Ask Nigel: November 28

Dear Simon,

Your question brings back memories, both of Jenks, and of a highly entertaining day at Ricard late in 1982. I wrote a Fifth Column about it at the time, and as you read it, bear in mind that this was a very different time in F1, not least because the trend was increasingly towards turbocharged engines, as pioneered by Renault. That being so, the revs I mention, for example, are extraordinarily low by the standards of today's normally-aspirated screamers. Here is a lightly edited version of the column, which, incidentally, I entitled, 'A Salutary Experience'.

Remember the old joke about Nelson? He is allowed down from his Column for the day, and can do whatever he pleases. Given such limited opportunity for pleasure, you might expect him to repair to The Connaught, enjoy a memorable dinner and afterwards spend time relaxing with a modern Lady Hamilton. (Come to think of it, he might eat later. It's quite some time he's been in Trafalgar Square). But no. He passes up the pleasures of table and bed, and chooses instead to devote his brief parole to a yet more exquisite pleasure: exacting revenge on the pigeons...

A journalist, I feel, should write exactly what he or she thinks, for otherwise the whole exercise is pointless. If everyone in Grand Prix racing did a perfect job there would be 26 winners every time out, so it is necessary to try to explain why there is only one. If a car is badly prepared or a tyre company screws up or a driver is off the pace, you have to say so. This can lead to a certain coolness when next you encounter the team or individual concerned, and that - particularly if the criticism was overharsh - is to be expected.

I remember Jackie Stewart telling me of the time he undertook to write a report of the Buenos Aires l000Kms for a magazine. He had been surprised he said at the difficulties involved, and chastened by the fact that he had to bare his soul, commit his opinions to print. That made me feel very gratified and smug.

A few days ago, at Paul Ricard, Eddie Cheever must have felt exactly the same way, although, to his credit, he did not show it. Not much, anyway. Until this year I was never much of a fan of Cheever's driving, and frequently said so. On November 26 Eddie was down from the Column, and I was one of 20-odd pigeons.

It began with a telephone call from Renault: would I like to drive their Formula 1 car? Heart thudding, I said yes, of course I would. It will only be in a straight line, they added, charitably leaving unsaid the fact the Armco barriers are hard and Formula 1 cars expensive. Fine, fine...

To Ricard, then, on a cold and dampish afternoon. At dinner that night (team manager) Jean Sage said that the forecast for Friday was gloomy, adding that we would probably not get a run if the day turned out wet.

Later on Cheever's team leader, Alain Prost, turned up. After a full day's testing with the F1 RE30B he had cleared off into the mountains with a Renault 5 Turbo, getting in a little practice for the Rallye du Var. It was still raining, he said.

Friday morning. I looked out to find the streets awash, mist over the sea, but as we drove up to the circuit the rain had stopped, and it held off until the evening.

"It's a pity," said Cheever, "that the surface is wet, because you won't really be able to feel the acceleration..."

As he spoke, (Renault competitions director) Gerard Larrousse was out in the car, hammering past in a cloud of spray, revs sometimes rising hysterically as the rear wheels hit a particularly bad puddle. We looked at each other and shivered. There was nothing new in seeing a Renault fishtail through the wet, but the circumstances lent a new dimension to it now.

It is always said of theatre critics that they are frustrated actors, writing about it because they can't do it. I last drove a racing car eight years ago, this a Lola T70 at Silverstone, and came away with all the usual thoughts of, 'If only...'

I'd driven it reasonably quickly, and relished the experience, finding the car marred only by the gearchange, which I found singularly imprecise.

"Hewlands are a knack," Cheever agreed. "You have to try and use your hand only, rather than move your whole arm. As a matter of fact, I don't care for the gearchange on the Renault and I think we need to improve the linkage. The throw is too long - much longer than on the Ligier, and both cars use Hewlands."

In the summer of 1977 Eddie tested for Ferrari, and I asked him about the gearbox on the T2. He rolled his eyes: "Just beautiful. Ferrari gearboxes have a gate, of course, so you always know right where you're going, with the lever. But it was incredible...like the gearbox seemed to suck the lever into the right place on its own. Remember," he went on, "when you change down in the Renault, give the engine a big rev, not just a blip. Then you'll find that the lever will go in smoothly."

