It’s amazing how the stories change over the years isn’t it?

@@AidanMillward Are you able to elaborate?

@@AidanMillward yeah it is! Great video, though - thought you told the story really well. Really enjoy your content, look forward to more 🙂

I dont think he lost his helmet in the crash so much as the medical staff took it off when they were giving him cpr at the catch fencing. At least thats what I saw in the video since you can see him flying thru the air with his red helmet still on his head, altho it might have fallen off when he impacted the ground im pretty sure the medics removed it

@@Oblio1942 No, his helmet did indeed come off during the crash. This is pretty well documented. It was lying several feet from him when Dr. Watkins and the medical team arrived. Gilles, like half the 1982 grid, wore a GPA helmet which utilized a snapping mechanism to secure the helmet instead of a traditional chin strap. Drivers felt the GPA helmet offered a better fit and comfort than helmets using a strap. The helmet snapping mechanism failed and this accident was the beginning of the end of GPA in F1. Drivers gradually abandoned using GPA helmets and GPA's fate was sealed when they couldn't receive the certification necessary to be a helmet provider in F1 (believe following the 1986 season). However, GPA is a leading helmet manufacturer for equestrian related uses and competitions today. Christopher Hilton's book, 1982, verifies all of this. He interviewed several drivers, including John Watson and Derek Warwick, who were one of the first drivers at the scene of the crash. Both pulled Gilles out of the catch fence. Both said that his helmet was off. Warwick went as far to say that Villeneuve's helmet was broken. They also said both of his shoes (and socks?) had been pulled off his feet as well. Such was the ferociousness of his crash. Pironi, who was preparing for a final run when the crash happened, followed the medical car out of the pits and stopped at the scene to see what was up. However, Watkins turned him away. He was apparently given Gilles's helmet to take back with him to the pits. This is the true story. Not sure what the creator of this video was insinuating about how the story has changed over the years.

Ironically, this was a situation that Ferrari himself created. I would argue that it was a situation that could only have existed in a team like Ferrari. They were always my favourite team and although I swore off F1 after the 1982 season, the team is an object lesson in how not to do it. They designed some great cars - the 126C2 was actually one of them - but their own management always made sure their chances of World Championships were torpedoed before they could secure them. Perhaps the best case I can remember was Eddie Irvine. He made a critical pit sop for tyres while challenging for the World Championship and the team brought out three wheels…

come on , villeneuve was not like a chid for enzo ... it was sadly pironi

​@@guillaumelussier7492 Enzo Ferrari himself wrote in both his memoirs and his book "Pilote, Che gente" how highly he thought of Gilles Villeneuve saying, and I quote, "I loved him like a son. I was affectionate to him." Enzo also remarked in a documentary the following "His death has deprived us of a great champion - one that I loved very much. My past is scarred with grief; parents, brother, son. My life is full of sad memories. I look back and see the faces of my loved ones, and among them I see him." If that isn't someone who sounds like they have utter grief and sadness for losing a dear friend, than I don't know what is. Enzo clearly felt like it was his fault on some level for not backing Villeneuve.

thanks man , i hope that im wrong

Wasn’t burned alive actually he was probably dead before the fire

No, i agree, with daniel it sounds like Paletti was busted up badly by the accident, but the fire was fought off very effectively by fire marshals and one Didier Pironi, who was actually showing the fire marshals the best way to keep the fire away from the driver. Also, refueling or not era (I don't remember) this accident happened on the starting grid- so Paletti's fuel tanks were likely full. It was due to those fighting the fire that the entire car was not involved. Go watch again & you'll be amazed what a great job they did of keeping the fire out of the driver's cockpit

Paletti was killed instantly in the impact. The fire had nothing to do with it and made no difference to the outcome.

And Ferrari never won any championship anymore up until 1999, a punishment of their greed or pride? (or maybe gluttony )

@@homeperson11244 Ferrari did win the Constructors Championship 1983 and 1999, just not the Driver's until 2000

@@paulo9504 You're right about that, thank you for correcting about the 1983. The 1999 tho i did say up till 1999, and yes they only won the constructors championship at that year

@@homeperson11244 more of consequence. punish means some 3rd party is actively penalizing them

@@GloomGaiGar I don't think it's a full consequence of their action because tbf around those time they hired drivers that theoretically would bring championship. Guys like Prost, Mansell, and Alesi are no big slouch of their own. Although it might be true it's part of consequence of overproud or overlook themselves, i still consider it as a punishment from a third party of whom living up in the skies.

