the way he passed people. We have come through an era of grand prix racing in which overtaking was more difficult than ever before, yet there were times Watson made it look natural and matter-of-fact. Who can ever forget the manner in which he disposed of Pironi, Cheever and Lauda in the course of a single lap at Detroit? It was almost too much too believe, but the facts speak for themselves: on lap 32 he was fifth, and on lap 33 he was second.

John has always been among the latest brakers in the business, and this year he really made use of it. Perhaps that day at Detroit crystallized Watson at his best, brave and assertive and confident, but there were other times when he was almost as impressive. At Las Vegas he knew he had to go for it, and his drive was breathtaking.

The MP4B won four grands prix, with John and Niki taking two apiece, their manner of success totally different. Lauda usually outqualified Watson sometimes by a considerable margin, and his pair of victories, at Long Beach and Brands Hatch, were dominant affairs in the great mid-seventies tradition. It was as if sometimes Niki would said himself, "I think I'll win today." It looked that simple, a great driver amusing himself, toying with the 'opposition'. Motor racing sleight of hand. How was it possible to simply to drive away like that?

Lauda, however, did not race as well as Watson, and there were days - Monaco, Montreal, Monza - when he simply gave up. After Long Beach, only the third race in his comeback, everyone was a little stunned and confused by his supremacy, but after Detroit it was Niki's turn to be bewildered. For many laps he had sat at the back of a three-car queue, and then along came Watson up from 17th on the grid taking an identical car straight past the lot of them.

"Think of Niki's brain like a computer. Well his computer wasn't programmed for something like that. The information was fed in - the computer refused it!" There was no mistaking the relish in John's words. He could play the psyching game, too.

In their days together at Brabham, one always felt that Lauda had the upper hand, as has been the case in every team for which he has driven. The Austrian involves himself very deeply in every facet of the business, but this year Watson's approach to him was different. Very well, Niki could be at the centre of everything, the man in the limelight, but John reasoned rightly that he could benefit from that. Lauda remains a supreme test driver, and it is beyond doubt that the MP4B would not have become such a competitive force without him.

The whole nature of the Formula 1 car changed during Niki's two-year absence, and he made no secret of his distaste for the rock-hard 'downforce' device of 1982. The secret of his skill has always been smoothness, inch-perfect placing of the car, delicate throttle control. And as Villeneuve (to whom Lauda was close) said in Brazil, "with these things, it's a matter of turn in, aim for somewhere near the apex, bang your foot to the floor and hold on." It was delightful, in the circumstances, to see Niki make precision work so well for him. At Long Beach he alone never looked like clipping a wall.

To some extent, though, it must be said that he played the percentage game this year, matching himself to the form of the car on a given weekend. He remains the great pragmatist.

Before the start of the season most of the pundits reckoned that that 1982 would be 'The Year of Renault'. Alain Prost had been the dominant figure during the second half of '81, and the French team at long last appeared to have their reliability together. And they began this year superbly with the anticipated cakewalk at Kyalami. Prost then finished third at Rio, which became first after the disqualifications of Piquet and Rosberg. Two wins in two races for Alain, then, but they were his lot for the season. In the 14 events which followed he retired nine times, and Rene Arnoux made the finishing line on only five occasions through the year.

Their out-and-out competitiveness lacked for nothing. 10 times a Renault started from pole (Prost five, Arnoux five), and only at Brands Hatch were the yellow cars out of serious contention. More to the point, they were the class of the field at a place like Monaco, traditionally their scene of embarrassment. It was there they introduced a new electronic fuel injection system with butterfly throttle arrangement. Suddenly the Renault V6 matched Ferrari's turbo for responsiveness, and at a round-the-houses track the transformation was astonishing. When Arnoux came past me at Mirabeau on the first lap his lead was such that I felt there must have been a multiple shunt behind him somewhere. Not a bit of it. The car was simply that good. Similarly, it put Prost on pole through the Scalextric meanderings of Detroit.

If Alain and Rene benefited considerably from the vastly improved 'driveability' the new system lent to their cars, they paid a high price for the pleasure. The problem was that the electronics were wilful, unfathomably going on the blink, usually late in the race. The driver would lift off, the mixture would go rich and the engine would cut out. Thanks to this, Prost lost a certain victory in Austria, Arnoux in Dijon.

