In The Season That Power Could Not Control, Part One traces how the 1986 Formula One season was shaped long before its dramatic conclusion.

This episode explores the conditions that made the year so unstable: turbo power pushed beyond restraint, fuel limits that distorted racing rather than containing it, and a championship environment where speed routinely outpaced control. At the centre sat Williams — owners of the fastest car and the strongest package, but without the internal discipline required to manage success.

As contrasting driving styles emerged within the same team, momentum began to distort judgement. Victories created expectation rather than security, while equality without authority left key decisions unresolved. Outside that internal struggle, restraint proved more effective than aggression, and disruption proved as influential as dominance.

Part One is not about how the championship was lost — it is about how it was quietly put at risk. By mid-season, the table still looked open, but the foundations were already unstable.

Join us again tomorrow for pressure, reaction and consequence from racing’s rich and chequered past.

Cover image: By Morio - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

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Music by #Mubert Music Rendering

Formula One seasons often announce themselves with spectacle. The 1977 season began differently.

In the heat of Buenos Aires, a punishing opening race became a test of endurance, judgement, and restraint — and it was there that a brand-new team achieved one of the sport’s rarest feats. On their Grand Prix debut, Walter Wolf Racing won not through surprise or chaos, but by managing conditions better than anyone else.

This episode revisits the 1977 Argentine Grand Prix, a race defined by attrition and a late-changing lead, where Jody Scheckter’s measured drive delivered victory for a team that arrived prepared rather than hopeful. It then turns to Pascal Fabre, whose brief Formula One career illustrates just how narrow the margins were — and still are — between opportunity and obscurity. Finally, it steps back to South Africa in 1965, where the Cape South Easter Trophy reflects a time when Formula One existed alongside national championships and one-off races that mattered deeply to those who contested them.

Together, these stories remind us that Formula One has always rewarded judgement as much as speed — and that sometimes, the most telling moments are not the loudest, but the most controlled.

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Formula One likes to return to its great stages. But sometimes, one visit is enough.

On this episode of Chequered Past, we explore the Grand Prix that never came back — races that answered every question they needed to ask in a single weekend. From Donington Park’s unforgettable 1993 European Grand Prix, to Mugello’s modern-day examination under pandemic conditions, these were events that felt complete the moment the chequered flag fell.

We travel back to Berlin for the unique 1959 German Grand Prix at AVUS, run in two heats on a circuit already slipping out of time. We revisit Dallas in 1984, where ambition collided with environment and endurance became the defining challenge. Together, these races reveal how circumstance, context, and change can make a return unnecessary — or impossible.

These were not failures. They were moments.

Because some Grand Prix don’t fade away.

They simply don’t ask for an encore.

Cover image: By Martin Lee - Senna_1993_European_GP, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link

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Music by #Mubert Music Rendering