More advice: "When you're turning around at each end, keep an eye on the boost gauge. You must keep the pressure up, otherwise the engine will die. Blipping the throttle won't keep it from stalling. You'll probably find the easiest thing is to leave it in second, dip the clutch and coast round, keeping your foot on the throttle. And in this weather there's probably not a lot of point in trying to boot it in first or second..."

My turn arrived. Renault had very sensibly brought along a Formule Renault Martini for everyone to try before getting out in the Formula 1 car. It was a nice little thing, which reached its 6000rpm maximum in fifth with case on the runway course which had been laid out for us. Round the hairpin, tail out, opposite lock, piece of cake this driving racing cars lark...

And so to the big moment. I could have done with a cigarette between stints, but there wasn't time. The cockpit of the RE30B I found very comfortable, but unfortunately the welt on my moccasins made it impossible to reach the accelerator without snagging the brake pedal. I therefore removed my shoes - which turned out to be the first of several mistakes.

"Contact!" said one of the mechanics. As instructed, I put my right foot to the floor, and suddenly the 500-odd horsepower behind was alive. This was it.

After the Martini everything about the Renault felt very big. In the little car you had two skinny tyres out ahead, but now there were two wide ones very much closer. Out of the hairpin in first, accelerate, into second, accelerate. Hey, this is all right! Pull the lever back...fifth.

The engine threatens to die of rev starvation. I move the lever around, trying desperately to find one of the lower ratios. It is just as I remember the Lola, only this time there is boost pressure to worry about as well.

Eventually I sorted it out, got it into third. The pressure built up once more, and I then experienced this truly extraordinary horsepower. Between eight and 10 thousand the rush forward was stunning, way beyond anything I had encountered previously, and seemed to be acceleration without end. In fourth, and going hard, I saw the marker cones ahead, eased off and found the brakes as impressive as the power.

After a couple of runs I was starting to regret the absence of
shoes, for my feet were cold to the point of deadness. Keeping everything going round the hairpins became more difficult than ever, but I emerged once more with the engine still living. Away we go, up through the gears, second, third -

- I spun. In a straight line I spun. The power was hard on as the rear wheels hit a puddle. Round came the tail very quickly, and the car looped off the runway, slithering across the grass and coming to rest with a dead engine. I felt no fear because there had been nothing to hit, but a variety of other emotions flooded into my mind. Thank God this was thelatest car, without skirts, because it certainly wouldn't have had any now. Had any damage been done? If so, there was just the ghost of a chance that my colleagues awaiting their turn (let alone the Renault personnel) might not understand. It was like making love for the first time - with all your friends watching.

For a few seconds I sat there, furious with myself, and then the mechanics arrived, followed by an anxious Sage. Mercifully, all was well, the guys grinning as they removed grass and earth from the sidepods. No harm done, they said.

Back on the runway, the engine was fired up once more. Seven thousand revs, let the clutch in gently, away. After several more runs I got the sign indicating that number 15's time was up.

Pull off, stop by the transporter, flick the ignition switch. My colleague Eoin Young leant into the cockpit: "Thanks for that. You've just written my column for me..."

I retrieved my shoes, stamped up and down to get some feeling back into my feet and accepted a lighted fag from someone who knows me well. "Hold your hand out in front of you," said Cheever, doing a remarkable job of keeping a straight face. "Is it shaking?"

It was not until later that evening that driving the car really began to come into perspective, and somehow I can remember it more vividly now than right afterwards. No words of mine can adequately describe the rush of power from that turbocharged V6. It was not more than I expected, but it was as much, which is not true of most things in life.

More unsettling will be the thoughts in my head next season, when I see the see these things being driven once more. On one run I got 8200rpm in top, and it felt very quick indeed, particularly through the steering as the front wheels sought their own path over the undulations. Then Eddie talked about the left-right after the pits, which he takes, he says, at 10,900 in top...

I recall the mysteries of that gearbox, of never being quite certain which ratio I was going into next, and I think of final qualifying at Monte Carlo, of the downchange before the swimming pool where you need to be fairly sure the lever is in the right place.