Renault also had more trouble than most with the skirt systems, but by and large they clearly knew how to present a competitive car. After all these years of running a turbo engine, however, their reliability record was nothing less than lamentable. True, they won four races - as many as any other team - but they should have had twice that number. Team personnel frequently pointed out that their problems usually stemmed from things 'bought in', rather than of their own manufacture, but this is hardly an excuse. All teams, even Ferrari, have to use outside suppliers.

I admire Prost's driving, but it does not stir me. He is quiet, calm, almost mechanical in his sheer efficiency, but somehow the Renault's unimpassioned engine note harmonises perfectly with the man in the cockpit. There is no apparent fervour in Prost on the track, partly because he has great natural talent and smoothness is his watchword. That apart, I also feel that there may be a question mark against his aggressiveness. At Kyalami his comeback drive to victory was stunning, but it should remembered that his car, easily the fastest in the race, was on new tyres and running perfectly.

In circumstances such as those he is formidable, but there has been occasions this year when I have been surprised at his apparent lack of fight, particularly defending a lead in a faltering car. Somehow one could not imagine an Arnoux or Rosberg conceding quite so easily.

Last year Alain really came on strong, more and more as the season progressed, but he seemed to mark time in 1982. Perhaps he believed the widespread predictions that he would waltz away with the world championship, and started to think that it was his for the taking. He is an extremely ambitious young man, never slow to assert himself, and went into the season unequivocally as Renault's star turn. As we moved into summer it became clear that the internal politics were becoming a problem with the French team.

After a comparatively backwards year, Arnoux came back with a vengeance in 1982. His confidence, which wavered during his first season with Prost, was fully restored, and on occasions he was staggeringly fast. It was perhaps inevitable that he resented some of the 'superstar' treatment handed out to his teammate. The two men were poles apart in everything save the length of time it took them to get a Renault around a circuit. There is nothing polished about Rene. Out of a racing car he remains a shy, almost timid, individual; in it he is as brave and assertive as you will find. From a PR man's point of view he is a dead loss, so it is good that he has now moved to the only team where that counts for nothing.

And there is passion in Arnoux's driving. Would Prost have involved himself so deeply in that duel with Villeneuve at Dijon three years ago? I think not. Equally, I doubt that Alain would have spun so unnecessarily at Monaco and Montreal this summer. Rene is more of a charger, but more likely to go over the limit.

There was bitter controversy at Ricard when he refused to surrender a 23-second lead in order to let Prost win, and it was interesting that most of France seemed to side with him. It was the beginning of the end of his Renault career, however, for his team mate quickly advised the management that 'this team wasn't big enough for the both of them'. While Alain simmered away on regulo 9, Rene said that to let your partner slip by was one thing, but to stop and wait for him was quite another. I agree. It would have been a fatuous spectacle, and I cannot imagine that Prost wanted to get the world championship in that way.

The end-of-season solution was probably a happy one all around. Alain's staus at Renault will be unquestioned next year, and Rene has found his spiritual home at Maranello. Already, before he has so much as raced a Ferrari, he is idolised in Italy, a true working class hero. Monza did that for him.

The uncertain fortunes of grand prix racing were never more clearly seen than in Nelson Piquet's North American jaunt in the middle of the year. At the Detroit Grand Prix the reigning world champion was a frustrated spectator, having failed to get the Brabham-BMW into the race, and seven days later, in Montreal, he stepped up to the rostrum to receive the trophy from Gilles's father.

Piquet and the Brabham team had a mixed up season, but despite his comparative lack of success (11th in the championship), the Brazilian probably drove consistently better than ever before. He had a marvellous race before his home crowd at Rio, winning after fighting hard for almost the entire distance. He was on the verge of collapse after his most tiring of all grands prix, but the faceless figures of Paris would decide, a few weeks later, that it had all been for nothing.

From the beginning of his team's association with BMW, Nelson was one of very few Brabham people who had genuine enthusiasm for the German 4-cylinder turbo engine, and never gave the 'Cosworth Charter' his support. He wanted power, power and more power, and thus accepted with commendable equanimity an unhappy sequence of races with the troublesome BMW-engined BT50, while team mate Riccardo Patrese continued with the very much more raceable Cosworth car. At Monte Carlo, for example, the Italian was a frontrunner throughout and eventually won, while his team leader popped and banged around in lower midfield. And Detroit, of course, brought worse than that.

