Three final laps of the race. Engines roaring at speeds reaching 160/165 miles an hour (aprox. 260 km/h). No chance to win, but no backing down – this is the greatest duel for the second place. Never has there been a more exciting battle – neither Gilles Villeneuve or Renè Arnoux give an inch, they bang wheels and pass and re-pass each other for five times in just two laps.
Artist: Arthur Benjamins (1995).
Both drivers show superhuman control over their racecars. As Arnoux recollects in a recent interview: “With cars the way they were back then, you needed to have complete faith in the other driver, because if you collided, you would be flying immediately. He trusted me and I trusted him, so we were able to tap each other seven times.”
Getting ahead by less than a quarter of a second, the regular engine of Ferrari 312-T4 wins the turbocharged Renault RS10 driven by Renè. Even 30 years later, by many this is considered to be the most exciting battle in the history of Formula One.
"After Dijon 1979, (at the Race Direction in Silverstone) we wondered what Gilles and I had done, then, in the room, we found Lauda and other drivers, with Niki starting by saying that we had made some very dangerous maneuvers. To hear him pissed me off, imagine Gilles. At a certain point Lauda asked us if we had something to say: 'that if it happens again I'm ready to do it again', Villeneuve replied. And I: 'Niki if you had been there, I would have finished second'. We had exaggerated and left”. Rene’ Arnoux
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