True, in fact Gilles Pironi works for Mercedes F1 team.

It’s my opinion (and that’s all) that Villeneuve had become lazy. It was considered by all and sundry that he was ‘the fastest driver in the world’ and that seemed be enough for him. But if you want to be world champion, you need to be more than that. Someone suggested years ago that he would have done better at a British team and I was horrified. Ferrari without Villeneuve? No way! In fact, they were right. At a team like McLaren (which he was linked to) or Williams (which he wasn’t), Villeneuve would have been taught to focus more on the long game, rather than trying to set a lap record on every lap. This was where Pironi had the wood on him. It took him a long time to adapt to Ferrari and to be fair, he had the lion’s share of the team’s bad luck in 1981, but Pironi understood that being a championship winner didn’t just happen. It had to be a long term goal with achievable objectives along the way. It’s been said that Pironi didn’t have Villeneuve’s natural talent. That’s as may be but talent wasn’t something he was short of either. Jackie Stewart also rated him very highly and thought of him as the coming man. A lot of other people seriously underestimated him and still do.

You are correct about Pironi's wife. See the excellent British documentary Villeneuve-Pironi which is fascinating.

Pironi didn’t owe him anything.

1979 with Schecter wasn't the previous year.

​@@thethirdman225yeah, as great as villeneauve is, Peroni wasn't obligated to be anyone's bitch and had his own career to worry about.

@@henryreid3562 I can understand Villeneuve’s anger up to a point. I just don’t understand why he apparently allowed it to consume him. I thought he was the best I ever saw. But in his last weeks his behaviour was not a credit to him. I have always said that those who talk about debts owed by teams forget that such an arrangement might not even have been recognised by Ferrari. Furthermore, it doesn’t apply to the other team member (aside from the other assumptions it makes). I have also always said that those who blamed Pironi for Villeneuve’s fatal crash do him a disservice. I thought Villeneuve a far more professional driver than to allow such personal problems into the cockpit. I am starting to wonder if I was wrong about both.

Gilles Villeneuve reminded of Mansell very aggressive driving but missing some race smarts. Prost, Piquet or Lauda always had the championship in their mind and not only the race at hand.

I kinda think '22 Ferrari will let a lot of people down. Too high of expectation yet history tells otherwise: Ferrari had been bad when new major regulation overhauls took place, at least for the last 2 decades ('03, '05, '09, '12, and '14)

I am very curious as to what Maranello has up their sleeves. But I am thinking Sainz over Leclerc..

Agreed with you both. I think they’ll be up there but I don’t see a championship coming this year. I’m very much looking forward to testing and seeing these cars run together

@@haryosoo 03 was not a major regulation overhaul and they still won the double that year lmao.

@@haryosoo siting 03 as pproof of Ferrari's inability to cope with sweeping regs changes is kind of a really poor choice, 00 to 04 was ferrari dominance at its finest...

JV races in Daytona?

@@parrotantics2046 yes. For hezeberg Motorsport. A Dutch team that mainly competes in euronascar.

Jacques also has just had another son whom he named Gilles in honour of his dad.

@@brad6630 it's nice that he finally made peace with his father I suppose.

It's Daytona... If you are on the lead lap on the last lap, you have just as good of a shot as anyone. Well, only if you are in the pack that doesn't get taken out in the last lap crash anyway...

*_" It was the last season to have ground effect cars and now we're getting them back after 40 years."_* Ground effect never went away. That's what the splitter plates and diffusers and blown diffusers and Coanda effect were all about.

Also Giles and rene in dijon79 greatest battle of all time, completely overshadowed the first turbo win in the sport

@@Alnilam1973 that was the one where he just fucking launched it final lap, wasnt it?

It was more Picinini's machinations behind the scenes than either of the drivers. Certainly not Enzo - he adored Gilles.