In the days immediately following this disaster, most members of Bernie Ecclestone's team were ready, indeed eager, to sling in the BMW project, but Piquet was not among them. For Montreal there was a revised metering unit for the engine, which substantially improved its throttle response. And...there was cooler weather. For the race, indeed, it was positively arctic, and the BMW thrived. Visibly quicker than anything else in a straight line, Nelson held together without problem to win from Patrese's BT49D. Brabham-BMW from Brabham-Cosworth. Hmmm, murmured Bernie's FOCA associates, this turbo business is getting serious...

At the next race, Zandvoort, Piquet was second to Pironi's Ferrari, but the rest of the season brought only a distant fourth, at Dijon. Everywhere else Nelson retired, frequently after leading. During the second half of the year the team introduced its 'planned pit stop' policy, reviving thoughts of Fangio, a Maserati 250F and the Nurburgring. Well, almost. But the strategy worked as intended only once, when Patrese came in for fuel and tyres at the Osterreichring, resuming without losing the lead. Usually, though, the engines of both cars ran up the white flag before half distance, leaving the mechanics sadly to pack away their Indy-style equipment and flameproof gear.

Like all Gordon Murray's cars, the BT50 was lovely to behold, and there were times, like the weekend in Austria, when it was in a class of its own. There was something very dramatic about its progress as Piquet and Patrese clunked into sixth past the pits. But the Bee Em Vee, apart from its brief mid-season hiatus, remained stubbornly unreliable. Only at Dijon did both cars finish - and there it was the chassis's turn to be obstinate.

Through it all Piquet never got discouraged, and he looked a more complete a racing driver than ever before. He showed little interest in the responsibilities of a world champion, however, and FISA should have shown him some kind of red card after the incident with Salazar at Hockenheim. After unsuccessfully disputing a piece of tarmac with Alan Jones at Zolder last year, the Brazilian ranted that he would put the Australian over the guard rail next time, and we saw a similar lack of composure in Germany.

Nelson had a huge lead when he came up to lap the ATS, yet foolishly risked everything to get by into the tight chicane. That showed poor judgement, but worse by far was his decision to stage a playground brawl in front of the TV cameras. (Wisely he never attempted to get into fisticuffs with Mr. Jones...) It was embarrassing to behold, and disquieting to hear his behaviour excused, even defended, by people who should no better. Heat of the moment, pressure, that sort of thing. Baloney.

Brabham was the first turbo team to equip its drivers with cockpit-adjustable boost control, later fitted to the Renaults. It was perhaps significant that Ferrari, with their phenomenal reliability, shied away from this, Forghieri commenting that an engine was built to operate at a certain temperature - which changed when you altered the boost.

For the first time in three seasons, Bernie had two leading drivers in his team, with Patrese replacing Hector Rebaque and feeling that for the first time, he had a car worthy of him. Usually there was precious little to choose between Nelson and Riccardo, but the Brazilian generally held slightly the upper hand.

Perhaps Patrese was somewhat fortunate to emerge as winner of a truly chaotic Monaco Grand Prix, but it was not undeserved. From the start he was in the thick of things, not able to run with the Renaults but a match for Pironi's Ferrari, and in the final spin of the wheel number 2 came up. He also put in a very fine drive at Montreal, and seemed to be heading for a decisive victory at the Osterreichring, when a seized engine put him into one of the seasons more terrifying spins. At Ricard he displayed considerable courage and great presence of mind when his engine took fire, driving the car to a fire marshals' point rather than heading to the pits. I feel he will be one of the leading lights of 1983.

The best of Italians, though, drives for Ken Tyrell. Over the season past Michele Alboreto blossomed into a genuine topliner. In only his second Formula 1 term, and already a team leader, he showed every quality required of a modern grand prix driver. During qualifying he was frequently the fastest man into a given corner, the stopwatch confirming what the eye had seen.

Alboreto is a quiet, courteous fellow, invariably the very antithesis of what 'Italian racing driver' is supposed to mean (although it was surprising to see his ferocious outburst against Daly at Zandvoort, when the two of them were involved in a late-race bumping match). Michele finished in the points on seven occasions, and of course finished the year with that highly impressive victory at Las Vegas.