I remember, too, the way Rene Arnoux drove the early laps this year, contemplate all that power on the burst from Casino Square down to Mirabeau. And that, mark you, does not even take into account the fact that there are other cars about you, wanting to race with you...

"Silly idiot," I thought, when Rene spun. "And he's stalled the thing, as well!" Yes, he is a professional racing driver and I am a journalist. Perhaps he would be ham-fisted with a typewriter. In future, though, I believe I shall be a little more circumspect when I take the lid off mine.

Almost 20 years on, I remember that day with a mixture of pleasure and embarrassment. Soon after my run, though, I started to feel better when someone else spun it in exactly the way that I had. And at the end of the day I felt much better when the yellow car looped off, and stalled, once more. Its driver? DSJ...



Dear Steven,

Fear is not something racing drivers habitually discuss, but, yes, the great majority of them will admit to being scared occasionally, and not surprisingly so. Racing may be infinitely safer than it was, with fatalities and serious injuries a rarity these days, but still it can be intensely frightening, I'm sure, particularly when you're driving in heavy rain at 170mph or so, and visibility is virtually zero.

One accident I witnessed, many years ago, made a great impression on me. On the Saturday morning, at Hockenheim in 1982, I arrived in the press car park a little late, and practice was already underway. It was raining hard, and as I buttoned up against the elements I chanced to look across to the end of the straight leading into the stadium.

There was a car - a Ferrari - in the air, 20 feet or so from the
ground, its nose pointing skyward. It came down tail first, then began somersaulting, coming to rest finally at the trackside.

The rescue scene was from Hades. Didier Pironi had suffered the appalling lower leg injuries so common in an era when drivers sat virtually between the front wheels, and his bloodied face was a mask of agony as the doctors worked on him. Finally he was released, and taken to hospital, where, against all likely odds, his right foot was saved from amputation.

Simple lack of visibility had caused the accident. Alain Prost, on the left side of the track, was not at full speed, for he was coming in at the end of the lap, and Derek Daly went to pass him on the right. Pironi, moving considerably faster than either, assumed that Daly was moving over for him, and went left of the Williams - into the wall of spray which concealed Prost's car. The Ferrari hit the back of the Renault, and flew clear over the top of it.

Alain's hardline aversion to dead reckoning conditions dated back to that day. "I like to drive in the rain," he said, "because it's fun to slide a car around. But when you're running in a bunch of cars, and you literally can't see anything, that's different. If you can't see, it doesn't matter if you're the best driver in the world, or the worst."

In Adelaide, at the end of 1989, conditions were terrible to the point that Prost said he would start the race, but would pull in after a single lap. Many of his colleagues agreed, and said they would do the same, but in the event only Alain went through with it.

"I feel ashamed when I look back on that day," said Gerhard Berger. "A lot of us agreed with Alain, but when it came to it he was the only one brave enough to go through with it. What he did took a lot more guts than staying out there."

"Does it scare me, driving into nothing at 300kph?" Prost said once. "Of course it does - I'm not an idiot..."



Dear Nathan,

I may not tramp out into the wet Welsh forests, but I'm not agin' rallying - I wouldn't dream of missing the Rally of Great Britain highlights on TV each evening, for example.

The only thing wrong with it, as far as I'm concerned, is that 'saloon cars' - particularly those with four doors - don't do much for me, and that's what they use, and...the fact that it's not racing. It's true I love to watch cars sliding, but I have to say I rather prefer the spectacle of sprint cars on dirt ovals in the USA. Sorry...



Dear Derick,

The multi-car accident at Paddock Bend on the first lap of the 1976 British Grand Prix was triggered by the Ferraris of Niki Lauda and Clay Regazzoni banging wheels. After that, cars took avoiding action every which way, and one of those damaged was Hunt's McLaren.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that the crowd played a huge part in influencing the stewards' decision to allow James take the restart. At that time, he was very much England's great sporting hero, and when it looked as though his car couldn't be repaired in time, the spectators got very angry and vocal in a manner no one could ever remember before. Let's put it this way: the restart could have been taken considerably earlier than it was...

Were the stewards right to let Hunt and the others take the restart? In my opinion, yes - so long as their cars were readied by the appointed time, but no, if such were not the case. Hard as it would have been on James, who was blameless in the shunt, according to the rules he should not have been allowed to restart - but that, of course, would probably have led to a riot.