@@AidanMillward both of them went for it , the last few laps laps are incredible,find it, watch it! Gilles career was incredible never give up is where he started from and I can't understand why his story is so undertold

@@jamesdyer7960 Enzo adored Gilles like no other driver but said nothing to pironi post race, I could understand Gilles being pissed after giving up a title to Sheckter but we will never know the truth because of the legends surrounding both enzo and Gilles.

*_"Imagine the accident happening now, with modern cars Gilles would have walked away."_* When Dr Harvey Postlethwaite moved to Ferrari in 1981, he knew that carbon fibre was the answer to their problems. He also knew that the team were not ready for it. Postlethwaite designed the first ever Ferrari monocoque chassis and had it built from aluminium-Nomex honeycomb sandwich by a company called Hexel in Belgium. This new chassis stood out from the crowd because it was bonded, rather than rivetted. It was very light and very stiff, compared with the other chassis of that era. In the early part of the season, the car used rocker arm front suspension but that proved to be quite hard on tyres so Postlethwaite replaced it with a pullrod front suspension and cut off the blended fairings, giving the car a slimmer appearance. In this guise it was an absolute weapon. Unfortunately, whatever its merits - and there were many - it proved to have the crash resistance of a blancmange. In Villeneuve's crash, the panel behind the seat was completely ripped out, exposing the fuel bladder. In so doing, it released the anchor bolts of Villeneuve's harness and he was thrown from the car and killed. Pironi's car came apart at about the driver's hip and everything forward of that, including the front suspension and the instrument panel, was torn off. McLaren were already building cars from carbon so the change was underway. Lotus followed suit quickly after. So the fact is that had Postlethwaite been hired a year earlier, carbon might have been available. It would almost certainly have resulted in lesser injury to both men, though I suspect Pironi would still have been pretty smashed up but Villeneuve might have survived. In 1983, Ferrari switched to carbon, like everyone else. It seems to me that carbon fibre has saved more lives in F1 than any other factor and if it had arrived a year earlier or the crashes had been a year later, the results could have been very different.

i actually was born later that year when Gilles died. yet I know that this bloke was one hell of a driver who like aiden said had only two speeds either zero or the full throttle. Yet he was also the nicest bloke and it's devastating that he died.

Gilles Pironi works for that Brackley lot too!

@@jamesdyer7960 haha i saw it on his FB nice , in a way , to work on his dad "old" team.. (Tyrrell after a lot of purchages is now Mercedes ;)

Yeah, Keke is a real jerk. Frank Stallone paid him to say it.

That was the Canadian GP when Pironi took pole.

Probably not the smartest thing to say.

Pironi should have responded "well if you guys hadn't tried to get the race cancelled, none of this would ever have happened"

*_"At a race later in the season, Pironi told an interviewer "we all wish Gilles was here." It was broadcast over the PA. Keke Rosberg said "if it weren't for you Gilles WOULD be here.""_* What does that say about Villeneuve's level of professionalism?

That just sounds like loser talk. It's beneath the way I prefer to remember him.

It's a statement of fact, period.@@thethirdman225

You only have to look at Jarama '81 for proof of his mental strength!. Gilles was one of those generational talents who could produce something sensational at any time, when others could not. Clark, Rindt, Pryce, Gilles, Mansell, Bellof, Senna, Schuey, Montoya, Alonso, Lewis, Max and I am going to say Leclerc. These are they types of drivers, personalities that ignite the passion with F1.

@@jamesdyer7960 Pironi, from a political standpoint, was far more ruthless and stronger than Villeneuve. Villeneuve was used to being friends with his teammate, like in the case of Jody Scheckter. In this regard, Gilles was naive. His own wife warned him that Pironi was not his friend and could not be trusted when he didn't invite him to his wedding but did invite key members of Ferrari. Pironi did undermine Villeneuve's postion within the team and wanted to be the undisputed #1.

@@paulo9504 Pironi waited until the last lap to eff GV over, that is essentially cowardice. Up until then Gilles had just been keeping him at bay and following team instructions. GV was naive, yes, but he wasn't 'beaten'. Ferrari failed to haul Didier over the coals afterwards, so it's no wonder GV was going so sign elsewhere for '83. Even though he would have been a better bet for honours in a farrari than Arnoux or Tambay in '83.