After several seasons of virtual obscurity Ken Tyrell's team came back strikingly in 1982, and this was the more impressive since it was accomplished on a very low budget. For most of the year Ken was without a major sponsor and as you watched the very obvious progress and refining of Maurice Phillipe's 011 design you wondered what some of the big-buck operations did with their money. As early as Rio, other drivers commented that the car rode bumps like no other, and most of the time it was a very competitive tool.

Alboreto never failed to get the best from it, but I was mildly shocked by his attitude at Hockenheim where, after Pironi's morning accident, he flatly refused to take the car out in the rain during the official session. All right, there was no question of moving up the grid, but race day could have been wet, which would have left Michele somewhat unprepared. That apart, he could hardly have impressed me more.

Tyrell's almost chronic money problems meant that it was impossible to do justice to the second car. All the tweaks were for Alboreto, which was perfectly understandable, but it was inevitably hard on Brian Henton, who took over the drive after Slim Borgudd went back to his drums.

In the circumstances Brian did a very fine job - don't forget that fastest lap at Brands Hatch - and is much more worthy of a Formula 1 drive than most of the Wallet brigade. His best drive was in the Austrian Grand Prix, where he really got stuck in, even passing a stunned Lauda on his way up the charts. Had his engine stayed together he would probably have finished third.

That race at the Osterreichring produced the closest finish of the year, with Keke Rosberg losing by a couple of feet to Elio de Angelis. This was the oasis in an otherwise dry season for Lotus, for the 91, while perhaps the most beautiful car of the year, was rarely among the most effective. And the 'buzz' generated by this team when all is truly well (as in the Andretti-Peterson era) was just not there. The car was a little on the heavy side, and both drivers were constantly frustrated by its unwillingness to follow the path suggested by its front wheels.

Many times the two cars showed well on the first day of practice, only to slide down the grid later as others improved while they did not. In Austria something of that old black magic returned, but one somehow never got the impression that it would be maintained. It is not easy to assess the stature of de Angelis as a grand prix driver, for I feel that very often he does himself less than justice. Consistent Formula 1 success is probably the first thing he has wanted in life which he has been unable to buy. On sheer raw talent, he may be the equal of Michele Alboreto, but his hunger for success is another matter. When there was a chance of victory in Austria he responded superbly, making no mistake under the fiercest pressure. The win was well taken and deserved, but there are weekends when he appears merely to be driving around. In manner and personality he is very different from most of his colleagues.

Nigel Mansell will want to forget all about 1982, a season in which nothing went right for him. He drove a courageous race in Brazil and a superb one in Monte Carlo, but did not score anywhere else. And at Montreal, of course, he sustained an agonising arm injury, which caused him to miss two races and hampered him in many more. This year de Angelis was back in favour, and it was Nigel's turn to stand in the corner. There were 'personality clashes' within the Lotus team, and it became obvious that Mansell was not enjoying his motor racing very much. But he is a resilient man, and will come through this unhappy period. All in all, most people were surprised when Colin Chapman announced an unchanged driver line-up for the third consecutive year.

Those, then, were the teams which produced victory in the season past. Of those which did not, the most prominent were Alfa Romeo and Talbot-Ligier. The Italian team produced a much more competitive car for 1982. Designed by Gerard Ducarouge, the 182 was a very smooth looking device, particularly in its element at 'swervy' circuits, where the torque of the V12 also played a significant role. It was hoped that chaining Carlo Chiti to a desk might improve the on-circuit organisation of the team, and perhaps it was a little better this year. The reliability factor, however, did not change. For a team of such resources - financial and technical - to come out of a 16-race world championship with only seven points is nothing less than a disgrace. Four of them came from Andrea de Cesaris's third place at Monte Carlo, and even then the Italian was out of his car when the flag fell. As Patrese completed his final lap, Andrea, his car out of fuel, was sitting on a wall near Casino square, crying his eyes out. That moment mirrored the Alfa season.

It was tragic that chronic unreliability plagued the 182, for there were times when it looked a very fine car. At Long Beach, only its second race, de Cesaris pumped himself up to claim a remarkable pole position, and in the race he led for a while.

