The lax F1 engine policy that BMW exploited for Piquet’s second title

“Lift and coast.” A familiar phrase as tyres and power unit supplies were eked out in the final races. Each driver is expected to get through a season on three engines, which is a bit like asking the FIA president if he wouldn’t mind limiting his TV cameo appearances to 50. It’s a tough call. Things were more free and easy in the championship shoot-out 40 years ago.

For the final race of 1983, BMW came to South Africa with no fewer than 13 engines. For one team. Or to be perfectly honest, for one driver. Nelson Piquet was BMW’s man as the Brabham number one went head-to-head with Renault’s Alain Prost (Ferrari’s René Arnoux was an outsider in this championship mathematical mix).

BMW had need of that engine roster when Piquet and team-mate Riccardo Patrese blew two of the four-cylinder turbos on the second day of a test immediately preceding the GP weekend. Another unit let go in first practice. You begin to understand why FIA president Max Mosley set out to slash this profligacy when BMW allegedly manufactured 600 engines in one season. We’ve since gone from one extreme to the other. But that’s the way it was at Kyalami in 1983.

Renault-Elf ignored Prost’s pleas to do something about its fragile turbo. Why worry? Prost had been leading the championship since May and had won four races to Piquet’s three. Renault was confident enough to fly in a mob of French media on a chartered plane. Many of the reporters, new to motorsport, expected as a matter of course to witness the crowning of the first French F1 world champion.

Brabham and BMW had other ideas. Piquet qualified on the front row, with Prost back on row three. Patrick Tambay had confirmed his pace throughout testing and practice by putting his Ferrari on pole. Which gave the Maranello management something of a dilemma.

Ferrari had just told Patrick he would not be required in 1984. And now Arnoux, Ferrari’s main man, had struggled onto the second row. When asked to help Arnoux during the race, the normally mild-mannered Tambay told team manager Marco Piccinini where he could stick his request. Patrick then happily repeated what he had said to anyone who asked.

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Prost and Renault were confident of sealing the title but turbo failure would wreck its hopes and the relationship between driver and team

All of which compounded Arnoux’s woes. The little Frenchman was nursing a bruised ankle, caused by a marshal having accidently pushed the Ferrari over Rene’s foot after the 126C3 had ground to a halt with an electrical problem.

The irony was that the marshal had been eagerly responding to Arnoux’s advice that the Ferrari should not remain parked in a dangerous place.

Brabham, meanwhile, was hatching a plan. This was when race-day strategy amounted to deciding where and when the drivers and mechanics ought to have lunch. Brabham had set a daring new trend by introducing refuelling. The usual plan was to run long but, on this occasion – on the suggestion of team boss Bernie Ecclestone – they did the opposite.

Elf was furious because, in its view, BMW had brought a special rocket fuel, allegedly to help deal with running at Kyalami’s altitude. But there were no protests, no checks by the FIA

Piquet took off like a scalded cat, pulling a couple of seconds on the rest in each of the opening laps. This had the additional advantage of running in clear air while the opposition did their turbos and tyres no good in the sultry conditions. Piquet, helped by Patrese robustly defending second, made a stop (9.2s – a record at the time) and rejoined without losing the lead. His second title was all but assured when Prost, as he had predicted, suffered a turbo failure.

Seasoned members of the French media were not surprised. Their visiting brethren, having come all this way for nothing, were outraged.

A lasting memory is of Alain sitting in the garage with an equally pale and wan Gerard Larrousse as the driver and team boss tried to explain the unexplainable in easily understood phrases. It was difficult to decide which was the more unpleasant; the surrounding fug of Gauloises smoke or the choking inquisition. Prost’s relationship with Renault, already in choppy waters, ran aground right there. (His future would be decided not long after when a chance meeting with Ron Dennis in the helicopter queue would lead to six seasons with McLaren.)

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BMW turned up to the South African GP with 13 engines for Brabham

Elf was furious because, in its view, BMW had brought a special rocket fuel, allegedly to help deal with running at Kyalami’s altitude. But there were no protests, no checks by the FIA. ‘Relaxed’ doesn’t make a start.

PLUS: When BMW added F1 'rocket fuel' to ignite Brabham's 1983 title push

On the eve of the race, for example, Paul Rosche, the brilliant brain behind BMW’s 4-cylinder grenade, had ambled, beer in hand, into the Williams garage and taken a good look at its latest engine, Williams having switched from Ford-Cosworth V8 to Honda turbo. Strange as it may seem today, a change of engine supplier during the season was not seen as unusual. But it could lead to problems elsewhere. I speak from experience.

Filing a race report in the days before computers involved dictating your newspaper story down the phone – usually in a busy press room full of clacking typewriters. This having been a Saturday race, I bawled my report across to The Observer in London. Through a combination of my Northern Ireland accent, the background din and an uninterested sub editor, The Observer on Sunday 16 October 1983 informed the world that Keke Rosberg had been racing a ‘Humber-engined Williams for the first time’. This was a surprise to many – not least the author – since the British manufacturer of luxury cars had shown no interest in motor racing since competing in the Tourist Trophy in 1914.

Just as well we have the precise filing of online stories today. It does away with the need for reports bellowed across continents and creating the possible mystery of a race engineer apparently asking his driver for a “lift to the coast”.