No F1 driver is there to finish second.

@@paulo9504 That story about the wedding invitation has been debunked. It’s just part of the hero v villain soap opera that was created by people like Nigel Roebuck and Gerald Donaldson to sell books.

It sounds like it was more miscommunication rather than Gilles trying to overtake. Like I say, Mass moved off line and Gilles went the same way.

@@AidanMillward yes and the slight cresl left less time to react.

Interestingly, there is a photograph of Villeneuve on his very last lap, just before the crash, that shows his tyres were utterly shot.

looking at the footage, it just seems like everything that was wrong safety wise about the 80s came together, "who cares just send it in there" attitude mixed with the FIA wanting to create premodonna's mixed with Gilles everything or nothing attitude came together at the worst possible time...

Mass was driving in the middle of the track when Villeneuve approached him. Had he been on either side of the track I don't think the accident would have happened. Edied: Mass not Made- auto correct strikes again

@@simonkevnorris You’re blaming Jochen Mass…? Seriously?

@@thethirdman225 Yes, he was in the middle of the road. Gilles had to go either to the left or right - then Mass went the same way.

Well, when someone comes up on you that quick - and those cars were hard to see out of, especially when Villeneuve was both on a curve and creating a hill - you’d need mental telepathy to know he was coming right up to the last second. Blaming Jochen Mass for Villeneuve’s death is a cheap shot at best.

If Villeneuve was in that state of mind, he had no business driving an F1 or any other car that day.

this answers the question of why Ferrari would never Win the Indy 500 even enzo was still alive with the 637

This pitting drivers against each other resulted directly in one driver fatality in 1957 and possibly another one indirectly in 1958. In 1957, among a Ferrari three driver fierce rivalry between Peter Collins, Mike Hawthorn and Luigi Musso, Musso was on the short end of the stick going into the French Grand Prix at Reims and badly needed a win. Trying to pass Hawthorn for the lead at a tricky right hander, Musso ran wide, lost control of the car, which skidded, flipped, hit a ditch and threw him out of the car. In 1958, Enzo Ferrari began to have it in for Collins and tried to kick him off the team a couple times, only to be rebuffed when Hawthorn threatened to quit if he did. Collins, like Villeneuve, had a bit of wildness in his driving and his anger with Enzo may have made him be even prone to take chances in the desire to win. He won the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, beating the championship leader, Hawthorn and then at the following race at the Nurburgring, Collins was chasing leader Tony Brooks and in an eerily similar accident to Musso's, ran wide on a corner, the car hit a ditch, flipped and flung Collins out of the car.

Good for Enzo. He was a REAL racer's dream boss, even if he was an arrogant bastard.

Enzo Ferrari built great cars and terrible teams. His style was directly responsible for the team failing to win several championships over the years, simply because he prized dumb machismo over cool intellect. Dumb doesn’t get it done.

There was never any guarantee that Villeneuve would be World Champion. His personality was against it.

lol, he is just like me fr

*_"According to a biography I read, prior to this WDC year he was already psychologically compromised."_* ^^ THIS ^^ If Villeneuve had survived, I think Pironi would have eaten him.

No. Hans works if you're still strapped in the car. Villeneuve was catapulted out of the car when the car nose dived and hit the ground and then he flew to the catch fence

@@bmwzaxos5264 If the safety belt would have been attached to the chassis he might have survived. Unfortunately the harness was attached to his seat. Watch the images closely (you can find them on YT) and you can see the seat still attached to his back after the car disintegrated.

GV was one of the few, if not the only driver that Enzo didn't treat like garbage. IMHO, he was responsible for a number of deaths throughout his time running that team. Some call him a genius, others - me included - consider him to have been a tyrant on a good day, and thoroughly overrated.

@@y_fam_goeglyd Enzo overrated, not Gilles presumably?

' Didier was doing what race drivers now always do'. And there you have it. Different times, different values?

@@jamesdyer7960 No. You’re either a racer or a bunny.

Don't forget that the accident with Martin Donnnely at Jerez in 1990 also need with him in the middle of the track also in his seat strapped in. He was lucky to survive and did race in other categories. I was at that race and saw the accident in the distance.