After his riotous season with McLaren, Andrea was certainly a vastly improved driver in 1982, much happier in an Italian environment. But I still worry about his mental approach to the job. There was something almost spooky about the state he was in after that admittedly sensational lap at Long Beach, but perhaps this is a very Anglo-Saxon viewpoint. Quite clearly he had been r-r-r-r-right to the edge, and his behaviour seemed reflective of a truly enormous fright.

Frequently, though, his race performances were undeniably impressive. There were more tears in Canada when he ran out of fuel once more after a long battle with Cheever, but let no one doubt his commitment of courage. Why he had to behave like a brat at Dijon, deliberately blocking Rosberg and Lauda while being lapped, is something only he knows.

De Cesaris's sheer pace put Bruno Giacomelli in the shade sometimes, but by and large this was a typical Bruno year, with lots of effort and little reward. He is a sensitive character, and was absolutely shattered by the death of Villeneuve, whose house guest he had been the weekend before Zolder. Over the years he has patiently given Alfa Romeo immense service, and I am sad to see him undeservedly lose his drive.

Guy Ligier's team had a dreadful time, beginning the year with what Jacques Laffite called 'the antique,' this being the vastly overweight JS17. Jacques actually found the whole 'water tank syndrome' something of a poor joke, declaring that such a device in his car was somewhat superfluous since it was way over the 580 limit as it was...

For all that, though, the car handled nicely, and at slow circuits like Detroit the Matra V12 remained vaguely competitive. Laffite and, more often, Cheever fell back on it in mid-season as their frustration with the new JS19 reached boiling point. Not until the very end of the year did it begin to show some real promise, by which time its two drivers had made alternative arrangements for next season.

Jacques was the same as always, racing hard everywhere, the complete professional. The difference was that this year his car allowed him only five points rather than his usual 40-odd. Perhaps the most well balanced individual in the entire business, his grin never deserted him, but this was easily the worst of his seven years with Ligier, and there was no real surprise when he snapped up Franck's offer.

As the season progressed, I found myself more and more appreciative of Eddie Cheever's efforts, feeling that perhaps I had done him an injustice in previous years. There were times in 1982 - Detroit, Montreal, Monza - when he was very impressive indeed, and at Las Vegas he drove a magnificent race. Guy Ligier, like Ken Tyrell, rated him very highly as a test driver, and it will be interesting to watch his progress at Renault.

The Arrows team did not progress this year, finishing, like Alfa Romeo, with only five championship points. Everything began badly, their number one driver Marc Surer crashing badly after suspension failure during Kyalami testing. The Swiss recovered quickly from his injuries, and was occasionally able to show glimpses of his very real ability, but the Arrows A4 was never a front runner, and the A5 did not appear until late in the season. Surer is a very pleasant man, with boundless enthusiasm for racing, and everyone hopes his luck will turn. Mauro Baldi's first grand prix season was uneven, the former F3 star sometimes failing to qualify, sometimes looking distinctly promising, as at the Osterreichring. Many of the Italians rate him very highly.

Gunther Schmid's ATS team did not achieve very much, although the cars were invariably beautifully turned out and sometimes unexpectedly competitive. The uncommonly brave Manfred Winkelhock rather shook the establishment by qualifying fifth at Detroit, but he finished in the points only once, at Rio, where he drove hard and fast in punishing conditions. Eliseo Salazar, after a promising spell with Ensign in '81, was very disappointing this year, although it should be remembered that he was in a German team with a German team mate. The normally easy going Chilean seemed morose and preoccupied for most of the season.

I think that the single most appalling sight this year was that of Riccardo Paletti's Osella after the Montreal start-line accident. The young Italian tragically died, of course, after hitting Pironi's Ferrari at approximately 100mph. I have seen racing cars damaged by greater impact than that, but never one which simply folded up like the Osella. It was shameful. Of what possible use are safety rules and regulations when a car can technically meet them yet crumple like Paletti's? As Jean-Pierre Jarier staggered uncertainly away from yet another heap of wreckage at Las Vegas - a front wheel and hub had detached themselves - his mind was made up. Nothing would make him drive an Osella again. They are pleasant people who have had nothing good from their brief time in Formula 1, but the fact remains that the cars have broken too many times, and there are no excuses.

