The Lotus legend who lived on opposite lock

'Mad Ronald', Mike Hailwood used to call him, and if ever you watched him through the old Woodcote, you knew why. From the beginning of his career, Ronnie Peterson was stunningly quick, and from the beginning, too, he lived on opposite lock.

"Any number of times," said Jackie Stewart, "I'd follow him into a corner, and think, 'Uh-oh, Ronnie, you've overdone it this time - you're gone!' Somehow, though, he always seemed to get it back, and it never surprised me the fans loved him - he was exciting to watch from where I was, too!"

Peterson was one of those folklore drivers, like Rindt and Villeneuve, whose surnames were rarely heard: as it was always 'Jochen' and 'Gilles', so it was with 'Ronnie'. Throughout his career Michele Alboreto's helmets were blue and yellow, in homage to his childhood hero.

At the wheel of a Tecno, Peterson took Formula 3 by storm in 1969, and the next year made his F1 debut in a privately run March before joining the works team in '71, and netting four second places. The big break, though, came with a move to Lotus in '73.

In France Peterson won his first grand prix, and three more quickly followed: the Lotus 72 suited Ronnie to a tee.

It was as well, though, that his reflexes were otherworldly, that he could drive round problems so consummately, for by his own admission he was a hopeless test driver, with no gift for setting up a car.

"In that respect, Ronnie made me tear my hair out," said Colin Chapman. "You could change a car quite fundamentally - and still he'd set the same sort of times! You'd ask him how it felt different: 'Ummm, slides a bit more...' Where - front or rear? He'd say he wasn't really sure - and then, of course, he'd go and put the thing on pole..."

Peterson in a race car was Clark Kent in a 'phone box. If he was a gentle soul, languid and droll and quietly spoken, his racing persona was wholly extrovert, and never seen to greater effect than at Woodcote.

In the days of negligible downforce, when the driver had so much more say in a car's cornering speed, you breathlessly awaited Ronnie's arrival, then savoured - lap after lap - the sight of that black Lotus skittering through at 160mph, absolutely at the edge. Like Rindt, like Villeneuve, he made you catch your breath.

In 1974 Peterson won three races, including Monaco, but was still in the venerable 72, whose intended successor had proved a failure. In '75 the old car - now in its sixth season! - was pressed into service yet again, but there were no more victories, and the following year, unimpressed with the new 77, Peterson left Lotus, and returned to March, with whom he won at Monza.

There followed a disastrous move to Tyrrell, then into its second 'six-wheeler' season. Ronnie, invariably outpaced by Patrick Depailler, never got along with the car, but in considering his next move had to accept that no longer was he in great demand.

Help, though, was at hand, in the person of Count Giuseppe Zanon di Valgiurata, an Italian with a willingness to support drivers for whom he cared, one of whom - in the early March days - had been Peterson.

Ronnie wanted a return to Lotus, now prospering with Mario Andretti, and - so long as his palm was appropriately crossed - Chapman was happy to have him back. When Zanon stepped up a deal was done for 1978.

Initially Andretti was less than enthusiastic: "Tell me where it's written we need two stars in this team..."

By and by, though, it ceased to be a problem, and their friendship became as deep as any I have known between drivers. If there was a determination at Lotus for Mario to win the championship he should have had in '77, Ronnie, just happy to be back in a competitive car, willingly went along.

They began the season with the previous year's Lotus 78, Andretti winning in Argentina, Peterson in South Africa, but Chapman's beautiful 79 was something else again, and swiftly established itself as the class of the field. Until half-season Mario held sway, winning at Zolder, Jarama and Ricard, but by Brands Hatch Ronnie's phenomenal native speed began to assert itself. If he won in the rain at the Österreichring, where Andretti crashed, at Hockenheim and Zandvoort he looked like a man following team orders.

By now Peterson's reputation was fully restored, and on race morning in Holland he told me of his future plans: "It's not announced yet, but I'm going to McLaren next year, and Mario knows..."

Rumours that he was moving on had prompted one driver to suggest that now, with nothing to lose, Ronnie should forget the terms of his contract, and just go for it.

He was affronted: "Mario did all the sorting of the 79, and was quicker in the first half of the season - he deserves to be champion. I had open eyes when I signed the contract and I gave my word. If I break it, who will ever trust me again?" They were different times.

A fortnight later came Monza, and the appalling accident away from the start. Although Peterson suffered severe leg injuries, that evening Professor Sid Watkins called Andretti from Milan's Niguarda Hospital to say that Ronnie's vital signs were good, that Mario should uncork his champagne. Elated, we drank a toast to the man whose Ray-Bans were where he had left them, on the table before us.

When Andretti went to the hospital early the next morning, though, he was met on the steps by Emerson Fittipaldi, who told him their friend was gone: during the night, following an operation to reset Peterson's legs, bone marrow had escaped into his bloodstream, and simply stopped his heart.

"On the Sunday I became world champion," Mario said, "and on the Monday it was the last thing in my mind."