James Hunt retrospective part 1 of 3

and part 2 and part 3. What, no part 3? Sorry, I can't seem to find it.

Well, here's this interview with Hunt from back in the day(from 1973, while still a comparative f1 neophyte. He won the World Championship in '76, and retired in '79.)

another F1 video- Jean Pierre Beltoise '68

The original is here.

René Arnoux in 2008

I always liked René Arnoux. Arnoux raced in F1 from '78 till the end of the 1989 season, and while his stock had fallen considerably by the late 80s, it's easy for people today to forget how much he was regarded as a rising star around '79-'81. If I recall correctly he even held the record for most pole positions in one season at one time.

He left the Renault team when they were on top to go drive for Ferrari, presumably seduced by the legend. After two more seasons with Ferrari, the first good, the second somewhat less so, he was canned at the beginning of the third (1985) season after only one start-- and not allowed to drive for anybody else for the rest of the year because the Ferrari people wouldn't release him from his contract. Peering into the psyche of a famous person you've never met is probably silly, but it's difficult not to think that this may have soured him on the sport a bit and hurt his confidence.

After that he spent his last four seasons with Ligier, 1986-'89, and like Arnoux, Ligier didn't have the same form as in the early 80s, especially after their engine supplier (coincidentally, Renault) left F1 at the end of '86 and they had to make do with lesser equipment.

The 1st Formula One race

Devotees of the sport will know what I mean by calling the 1950 British Grand Prix the first formula one race, even though it was by no means the first Grand Prix. GP races date back to the Edwardian era, the first Grand Prix, appropriately enough, being the 1906 French GP. There was also an occasional US GP event, held on Long Island(!) and called the Vanderbilt Cup(!!)).

The FIA formally codified a set of rules, for formula one, formula two, and formula three in the late 1940s, so that a still devastated European economy could have a formal, unified world championship(i.e. a European championship, but we'll call it a world championship) in which the regulations for fuel capacity, engine size, etc, were codified and made comparatively uniform-- and the premier series was called formula one, with the championship race at Silverstone, England, on May 13th, 1950, inaugurating the first season.

Jackie Stewart explains the Nordschleife

From the movie "Champions Forever - The Formula One Drivers." If you've ever wanted to see Jackie Stewart drive the Nürburgring in Rolls convertible while talking about it to the camera, you've come to the right place. (I believe the guy seen talking briefly about Stewart at the beginning is François Cevert.)

A less leisurely(F2) view from '67 can be seen here.

Monaco 1982

When Alain Prost made one of his rare mistakes.

Pike's Peak

putting the zooom in Hugo Zoom. The Pike's Peak hillclimb used to be held on the 4th of July, but now it's held later in the summer. I know it's unrealistic, but I'd like to imagine that if Peugeot sold cars like this to the general public they never would've left the US market.

Monaco 1936-37