That Was The Week That Was: Anniversaries and Milestones From Motorsport's Past

May 2

1976: James Hunt took his first win for McLaren, but it took until July for it to be officially recognised. The Englishman crossed the line in first place in the Spanish Grand Prix at Jarama but was disqualified in post-race scrutineering after the rear of his M23 was found to be too wide. The team successfully appealed and Hunt was reinstated, closing the gap to title rivals Niki Lauda and Ferrari.

1981: The Lancia Stratos scored its 17^th and final World Rally Championship victory when Bernard Darniche and co-driver Alain Mahé won the Tour de Corse. It was Darniche’s fourth victory in the Ferrari V6-powered machine and he headed Guy Fréquelin’s Talbot Sunbeam Lotus by 16 minutes on the French island.

1985: Italian Attilio Bettega was killed after crashing his factory Martini Lancia 037 during the third stage of the Tour de Corse WRC qualifier. His co-driver, Maurizio Perrisinot, survived the accident.

1986: A year to the day after Bettega’s accident, the works Lancia team – and the whole WRC family – suffered more heartache when superstar Henri Toivonen and his co-driver, American Sergio Cresto, perished in Corsica after their Group B Delta S4 left the road in SS18 while leading. Finn Toivonen was dubbed the greatest driver of his era and had won three WRC events – the RAC Rally in 1980 and ’85 and the Monte Carlo Rally at the start of 1986.

May 3

1970: Brian Redman and Jo Siffert won the Sicilian Targa Florio road race in their Porsche 908/3. The Anglo-Swiss pair led home the sister three-litre, flat-eight car of Leo Kinnunen and Pedro Rodriguez to secure a J.W Automotive Gulf Porsche one-two.

1981: The inaugural San Marino Grand Prix was won by Nelson Piquet’s Brabham BT49C. The Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in the Italian principality had hosted the Italian Grand Prix the year before (the only time in World Championship history that it hasn’t been held at Monza), but its first San Marino-tagged event gave the Brazilian his fifth career win and second victory of what would prove to be a title-winning season. He beat the Arrows of Nelson Piquet and the Williams of Carlos Reutemann.

May 4

1926: German nobleman Wolfgang Alexander Albert Eduard Maximilian Reichsgraf Berghe von Trips was born. More easily identifiable as Wolfgang von Trips, he competed in 27 Grands Prix for Ferrari, Cooper and Porsche, winning twice in the ‘sharknose’ 156 – in the Dutch and British GPs – in 1961. He was killed, aged 33, in that year’s Italian GP while fighting for the title from pole position after his car collided with Jim Clark’s Lotus and went into the crowd.

1946: Happy 70^th birthday to Irishman John Watson! ‘Wattie’ raced in 152 GPs for Brabham, Surtees, Lotus, Penske and McLaren, winning on five occasions – for Penske in Austria in 1976 and McLaren in the 1981 British GP, ’82 Belgian and Detroit GPs and ’83 Long Beach GP. He also won four rounds of the World Sportscar Championship – one for Porsche and three for Jaguar. After retiring from the cockpit he became a well-known commentator on Eurosport’s F1 coverage and still wields a microphone in various series to this day.

1948: US sportscar racing legend Hurley Haywood was born. He won Le Mans in 1977, 1983 and 1994, the Daytona 24 Hours in 1973, ’75, ’77, ’79 and ’91 and the Sebring 12 Hours in 1973 and ’81 – all for Porsche.

1980: Didier Pironi landed his first F1 win, taking his Ligier JS11/15 to victory in the Belgian Grand Prix at Zolder. Outqualified by Alan Jones, the Frenchman went on to beat the Australian’s Williams by 47 seconds. Jones’ team-mate Carlos Reutemann finished third.

1987: Moto GP World Champion Jorge Lorenzo was born. The Spaniard has to date taken 41 top-class wins since 2008 – all for Yamaha – and has lifted the title on three occasions, in 2010, 2012 and 2015.

May 5

1985: Alain Prost won the San Marino GP for McLaren, only to be disqualified after the race when his McLaren was found to be two kilos under the 540kg minimum weight limit. That promoted Elio de Angelis to the top step of the podium, the Italian handed his second career win for Lotus. Thierry Boutsen’s Arrows was moved up to second, with the Renault of Patrick Tambay assuming third place. 

1986: Jaguar took its first World Sportscar Championship race win since Le Mans in 1957 when Eddie Cheever and Derek Warwick won the Silverstone 1000km in the TWR-run Silk Cut XJR-6. They beat the Rothmans Porsche 962C of reigning World Champions Derek Bell and Hans Stück by two laps, with the Kremer Racing 962C of Jo Gartner and Tiff Needell taking third.

May 6

1973: The Ford-powered Gulf Mirage M6 prototypes took a one-two in the Spa 1,000km, with the Derek Bell/Mike Hailwood car leading home the Howden Ganley/Vern Schuppan machine that had also been driven in the race by Hailwood. Third went to the Matra MS670B of Chris Amon/Gérard Larrousse/Henri Pescarolo.

1988: The Ford Sierra RS Cosworth scored its only World Rally Championship victory thanks to Frenchman Didier Auriol in Corsica. Auriol’s two-wheel-drive works car beat the Lancia Delta Integrales of Yves Loubet and former event winner Bruno Saby.

May 7

1967: Denny Hulme won the Monaco Grand Prix for Brabham, his first victory coming two years after his F1 debut in the principality. Team-mate and reigning World Champion Jack Brabham had secured pole position, but the three-litre Repco V8 in the back of the Australian’s BT19 had let go on the first lap, allowing Hulme to win by lap in the newer BT20 ahead of Graham Hill’s Lotus-BRM.

1968: Exactly a month after the death of his friend and Lotus team-mate Jim Clark, Briton Mike Spence was killed, aged 31, in a Lotus 56 while practising for the Indianapolis 500. Spence had contested 36 Grands Prix, for Lotus and BRM, with a best result of third in the 1965 Mexican GP.

1978: Patrick Depailler guided his Cosworth DFV-powered Tyrrell 008 to a maiden F1 victory on the streets of Monaco. The Frenchman finished 22 seconds ahead of World Champion Niki Lauda’s flat-12 Brabham BT46 and the previous year’s winner Jody Scheckter in a Wolf WR1.

May 8

1982: An infamous date in the annals of motorsport history. During qualifying for the Belgian GP at Zolder, Gilles Villeneuve crashed his Ferrari during a quick lap after colliding with the March 821 of Jochen Mass. Villeneuve, who was trying to better the time set by team-mate Didier Pironi, was thrown from the cartwheeling 126C2 and died from his injuries. It was a tragic end to a five-year F1 career, which had yielded six wins, for a man still regarded as one of the most gifted and spectacular ever to sit in a racing car.

Gilles Villeneuve image courtesy of LAT