1973 French Grand Prix review for Motor Sport Magazine

By Anefo / Mieremet, R.. / neg. stroken, 1945-1989, 2.24.01.
05, item number 926-5790 - http://proxy.handle.net/10648/
ac32df0c-d0b4-102d-bcf8-003048976d84, CC BY-SA 3.0 nl,
 https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=23303177

My latest classic grand prix retro review for Motor Sport Magazine's website is here. This time it's from the history-rich French Grand Prix.

I've looked back at the 1973 race, then as now at the Paul Ricard circuit (albeit there have been some adventures between times).

Then, Paul Ricard was an archetypal 'new' venue, with all the growing pains that entails. And that wasn't the only source of novelty in this '73 meeting. One new boy shook up Formula 1; another at last took his first F1 victory.

You can have a read of my retro re-tread here: https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/history/f1/1973-french-f1-grand-prix-peterson-breaks-his-duck

Plus you can check out my previous classic grand prix articles for Motor Sport here and here.

1 - Film Review: Not just another F1 film

Yet another F1 film release? Right in the wheel tracks of the blockbuster successes of Senna and Rush, a documentary and a theatrical film respectively? Just like them based on the sport's past? What on earth can it offer over and above these? Well, in the case of 1, rather a lot as it turns out.

Even above and beyond the challenges outlined in the opening paragraph, the film-makers of 1 - a new film about the history of F1 - hardly could have asked for a more daunting set of objectives. Max Mosley told the film's director Paul Crowder at the project's outset that if he could 'capture why he's devoted 40 years of his life to F1 then he'll have succeeded'. In essence, the makers felt that their mission was to capture the essence of this the pinnacle of motor sport. Its glamour, its pace, its danger, and everything else besides. No mean feat.

Despite what it says on the tin though 1 isn't really a history of F1. Not exactly anyway. But nevertheless it can be said to have gone a long way to meeting its haughty mission statement.

Martin Brundle starts
 and ends the story
Credit: greenmashup / CC

The film starts not in the beginning, but on the starting grid of the 1996 Australian Grand Prix. Perhaps not the most obvious choice, but its reasoning soon becomes clear. The animated buzz of the assembled crowd, the rich colours resultant of the full-beam Melbourne sunshine, as well as the mass of team members and assorted hangers on crawling over the assembled cars - all in eager anticipation of the race, and season, start - are familiar. As is the gradual, aching build up of tension, eventually to be released as the cars are unleashed like feral beasts when the red light goes out.

But then...not long after we had a spectacular accident: Martin Brundle got his braking wrong and cartwheeled over several cars, his machine disintegrating as it did so. The car, by now a heap of wreckage, came to rest upside down in a gravel bed, and the seconds of time wherein there is no movement from the cockpit seem to stretch on like hours. All of the harrowing accidents, some fatal, that took place within the previous 24 months suddenly seem scarily redolent. Yet, before you know it Brundle emerges, in his own words 'without a bruise on his body' and then can be seen - accompanied by the roar of the crowd - hot-footing it down the pit lane to find Sid Watkins in order to get the OK to take the restart.

What is right and what is wrong on team orders?

It was possibly the most glum podium in F1 history. Red Bull had claimed a one-two finish on a day it was expected to struggle, after an exciting wheel-to-wheel battle for supremacy. Winner Sebastian Vettel in so doing put clear points over those he's expected to be in a title fight with this year. While Lewis Hamilton finished in third, his new team's car showing that it has potency on race day and is much more competitive than many had thought/feared in advance. Yet, you'd never know it. Of the three drivers' faces two were sheepish and the other angry.

Sebastian Vettel won today, but that
was only the beginning of the story
Credit: Alex Comerford / CC

It was team orders what did it. Both Red Bull and Mercedes, whose cars had ran in close formation at the front for most of the Malaysian Grand Prix's duration, chose to enact a 'hold station' order from the pitwall after their final stops. This should have meant that Mark Webber finished ahead of Vettel to win and that Hamilton finished ahead of Nico Rosberg in third and fourth. Rosberg chose (however reluctantly) to obey the order; Seb didn't and won the race.

