The 1981 Las Vegas Grand Prix: F1's gamble that didn't pay off

No argument about that. Piquet was never the fittest of drivers, after all, and Reutemann looked to be in one of his unbeatable moods. In qualifying at Monza he’d produced what Villeneuve rightly called ‘the lap of the season’, setting second-fastest time in his Williams-Cosworth, and splitting the turbocharged Renaults of René Arnoux and Alain Prost. And now, in very different surroundings, came another scintillating lap: set on the first day, it would remain unbeaten. Everything pointed to one of those Reutemann weekends, when the rest were wasting their time, and most onlookers were hoping it would turn out that way.

Some, like Jones, weren’t bothered either way. If Alan loathed Piquet, he had no time for Reutemann either, and would not be volunteering to ‘help’ his team-mate. Which of the two, I asked, did he hope would take the title? “Neither…”

Even then Max Mosley was saying spectators didn’t count for much any more, that the future success of F1 lay in television coverage, and the Caesars Palace GP brought that home. It was like being at the filming of a TV special, rather than the settling of a World Championship, and for those in the grandstands it was a dead loss.

Some indication of the lack of interest in, not to say knowledge of, F1 was gleaned in the betting shops, only a few of which offered odds on the race. I ventured into one, and after perusing the chalk-written board and disregarding the likes of Peron, Grabbiani, Munsell, Stohr (who wasn’t even racing) and Cheevers, I went with Jones, offered at 4/1.

Although Alan, the reigning champion, had had poor luck through 1981, he had driven even better than in his title year, and I had a feeling he was going to walk his last race. Actress Susan George, a Williams guest for the weekend, strengthened my resolve when she told me she’d never seen Jones lose a GP. I could hardly resist advice like that – and, as it turned out, my winnings compensated in part for the hundred dollar bills removed from my pocket earlier in the week.

Had I bet on the championship outcome, my money would have been on Reutemann. He was on pole, followed by Jones and Villeneuve, and although Piquet was in fourth he had looked perilously frail in practice, while it seemed that Laffite, only 12th, could be discounted.

As well as that, there was Reutemann’s demeanour in the build-up to the race. Given the pressure of the championship one might have expected him to be even more reclusive than usual, but in practice Carlos behaved like a man who knew he had the title in the bag. The three title contenders appeared on a TV chat show the night before the race, and he ruled proceedings. The tension was in the faces of Piquet and Laffite.

Carlos apart, the outstanding performance in qualifying had come – predictably – from Villeneuve, who, as at Monaco earlier that year, had wrestled his unwieldy Ferrari 126CK into third on the grid, en route achieving angles extravagant even by Gilles’s normal standards.

“You put on new tyres,” he said, “and it’s OK for four laps – after that, forget it. It’s just like a fast, red Cadillac, but it flexes so much that it’s incredibly forgiving. I can get so sideways I’m almost looking over the rollover bar – and still it comes back! Mind you, I’d sooner have it vicious, with some grip…”

In the paddock there was general delight that Derek Warwick, after a nightmare debut season, had qualified his recalcitrant Toleman-Hart.

“When I found Derek Warwick after the session, he looked like a man on pole”

When I found Derek after the session, he looked like a man on pole: “It’s so long since I’ve raced I’m worried about my fitness – particularly at a place like this. I’ll just do the best I can…

“Whatever happens I stand to make some money out of this. At mid-season Jackie Oliver bet me I wouldn’t qualify the Toleman at any race this year. ‘All right,’ I said, ‘how much?’ ‘Whatever you like,’ he said, ‘a thousand, 10, 25…’ So we settled on 25 grand – and there was a witness! You can keep your betting shops…”

It was as well that Warwick’s wager hadn’t required him to finish a race in 1981, for the Toleman retired with gearbox problems, one of 13 cars which failed to make the flag. How easy it is now to forget that cast-iron reliability wasn’t always the way of it in F1.

This was, of course, the year of ‘hydraulic suspension’, a ruse concocted to get around a new ruling from FISA (then the sporting arm of the FIA), which required cars to have a ground clearance of not less than six centimetres. It was checked assiduously when cars came into the pitlane, and invariably all was legal – but what made it farcical was that on track the cars, by means of hydraulically lowered suspension, were visibly skimming the ground. Thus every competing car was illegal, and everyone knew it, but as long as no one was caught…

In this specification, the cars were horrible to drive. “They have to change,” said Didier Pironi. “I feel so stupid when I’m in the car, raising the suspension for the test in the pits, in front of all the spectators. How ridiculous! As for driving, there’s no feel in the cars now they have no suspension movement. They are brutal to drive.”

