I was born in 1982. Amazing to think I know, given my youthful appearance. But my abilities to defy the aging process aside; ’82 also produced an extraordinary F1 season, as I learned while browsing through the Motor Sport Magazine digital archive recently (an essential purchase, I would have thought).

That a ban on racing in Switzerland didn’t preclude a Swiss Grand Prix reflected the bizarre nature of the 1982 season – and then the race was almost cut short…

The season was extraordinary by any standards. Controversy and tragedy combined with new regulations that made for an uncertain championship throughout. Among the 16 races in 1982 was one that had unconventional origins – and would provide the only victory for the eventual world champion.

Switzerland had imposed a ban on motor racing since the 1955 Le Mans disaster, but Swiss driver Clay Regazzoni had helped promote a non-championship Swiss Grand Prix at Dijon-Prenois in 1975, which he duly won. In 1977, an extended Dijon circuit hosted the French GP for the first time. The race then alternated each year between Dijon and the Circuit Paul Ricard, which took the honour in ’82. So the Dijon organisers got together with the Swiss authorities to organise what would be a one-off grand prix outside the ‘host’ country.

With only three races left to go in the championship, the absent Ferrari driver Didier Pironi was still leading the driver standings, but would never race again after his awful accident two races previously at Hockenheim. Keke Rosberg was second in the drivers’ championship.

The normally aspirated Williams FW08 had just delivered Rosberg second place at the Austrian GP a fortnight before, his fourth of the season. But Pironi, Elio De Angelis, Alain Prost, Niki Lauda, John Watson, Riccardo Patrese, Nelson Piquet, Rene Arnoux and Patrick Tambay had all won races.

Qualifying at Dijon had seen the Renault duo of Prost and Arnoux claim the front row, the French marque hoping for a third successive win at Dijon. Patrese (Brabham) and Lauda (McLaren) were on the second row, with Andrea De Cesaris (Alfa Romeo) and Piquet (Brabham) on row three, ahead of Derek Daly and his Williams team-mate, Rosberg.

For the second time that year, there would be no Ferrari on the grid, after lone driver Patrick Tambay suffered a trapped nerve and went home early. To date, it was the last time a grand prix would start without a Ferrari.

Having crashed in practice, Arnoux took the spare Renault into the lead off the grid, while Rosberg made up two places at the first corner to take sixth. Lauda and Patrese were similarly dispatched by lap six, so that only Prost, Arnoux – now behind his team-mate – and Piquet were ahead of the Finn.

Prost pushed hard early on, setting fastest lap on lap two when he overtook Arnoux, but he had to conserve his tyres, particularly when Roberto Guerrero’s Ensign sprayed the track with oil. Meanwhile, Rosberg was doing the same, but with a curious mix. The Finn had three different compounds of tyre on the car: soft on the right side; a hard left-front; and medium on the left-rear!

When Piquet pitted on lap 40 for fuel and tyres, Rosberg moved up to third place, and his charge was only halted when he came up on De Cesaris for the second time. “Lapping De Cesaris in that race was the biggest nightmare of my Formula One career,” Rosberg stated in a recent interview, “I was alongside him every lap on the main straight, but Alfa’s top speed was superior to ours – I mean, I was lapping!”

The Italian eventually cost him more than 10 seconds, but then Rosberg began to catch Arnoux. Fuel injection problems once again caused the Frenchman problems, and he pitted. Rosberg was soon catching Prost, who was suffering from worn aero skirt. On the 75th lap of 80, Rosberg set his fastest lap. By lap 78, the lead was down to a few car-lengths.

And then came the bizarre twist in the tale.

“The organisers tried to stop the race a lap early,” recalls Rosberg, “I mean, you had to see it to believe it! Peter Collins (Williams team manager) saw it coming, climbed on the podium where the guy with the flag was read to drop it and stopped him from doing so.”

In fact, the field did another two laps, but by lap 80 Rosberg had managed to overhaul Prost and he crossed the line more than four seconds ahead, claiming his first win and taking the championship lead, which he held to the season’s end.

The best driver won. But everything could have been so different…

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