So, Vettel did wrong? It seems so. He confirmed after the race that he heard the instruction as well as apologised for making a 'mistake' in taking the lead to win. But it's hard to believe that Seb didn't know what he was doing. It appears most likely that his competitive instincts took over and he couldn't resist seizing the extra seven points on offer, regardless of everything else.

Return to Ricard?: F1 re-establishes its French connection

F1 is poised to re-establish its French connection it seems. Following on quickly from the long overdue return of French drivers to the sport this year (and no fewer than three of them), the equally long overdue return of a French race sounds imminent.

France is the country of motor sport's very roots. The first ever organised motor race took place there in July 1894. Such races eventually became Grands Prix and Grandes Epreuves (the use of the French lexicon isn't coincidence), which in turn eventually became Formula One. And a French Grand Prix appeared on the F1 calendar every year aside from 1955, when it was cancelled in the wake of the Le Mans disaster, seeming to be part of the furniture. But after 2008, after years of threatening by Bernie, the unthinkable happened and the French round was dropped for the 2009 season. F1's itinerary has stepped away from its heritage and core support notably in recent times - and surely the dropping of the French round is the most egregious.

Felipe Massa - winner of the last ever
French Grand Prix, in 2008
Credit: Thijs Bekkema / CC

But the issue of the French round's return has moved on in recent days ever so slightly. France's Prime Minister Francois Fillon, himself a motor racing man - he's on the committee of the Le Mans 24 hour race and has competed in the Le Mans legends sports car race - visited the Paul Ricard circuit last week. And while the actual confirmation of the returning French Grand Prix that many anticipated was not forthcoming, it did sound like it isn't far off. Fillon's utterances indicated that money is in place and Bernie is on board, with only a small and surmountable gap in finances to be bridged. It also seems that alternation of the race with another venue (most probably Spa) is how the race will be scheduled, and that the race's venue will be Paul Ricard.

Looking back: Montjuïc - a street track like out of your dreams

Reality bites in F1. Organisers of both of F1's Spanish races, the Spanish Grand Prix in Montmelo near Barcelona and the European Grand Prix on the Valencia street circuit, have made it known in recent weeks that they'll need less costly deals if the events are to continue. This is not surprising given the state of the world economy, which has hit Spain harder than many. A deal will be done presumably to ensure Spain continues on the F1 calendar - you'd think it would have to given Alonso-mania - though it's hard to see how two Spanish events can prevail, especially in an age where Bernie's keen to reduce the European presence on the calendar and with many countries queuing to get on it.

Spain's history of hosting F1 races is a long one, the first ever Spanish Grand Prix in the formula was in 1951. But the latest threats to the Spanish races continues the rather hit-and-miss and nomadic existence of Spanish F1 venues over the decades.

Six different circuits in Spain have hosted F1 Grands Prix (including Valencia, which has always had the 'European GP' moniker). The first venue used was the attractive Pedralbes track, run through wide open avenues in Barcelona's suburbs. It was used twice in total (the other race there was in 1954), before the Le Mans disaster the next year, and its fallout vis-a-vis circuit safety, did for it. The Spanish Grand Prix then disappeared from the calendar all the way through to 1968, when it resurfaced at the rather torturous, twisty and unpopular Jarama track near Madrid. That venue held the race on and off until 1981, with its final appearance that year giving witness to the classic and lauded win under pressure by Gilles Villeneuve.

The Spanish race then disappeared again for a while, until 1986 when the Jerez circuit in the south of the country became its host. It was an impressive facility, arguably the first of the 'modern' F1 venues that populate the calendar so heavily these days. Similar to Jarama it was known for being tight and twisty, but its main problem was that it never began to pull in a crowd, due in large part to being situated rather remotely, far away from Spain's major population centres. It lost the race eventually in 1991, though made a couple of further appearances in the 1990s as a last minute replacement for drop-outs elsewhere, and it continues to be used as an F1 test venue. Jerez was replaced by the Montmelo track near Barcelona, and it seemed that finally the Spanish round had found a permanent home. This was further cemented later by Spain finally uneartheding a top-level driver of their own in Fernando Alonso. And this was a lot of the reason why Barcelona was joined on the calendar by the Valencia street circuit in 2008. The Valencia track hasn't won any popularity contests though, not helped by the fact that it has been dogged by undiverting races in its short existence.