The final point (singular) scorer this year was the now defunct Fittipaldi team, which struggled on with a single car for Chico Serra. It was all a rather sad waste of time, a conclusion which Keke Rosberg came to just a year ago. Serra has a lot of ability - indeed Keke put his name forward to Frank as a replacement for Reutemann - but no opportunity to show it.

Derek Warwick was vastly disappointed when Gerard Larrousse announced that Cheever would drive for Renault in 1983, for he had been on the French team's 'shortlist'. Warwick, I feel, is in the same situation as Rosberg before he went to Williams. He is very quick indeed, aggressive and brave, and all too infrequently has he been able to put those qualities to good use. After a frankly disastrous first season in Formula 1, the Toleman team made good progress this year, largely because of excellent engine work by Brian Hart. When the 4-cylinder turbo unit first appeared at a race, Brian said that he would have preferred to spend another year on development, and his estimate was right. With a working budget minute by the standards of other turbo engine builders, and lacking such expensive niceties as electronic injection, the Hart engine became basically reliable and well able to deal with any non-turbos. Occasionally it was able to match Renault and Ferrari for sheer punch, although Warwick claimed that some engines were considerably better than others.

Corners, however, were a problem. The 'Belgrano' just didn't like them - except at Brands Hatch, where Warwick put in a sensational performance and reported afterwards that the handling had been fantastic. Later in the year - too late - the new TG183 appeared, and Derek said that he suddenly knew what ground effect was...

Teo Fabi had a heartbreaking first year in Formula 1, often failing to qualify, frequently getting involved in someone else's accident. At Imola and the Osterreichring, though, he was able briefly to show considerable promise, a real racer given half the chance.

It was a year of disillusionment, too, for John Macdonald and his March team. Adrian Reynard's 821 cars were never close to the pace, although their turn-out was beyond reproach. Jochen Mass, who has disliked grand prix racing for some considerable time, decided to make a comeback and frankly did not look up to it. Everyone likes Jochen, but few doubted the wisdom of his decision. He had two miraculous escapes in 1982, very nearly being struck by the remains of Villeneuve's Ferrari at Zolder, then somehow emerging alive from that carnage at Ricard. Thereafter he decided to call it a day.

Raul Boesel was a disappointment, sometimes outqualifying Mass, but very seldom being able to stay with him in the race. After Jochen's withdrawal from the scene Rupert Keegan was drafted into the team. Much more serious about his racing than in days gone by, Rupert did a commendable job and was always quicker than Boesel.

Far and away the most impressive of the newcomers was Roberto Guerrero, who joined forces with Mo Nunn to fight the perennial Ensign money battles. The young Columbian had great faith in Nigel Bennett's new car, and impressed everyone with his flair and speed. Testing was virtually out of the question, and many times the team set off for a grand prix without a spare engine, let alone a spare chassis. Guerrero, let me safely predict, will be one of grand prix racing's stars before very long.

No fewer than four drivers drove the lone Theodore. Daly started the year with them, before going off to Williams, and was then briefly replaced by the sadly under-rated Jan Lammers. Geoff Lees - reigning European F2 Champion, yet virtually unemployed - drove the car at Montreal, after which Lammers came back for a bit. Then, for the last five races, Rizla money brought in Tommy Byrne, who was somewhat out of his depth and must hope one day to match his driving to his ego. Well, it was asking a lot to expect someone of limited experience to climb aboard a 1982-style F1 car and shine immediately. We saw that when the highly touted Roberto Moreno turned out for Lotus at Zandvoort.

After a lot of gloom in the last few years, the overall picture is brightening. We have the prospect again of racing cars which will be exhilarating both to drive and watch. We have a world champion who understands the responsibilities of the title. We have, for the moment at least, an unusual degree of accord within the sport. Everyone hopes that the new rules will make grand prix racing safer, but I would still like to see changes to the qualifying procedure, which robbed us last May of the greatest crowd-puller in a generation. I would also welcome more responsibility from some of the drivers towards their own safety. When you hear one of them bitch about insufficient run-off area or too few rows of catch fencing, you wonder why he qualified with empty extinguisher bottles (lighter, you see) or ignored a yellow flag.

Must close now. That sounds like the postman, and my Renault cheque still hasn't arrived....

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