The race turned into a straight fight between Lauda and Hunt, the two World Championship contenders, and ultimately James overtook Niki at Druids, and went on to win. Months later, though, after an appeal by Ferrari, he was disqualified, and that I thought unjust: once he had been let back into the race, that should have been the end of the matter.

Ironically, however, he was reinstated as winner of the Spanish Grand Prix, from which he had been disqualified, due to a wing height infringement. That I never did understand - a car is legal, or it is not.

Some things in motor racing never seem to change...



Dear Gerrard,

It's a strange thing, but people rather assume that journalists hibernate in the winter. There are no races, they say, so what do you do with yourself?

Well, pretty much the same as usual, really. True, I'm not travelling all the time (although there are always trips to Jerez or Barcelona or wherever for new car launches, and so on), and that's a blessing, quite honestly. Using an airport may be quite a glamorous thing when you're going on holiday, but doing it every week is a stone drag. Anyone will tell you that air travel - particularly if it involves benighted Heathrow - becomes a little more insupportable with every passing year. I know that when I stop doing this, it will not be because I've had enough of motor racing, but because I can't face another crawl along the M25 to Heathrow...

The lack of travel apart, everything mooches along much as usual through the winter. I still have my various columns and features and interviews to write, these Autosport.com questions to answer, and, at this time of the year, long surveys of the season past to get done.

Winter is also a good time for writing books - or, at least, a far better one than summer, when I'm on the road half the time. This year, I'm one of half a dozen writers contributing to a massive 'Grand Prix Anthology', which will be published in the autumn of 2002.

Thanks to the current testing ban, all the teams are desperate to get running again as soon as Christmas and New Year are out of the way, which means that this year the new car launches begin rather earlier, many of them in December.

These things apart, I tend to take my holidays in the winter, because the only break in the F1 season is in August - the very last time anyone sane would choose to go away. We have a house in France which I don't see enough of in the summer, and try to get to more often during the 'off' season, and in January or February we tend to go to New York for 10 days or so - I'd rather be there than anywhere, and my wife adores the place, too. Sometimes I combine this with a trip to the Daytona 500.

One way and another, therefore, the F1 'off season' goes by pretty quickly...



Dear Matt,

No, that's not quite what I said - or, if it came across that way, I didn't mean it. As far as I'm concerned, the top drivers in any era - be they Nuvolari, Fangio, Moss, Clark, Stewart, Prost, Senna, Schumacher, whomever - would be top drivers in any other era, too. In other words, while it's almost impossible directly to compare, say, Nuvolari with Schumacher, their level of ability is such that I don't doubt Michael, had he been born 70 years earlier, would have excelled in an Auto Union, and Tazio, were he now 32 years old, would be winning world championships in a Ferrari.

In terms of talent all the way down the field, though, I don't think the current crop is a match for some of those in times gone by - inevitably, perhaps, because a number of them are there purely because of nationality/sponsorship, rather than pure talent. I know there's nothing new about renta-drivers, but nothing will persuade me that a Formula 1 grid is necessarily made up of the best 22 drivers in the world.

That said, the rookies this year have been exceptional. It seems ridiculous to use that word about Juan Montoya, given that, like Jacques Villeneuve, he won the CART Championship and the Indianapolis 500 before racing an F1 car for the first time, but this was his first season in F1, and he proved to be the most exciting newcomer since Michael Schumacher. And, while raving about Montoya, we should not forget Kimi Raikkonen or Fernando Alonso, exceptional prospects, both.

Are the F1 drivers of today flattered by the gizmos? Yes, undoubtedly, in the sense that these devices make it far more difficult for a driver to make a mistake: launch control - so long as it works properly - makes getting off the grid straightforward, traction control makes it very much more difficult to spin, and automatic gearboxes mean that you can neither miss a gear, nor exceed a rev limit. So, yes, undeniably, all these 'driver aids' make a racing car considerably easier to drive than once was the case.

On the other hand, all the drivers have them - yet still the cream rises to the top, and always will. I just find it a shame that throttle control, for instance, now has software doing so much of the work previously done by the driver's right foot. There again, I hate synthesised music, too...