“Jean-Pierre was really pissed off!” laughs the affable René Arnoux, looking back on the historic 1979 French Grand Prix. “But I wasn’t thinking about his victory, I was just trying to get second.”
And Arnoux had a lot on his mind, going side by side with Gilles Villeneuve, turbocharged Renault vs normally aspirated Ferrari 312T4, wheel banging into the final throes of the race.
It had taken 75 of 80 laps, but Formula One was being treated to a battle for the ages.
It was a genuinely groundbreaking day, because the aforementioned Jean-Pierre Jabouille’s victory was the first for a turbocharged car in F1.
For Renault it was an especially patriotic afternoon: its RS10 was driven by a Frenchman, shod with French tyres and had French oil running through its veins. And, having endured a trying few years standing by its blown beliefs, here it was taking the flag at home, aka Dijon-Prenois.
But despite all the patriotic delight that greeted Jabouille’s win, it was fellow Frenchman Arnoux and his French-Canadian pal Villeneuve who stole the headlines.
Clockwise from top left: Arnoux challenges Villeneuve; how the pair crossed the line, Villeneuve holding off Arnoux’s advances; Renault’s innovative winner in the La Ferté Gaucher circuit pits; Jabouille’s win is celebrated
