by Tom Rubython
The sequence of events that changed his mind started on Thursday 7th September 1978, when his friend, Ronnie Peterson, stepped off the plane at Milan’s Linate airport just after lunch. Peterson had flown in from Nice after spending the previous week at his apartment in Monte Carlo, which had, for tax reasons, served as his and his wife Barbro’s home for the last five years – since he stated earning big money. He was in Italy for the Grand Prix at Monza, due to take place that Sunday.
James Hunt and his girlfriend Jane Birbeck weren’t far behind them, coming in from Marbella.
Meanwhile, the McLaren transporters bringing Hunt’s car had left the Colnbrook factory on Monday evening and would arrive at Monza on Wednesday evening. The Lotus transporters carrying Peterson’s car had also left the team’s headquarters at Ketteringham Hall, near Norwich, on Monday evening and would arrive at the circuit late on Thursday morning, after taking a more leisurely drive.
It was a poignant weekend for both men. Hunt had just learned that Peterson would be replacing him as number one driver at McLaren for the 1979 season, and they were due to discuss it at Monza. There was no acrimony, as Hunt had already announced he was leaving McLaren for Wolf.
The weather was warm and sunny and both drivers were relaxed when they arrived at the Villa D’Este, the fabulous hotel on the banks of Lake Como where they were staying.
Villa d’Este was once a favourite retreat of the European aristocracy and was the perfect antidote to the hectic atmosphere of Monza. It was surrounded by ten acres of private parkland and garden and had perfect views all around of Lake Como from its sloping lawns.
Unusually, Barbro was not with Peterson that weekend. She hadn’t been well and had decided to stay home with their young daughter, Nina. In contrast, Jane Birbeck had given up her job and had been travelling with her boyfriend all summer.
Barbro’s more frequent absences from the tracks had sparked rumours of difficulties in their marriage, and the Formula One rumour mill said the couple was not getting on so well. It was true that Peterson was going to his other home in England after the race and not back to his wife. The marriage problems may or may not have been true, but there were other good reasons for Barbro not to be at the track.
Whereas James Hunt’s future may have been settled, Peterson’s situation made it a tense and difficult race. Although he was regarded by many as the fastest driver in the world, he had never won the world championship. This year he had been capable of winning it, but a variety of political factors meant that only in special circumstances would he have been able to do so. It was because of such factors that he had announced he was off to McLaren. The announcement had increased the tension within the team.
In the past two races, in Austria and the Netherlands, Peterson had scored 15 points to the nine of his team leader Mario Andretti. Suddenly, Peterson had catapulted himself into contention for the world championship after Andretti had dominated earlier in the season. Andretti went to Italy on 63 points; Peterson had 51. Peterson could still win the championship mathematically, but that was the last thing team owner Colin Chapman wanted.
Despite the fact that Peterson had been the dutiful teammate and perfect number two, deep inside the situation rankled. Peterson believed that, in a fair fight, he could beat Andretti to the title. Peterson was 12 points adrift from Andretti, with a possible 27 to play for. Nowadays, the two drivers simply would have raced it out to the championship. But back then, it was different: drivers were gentlemen and team orders were obeyed. Andretti had bluntly informed the press that team orders were in place, ignoring Colin Chapman’s advice not to overdo it.
Chapman had been doing all he could to help Andretti, even sandbagging Peterson’s car in qualifying by putting in too much fuel.
Peterson could win if Andretti dropped out of the race, but if Andretti was behind him and running, he would be ordered to move over. There were no other contenders. The next nearest driver was Niki Lauda, but he was 30 points behind and well out of it with only three races to go.
The situation was made even more complicated by the fact that Andretti and Peterson were very good friends and had holidayed together with their wives many times. It made the inevitable tension between them impossible to bear.
It was also a lot worse than anyone realised at the time. As Andretti admitted years later, the two friends weren’t talking at all in Italy. Although Peterson would not disobey team orders, their natural racing hunger had turned them into unspoken enemies since the previous race, when the Monza showdown had loomed. A bizarre, unnatural ambience reigned.