But there was one Spanish Grand Prix venue in history that was a real hit. It was a street track like out of your dreams. Faster, more varied and more challenging than Monaco, more picturesque as well. That track was Montjuïc.

Looking back: the time F1 drivers banned one of their own

In the build up to last week's Japanese Grand Prix the Italian magazine Autosprint reported that some F1 drivers wanted Lewis Hamilton's driving to be raised as a matter for discussion at that event's drivers' briefing.

I'm very glad that nothing came of that. Such a move would have been shameful, with the strong stench of a witch hunt. Furthermore, it would have been absolutely unnecessary. Yes, it can't be denied that Lewis Hamilton has been making contact with other cars too often over the last 12 months or so, but we're not talking about someone new on the scene, or someone unproven. Lewis Hamilton has been in F1 for close to to five years, and in that time proven beyond doubt that he's one of the sport's most accomplished performers. And up until the Italian race of last year (when his habit of tagging other cars began) he didn't make contact with other cars that often. It's very hard to think of occasions before that wherein he was involved in an incident with another car that was unequivocally his own fault. Hitting Kimi Raikkonen in the pitlane in Canada in 2008 is arguably the only one, and he's far from the only one to be caught out by that pit exit. Not bad for someone who in that time firmed himself up as F1's most exciting and willing racer and overtaker.

F1 does have a previous when it comes to egregious behaviour by some drivers towards one of their own. One time before a few 'senior' drivers effectively banned one of their fellow number from a Grand Prix. This they did by coercing the organisers of a race, on pain of them withdrawing and forcing the event to be cancelled, not to accept that driver's race entry. The year was 1978 and the banned driver was Riccardo Patrese.

Looking back: F1's first foray with the safety car

The safety car is very much the part of the fabric of F1 these days. Indeed, it led 24 laps of the 55 laps of the Korean race last weekend, and has led 78 F1 race laps this season. That's more than double that of Felipe Massa!

Having been an integral part of the racing scene in the USA since the year dot, the safety car was introduced to F1 in its current form midway through the 1992 season. Minimising disruption of TV schedules from race stoppages was part of the reason for the move, though a desire to potentially 'spice up the show' in a season in which the Williams FW14Bs (more to the point, Mansell's FW14B) were running away with virtually every race also concentrated minds.

Less well known is that there was an earlier attempt at bringing the safety car, or 'pace car' as it was known then, to F1 races. Given their experience, it's little wonder that the idea was abandoned for almost two decades subsequently.

The year was 1973, and up until that point stopping races wasn't the done thing. Races continued unabated pretty much no matter what, even in incidents of extreme horror such as Lorenzo Bandini's fiery and fatal accident in Monaco in 1967.  Not including the 1950 Indy 500 (technically part of the F1 world championship at the time), the first F1 race to be stopped ahead of time was the 1971 Canadian Grand Prix, which ended a few laps early because of rain and mist.

Looking back: F1's first visit to Suzuka

Next weekend the F1 circus visits Suzuka for this season's Japanese Grand Prix - a track that all true fans of F1 eagerly anticipate seeing the cars on.

Such is the classic and challenging nature of Suzuka's fast sweeps, and its lack of modern sterility, it's easy to assume that the likes of Moss, Clark and Lauda pounded round the circuit in years past. In fact, the track was only used as a World Championship venue for the first time in 1987.

Indeed, the date of the track's opening stretches even further back - to 1962 (no gleaming new Tilke facility being brought onto the calendar here). It was designed by John Hugenholtz, who also gave Zandvoort to the world (he designed Jarama, Nivelles and Zolder as well - but for the sake of the point I'll ignore those!). But despite the staging of a couple of 'Japanese GPs' in its early years, Suzuka remained criminally undiscovered by much of international motor racing for the first quarter century of its existence.

The history of bringing an F1 race to Japan was equally haphazard. The track at Fuji, who were always more proactive than Suzuka in bringing international motorsport to Japan, held the first two F1 World Championship events in the country in 1976 and 1977. The first visit has gone down in folklore as the scene of James Hunt and Niki Lauda's championship showdown, held initially in monsoon conditions that resulted in Lauda quitting a couple of laps in on safety (or sanity) grounds. This left Hunt to dramatically claim the crown by taking third, having to pass cars frantically in the late laps, after a pit stop to replace a blown tyre.