“The hydraulic suspension is a joke,” agreed Reutemann. “Everyone wanted to lower cornering speeds, but all we’ve done is make the cars more dangerous! They’re legal in the pits, and on the ground when they’re running – it’s a joke.”

Another not around at the end of the race was Villeneuve, whom the organisers had belatedly disqualified for not lining up straight on the grid. No matter: the Ferrari pulled off on lap 23 – rear end ablaze – before Gilles could comply.

In many ways, location being only one of them, this was one of the oddest GPs I ever saw. At no stage did Reutemann or Piquet figure – indeed, when Villeneuve vanished from the lap charts, his third place was taken over by Laffite, the only title contender who seemed to be racing. Piquet at this point ran fifth, Reutemann seventh.

For Carlos, it went mysteriously wrong from the start. While Jones burst into the lead, his team-mate was down to fourth by the first corner, and by lap three had fallen to seventh, ahead of Piquet, who also made an atrocious start. One point ahead going into the race, Carlos had only to finish in front of Nelson to be sure of the title, but when the Brabham got alongside the Williams he didn’t so much as defend.

Jones, bull-strong as ever in the draining conditions, won by 20sec, with Prost second, Bruno Giacomelli’s Alfa third, Mansell’s Lotus fourth – and Piquet fifth, which paid two points and allowed him to snick ahead of Reutemann to become World Champion.

Carlos, lapped, trailed in eighth, and his performance that day remains as unfathomable as any I’ve known. His face revealed nothing as he took off his helmet and balaclava, but he seemed fit enough, which was more than could be said of the semi-comatose Piquet, whose head had lolled against the cockpit side for half the race, who had to be lifted from his car at the end.

It was some time before Nelson was recovered enough to attend an informal press conference: he seemed pretty much out of it as he slumped there, bare feet in a bucket of cold water.

His was the title, though, and as Jones – more than a little ridiculous with a Caesars Palace crown of laurels askew on his head – took the plaudits, Reutemann quietly packed his gear. After mumbling something about handling problems, he disappeared to the silent balm of his hotel room, almost unnoticed. There was always a certain nobility about Carlos, and his private tragedy that afternoon was the more poignant for being exposed in a place as pitiless as this.

Jones, though, was in celebratory mood, having dominated what he believed to be his last GP. And now here was Thatcher at his most self-important, which was very self-important indeed.

At that time Mark was dabbling with motor racing, and if he invariably came across as a man of quite remarkable charmlessness, this was no deterrent to certain grandees of the paddock, who fawned over him without shame.

Not all, though. TV crew in tow, NBC mic in hand, elbowing ordinary humans out of the way, he strove desperately to get to the winner, incisive question at the ready. “Were tyres very important in the race today?” he said, gravitas written all over his face, and Alan, bless him, didn’t let us down. “Oh, absolutely,” he replied, deadpan. “You see, they kept the wheels from touching the ground.” It wasn’t a long interview.

Something else I recall from that afternoon was a remark from another driver – one who had failed to qualify for the race. “What,” he said, “was Reutemann playing at? Piquet had to get past him – all Carlos had to do was put him in the wall, and he was champion…”

I was lost for words, and so was Carlos when I mentioned it to him. To win a title like that, he said, wouldn’t have been winning anything. No one would’ve known, the other driver had said. “I’d have known,” said Carlos.

Not long after that Reutemann announced his retirement, and Keke Rosberg, who’d finished 10th that day in Vegas, went swiftly into action.

“The ’81 season had been the worst of my life,” he said. “I was 33, I’d been around a long time, and the Fittipaldi gave you no chance to show people how you could race. I couldn’t see where I would get a good drive. I had talked to Frank, but he said his team was settled for ’82.

“When I heard about Carlos’s retirement, I thought, ‘I bet that wasn’t in Frank’s plans’, and got in touch. Later he asked me to test at Ricard, and it went well. Finally Frank called me – he was off to Saudi Arabia, in a rush. ‘You can have the drive,’ he said. I said, ‘We haven’t even talked about money or anything – but… I’ll take it!’”

Twelve months on, in Las Vegas, Rosberg won the championship. And F1, mercifully, took its leave of Bugsy’s favourite town.