Andretti says now: “Peterson was one of my best teammates. When you can live in that same environment, operate, drive and still respect each other, that’s a great thing. I admit things weren’t the same as usual at Monza because of the tension. We were both a little uptight and hardly said a word. And that bothered me.”
And that was the real reason Barbro stayed away. She knew Dee-Ann, Andretti’s wife, would be there. For the wives, the situation would be very awkward. Barbro liked the Andrettis and didn’t want their relationship to be destroyed over one race. But Peterson and Andretti bore no real grudges. In their air-conditioned John Player motorhome that weekend, he and Andretti were in boisterous moods.
More than anything, Peterson was upset with Colin Chapman. Although intent on honouring the agreement he had made pre-season with Chapman, to support Andretti’s title campaign, he was angered by Chapman’s efforts to ensure he played second fiddle, especially by manipulating his fuel load in qualifying.
He had caught Chapman out at the French Grand Prix. During practice at Paul Ricard, Peterson had been very quick and clearly embarrassed a much slower Andretti. Chapman ordered the Swede into the pits and told the mechanics to fill his tank half full, just as the fastest times of the day were being set. Normally, Peterson wouldn’t have noticed some extra fuel, but he was so much quicker that day that it was clear Chapman had taken it upon himself to weigh him down with more fuel. Peterson’s manager at the time, Staffan Svenby, remembers the tactic well: “Ronnie was not too happy about this at all.” With Peterson weighed down, a slow Andretti was still beaten to pole by John Watson in his Brabham-Alfa Romeo; Peterson trailed in fifth. It was astonishing that he should be beaten by the clearly inferior Brabham, which had no ground effect.”
Peterson, though happy to play second fiddle, was distraught about being slowed down artificially. He could do little about it, though: he had signed for the team because it had the fastest car. The ground-effect era was starting and the Lotus 79 was one of the most dominant cars ever seen in Formula One. So upset was Peterson, he resolved there and then to leave Lotus, and he joined McLaren after just a year.
By Monza, Peterson’s patience was wearing thin and he was itching to flaunt his speed. Clive Hicks, Lotus’ tyres and fuel manager during the 1978 season, recalls that Chapman was continually reassuring Andretti during Monza weekend that Peterson would not threaten his championship: “I overheard Colin saying to Mario: ‘Don’t worry, he’s only a racer.’”
In Hicks’ view, Peterson was definitely the faster driver. It became apparent once Peterson drove the new Lotus 79 for the Spanish Grand Prix at Jarama, in June. Andretti had received the first new car; a huge improvement on the old Lotus 78, which had only had partial ground-effect. The 79 was fast straight out of the box.
By accident or design, only one car had been available early in the season. Andretti was being protected by Chapman because of their longstanding relationship and the work they had put in to make the ground-effect cars such a success. Hicks says: “Once Ronnie got his car, he was so much quicker than Mario. At Brands Hatch, I was told by Chapman to put ‘A’ compound tyres on Ronnie’s car. They were rock hard and should have slowed him down, but he was still quicker.”
When Peterson announced at the Dutch Grand Prix, two weeks before Monza, that he was off to McLaren, Chapman was even more determined to make sure Andretti won the world championship. Th
e last thing Chapman wanted was the champion’s number one gracing the McLaren the following year.
Chapman was enormously proud when his cars wore the number one sticker, as they had done when Lotus won the 1963, 1965, 1968, 1970 and 1972 drivers’ titles.
Rex Hart, Peterson’s chief mechanic that season, remembers: “Ronnie was looking forward to the race. He had won in Austria a month earlier and was in good form. We’d also had a one-two, Andretti and Peterson, two weeks before at Zandvoort. The cars were going well and we had high hopes.”
But there were effectively two camps in team Lotus that weekend – Peterson’s and Andretti’s – with Chapman the biased referee. But no one could have imagined the result. Bob Dance, the Lotus chief mechanic said: “Chapman was anxious that Mario should win the race and was very concerned that, if he didn’t win, his chances of the championship would take a severe knock. If Ronnie won, it would be a difficult scenario to contemplate.”