Yeah not sure about that. The belts were attached and anchored to the rear bulkhead, not the seat back. They could swap seats without messing with the belts. The belts may have run thru slots in the seat back but I believe the belts broke free from the rear bulkhead but the anchors prevented Villeneuve and the seat becoming detached from one another. It was a brutal crash in which the monocoque went through a catastrophic failure.

@@paulo9504 If you watch the TV images (you can find them on YT) you can see that the seat is still attached to his back when he gets thrown out of the car.

The force of the impact ripped off the panel behind the drivers seat with Villeneuve still attached to it. The main problem was the anchoring points on the bottom of the tub. They all ripped apart, thus enabling the driver to be thrown out.

The problem was that the panel behind the driver's seat was torn away, exposing the fuel bladder. Pictures of this are easy to find. This was what released the seatbelt anchors.

Wasn’t until the crash at the start of the 86 race at Brands they shifted the drivers legs back.

kzfaq.info/get/bejne/qbGpdryksbDIiJ8.html Not exactly the Steve Robertson story, but it does have some of it.

You mean I… boch’d it 😎

Better would be " I bocht'd it" . Good attempt though, honestly. 😉

Yep, I had heard he was on his last set of qualifying tires and that they were completely shot when the crash happened. Back in 1982 they used super soft and sticky qualifying tires that were know as 2 lap qualifying specials. One lap to get them up to temp and then one flying lap to get a time. Guys took all sort of risks in qualifying that year, not just Villeneuve. Traffic was always an issue since they usually had around 28 cars at any given race.

@@paulo9504 There is a photograph taken on the very last lap, just before the crash, that shows his tyres were absolute toast.

And an uncle. Joachim

That's an interesting comparison. Senna was every much a risk taker as Stefan and Gilles but the difference was he had the equipment to harness his speed and race craft. The German and Canadian were pretty much forced to drive at or over the limit to extract any kind of result. Gilles was able to do 'what he needed to' on the rare occasions the car was competitive. but I also think he may have revelled in being dark horse/underdog. There are just some drivers who have the innate ability to outdrive their cars, make the most of what they've got but the margin for error increases.

Huh, what I've heard about the potential Pironi comeback that didn't happen was that he had signed an insurance policy which would've been voided had he returned to F1.

This is correct. They were very marginal on fuel.

Reading up on it they only saved his legs to make it easier to get him out the car. Or words to that effect.

Same way McRae is regarded as one of the greats in rally. He smashed cars up more times than he won because iF iN dOuBt FlAT OuT.

Tells you a lot about the mentality of modern 'f1 fans' I'll take risk taking and ballsy moves over trundling around just collecting points any day.

@@jamesdyer7960 ballsy moves that trash a car 9 times out of 10 isn’t racing.

@@AidanMillward Properly talented drivers make ballsy moves stick (most of the time!). In the current era that is the only way to make up places, unless one waits for a pit stop (which could go wrong).

The story that ‘Gilles was naive and Pironi was a scheming politician’ denies the hard reality. No F1 driver worth his salt throws a race. If you think the guy behind you is going to be content to stay there, think again because you just became a bunny.

agree.. put that on my whishlist

Senna would have probably destroyed him. Gilles crashed too often.

@@AidanMillward Hmmm, Da Silva was not immune to high profile impetuous moments. Senna would have won the qualy battle but Gilles could make up soo much ground off the start. I reckon the two would have been fantastic to watch toe to toe

Senna would have absolutely destroyed him. GV was prone to making unforced errors and a bit reckless. You left Prost out of the equation who would have had his way with him also.

@@Dashriprock4 Yes, maybe, no. Prost highly regarded Villeneuve and he himself was able to handle Senna.

@@Dashriprock4 Ayrton was also prone to unforced errors though remember...

@@Dashriprock4 You're highly delusional in your opinion. Doubt you ever saw him actually race.

@@ctibpo991 actually I did. I'm 58 years old so I remember this well. I remember the recklessness and the rashness that was coupled with an innate talent. I'll continue to stand by my opinion that he would have never withstood the pressure of a Senna or Prost in their prime.