And then there were the race cars. Andretti’s contract stated that he had exclusive use of the two cars. For 1978, it meant that Lotus had to take four cars to each race. For some reason, Chapman had only built four new 79s, reasoning he could use the old 78s in a crisis. That decision not to build a fifth chassis was to lead to Peterson’s death by a series of tragic coincidences.
It had started a month earlier, when Andretti had damaged one of the four 79s after a crash on the opening lap of the Austrian Grand Prix. For some reason, the car had not been repaired, so Peterson went to Monza with the old car as spare. If something went wrong, he knew he could not use Andretti’s 79.
The 78 was outdated by then, but if Peterson had an accident and damaged his car he would probably have no choice but to race it, as the team was desperately short of 79 spares. The 79 had removable side-pods, which gave the team huge control over levels of down force and download distribution. But it was very difficult to repair.
Had Chapman organised the spare car situation that way, or were his excuses genuine? An unhappy Peterson suspected they weren’t.
On Friday morning, Peterson woke at the magnificent 16th-century Villa d’Este and everything felt right with the world. He got into his silver Rolls- Royce Corniche, which had been provided for the weekend by the Milan Rolls-Royce dealer. He began the 30-minute drive south to Monza Park with his manager Staffan Svenby in the passenger seat.
Andretti and Chapman, who were also staying at the hotel, went separately to the circuit in Andretti’s identical Corniche, also provided for him.
James Hunt, also staying in the Villa d’Este, didn’t have quite the same luxury mode of transport. The McLaren team were taken to the circuit in McLaren’s American built GMC minibuses, which had been driven over from England.
Peterson jumped straight into his Lotus 79 for the practice session, but after a few laps slowly rolled down the pit lane and back into the garage. The Cosworth engine had blown up. The Swede climbed into the old 78 and went back out, only to return shortly afterwards. “No use driving this old machine,” he said. “It’s too slow and it’s a waste of time to set it up, as I’m driving my race car tomorrow.”
With that, Peterson joined Andretti in the black John Player motorhome where the American was giving an interview. All Andretti recalls now is Peterson fretting about losing his sunglasses. He says: “Nobody had seen them, so he forgot about them, sat down and off-handily began to talk about practice. For him, it had gone from good to bad to worse: second-fastest in the first session before an engine blew up; back in the old 78 for the second; failing back brakes and clutch slip on Saturday morning and most of the afternoon.”
Peterson recounted a funny story about the 78: “As well as everything else, there was this lizard in the car. I kept trying to reach it to put it out of the car, but it kept getting away from me. It was still there at the end of practice.”
When Hunt and Peterson finally got chatting that day, the Englishman filled him in on what he might expect at McLaren, but Peterson was clearly looking forward to the prospect of his number one status at McLaren in 1979. Hunt couldn’t bear to tell him the truth: that the politics at McLaren would be little better than those at Lotus.
Andretti and Peterson left the circuit at the same time that Friday evening and, as racers will be racers, staged an unofficial Rolls-Royce race back to the Villa d’Este. As they left Monza Park, the two drivers looked at each other through their windscreens and, signalling to each other, raced back to Villa d’Este neck and neck. Staffan Svenby was in the front seat of Peterson’s car, with Colin Chapman in the back. Svenby remembers Chapman being ‘dead scared’ and screaming at Peterson to slow down. According to Chapman, the Swede won the Corniche race; but as Svenby remembers it, Andretti won.
When Svenby went back to his room, he could see the cars in the courtyard below parked side by side: “I could smell burning rubber, so looked out of the window and there were these two Rolls-Royces, one white, one silver, and the tyres and the brakes were still smoking.”
Later that evening, Svenby and Peterson joined the Andrettis and Chapman for an awkward dinner in the hotel restaurant, discussing the day’s events. Andretti and Peterson retired early to their rooms.
Peterson was up with the lark, and drove Svenby to the circuit. The dinner had somewhat lightened the team mood.
But his run of bad luck at the circuit was not over. In qualifying, he suffered with brake problems before a gearbox oil seal failed and lubricant leaked out onto the clutch. His mechanic worked hard and Peterson went back out, eventually lapping the 3.6-mile circuit in 1 minute 38.256 seconds. Peterson’s time put him fifth, alongside Williams’ driver Alan Jones. Andretti took pole alongside Gilles Villeneuve, with Jean-Pierre Jabouille’s Renault in third place, Lauda in fourth and Peterson in fifth. Hunt could only manage tenth. The Swede, however, refused to be downbeat: “Everything went wrong,” he admitted, “but I never give up. The race is not over until the man jumps up and down with the chequered flag, and I will drive flat out till I see him.”
Early on Sunday morning, Peterson, once again up early, drove to Monza with Svenby. He had wanted to reach the circuit by 8:30am to beat the traffic.
During morning warm up, the rear brakes on his Lotus 79 suddenly failed at the second chicane and he crashed. He said soon afterwards: “When I came to the second chicane, the brakes didn’t work and I went straight on. I don’t know how many layers of catch fencing I went through until the car stopped. The catch is badly smashed and I guess I’ll have to drive the old one in the race.” As Peterson suspected, the car could not be repaired in time for the race. There was a faint hope that Andretti might release his spare car, which was standing unused in the pit.
During the session, Andretti, Chapman and Peterson discussed whether Andretti’s spare 79 would be available. But it soon became clear that the idea was a non-starter, and Peterson resigned himself to using the 78. It was his death warrant, as the 78 was a much flimsier car with little protection at the front.
“Of course we wanted the car at the warm up,” Svenby went on, “and it was Colin who made the decision, but the number one had the first call. There is no question in my mind that Colin wanted Mario to win the championship. He was American, and Ronnie was going to leave the team.” It was a vital moment. Days later, the ramifications were lost on no one.
Other members of the Lotus team were equally aware of Chapman’s intentions. Rex Hart said: “He wanted to sell Lotus cars in America, and Andretti was an American.”
Peterson shut himself in the team’s motor home to examine his legs, which had been bruised by the impact. He was unhappy about using the 78, but went along with the decision. While the championship was still open, he wanted to have the best possible chance of winning. A short time later, he returned to the pit garage and got into the 78 to get the pedals adjusted.
At 3 o’clock, 24 Grand Prix cars trickled out onto the Monza circuit for the scheduled start 30 minutes later. The formation lap was led away by Andretti and G
illes Villeneuve’s Ferrari. As they arrived back at the start line, the starter raised the Italian flag.
He flicked on the red light as the first few rows of cars settled on the grid, and flicked to the green light before all the cars had finished settling. It created a wild staggered rush, compounded because some cars were already on the move before the green. But before the back of the grid had negotiated the Parabolica, let alone come to a standstill, the flag fell and the race was on. Villeneuve and Lauda got away quickly but Andretti and Peterson hesitated, believing a false start would immediately be called. Brambilla’s Surtees was travelling at around 80 miles per hour when the green light flicked on, and it almost immediately brought him up to Hunt on the fifth row. The back markers were already doing around 50 miles per hour and several of them cars passed the midfield cars. All the moving cars were still in second or third gear when the race began.
The wide starting grid at Monza funnelled abruptly into the short straight leading to the first chicane, and compressed the field. Peterson was caught and swallowed by at least half the field. Jody Scheckter’s Wolf- Ford was moving much faster and moved from left to right across the track to avoid hitting the Lotus and Hunt’s McLaren, which was on Peterson’s right. Peterson moved slightly to the right and Ricardo Patrese’s Arrows was on the right side of the track, intent on going past. Patrese cut in behind Scheckter and left Hunt’s McLaren with nowhere to go.
What happened next is disputed to this day. Hunt claimed Patrese hit him – forcing him into Peterson – but Patrese rejected that version: “I was not involved because I was in front of the accident. Ronnie had a very slow start in the t-car and everybody came from behind very quickly. There was a touch between Peterson and Hunt, and the accident happened.”
