Throwback Thursday: F1 Race of Champions

As Formula 1 ponders various changes to its rules and scheduling to address a worldwide slowdown in global audience for grand prix racing, it might be worth looking back to a time when F1 didn't take itself quite so seriously – like when it ran a non-championship "Race of Champions" in the middle of the regular season.

The Race of Champions was held at Britain's Brands Hatch circuit from 1965-'79, and resumed one last time in 1983. The 1979 race was held at Britain's Brands Hatch circuit on April 15 – just a week after the world championship round at Long Beach and two weeks prior to the start of the "European season" in Spain. It featured seven world championship regulars, joining 13 privateer F1 cars from the British-based Aurora series.

But the non-points nature of the race didn't mean it was considered a throwaway event – Brabham fielded two brand-new Alfa Romeo-powered BT48s for the race, while Lotus debuted its radical Lotus 80-Ford, although polesitter Mario Andretti decided to race his world championship-winning Lotus 79 after qualifying. Ferrari's Gilles Villeneuve also took a step back technically, returning to the previous year's Ferrari 312 T3 rather than the ground-effects T4 with which he had scored a dominant win in Long Beach.

Niki Lauda jumped Andretti at the start and took a good early lead in his new Brabham, while Villeneuve was also soon around Andretti for second. But both of them, as well as Lauda's Brabham teammate Nelson Piquet, closed down on the leader by the eight lap. A troubled Lauda pitted from the lead, and Villeneuve (LEFT) also lost the top spot a few laps later when he ran wide at the exit of Hawthorn corner, handing Andretti the lead – a rare moment for the reigning world champion in what would prove a disappointing season.

But Villeneuve wasn't done. After falling as much as four seconds down to the Lotus, the French-Canadian hunted down the champ (TOP), regaining the lead with a forceful pass into Paddock Hill corner. Piquet also made it around Mario before the finish but had nothing for the flying Gilles, who lapped everyone up to fourth place over the course of the 40-lap race!

Increasing commercial pressures led to the demise of the RoC the following year, although it was revived one last time for '83, when reigning world champion Keke Rosberg (Williams-Ford) held off America's Danny Sullivan (Tyrrell-Ford) for the win.

Here's video footage of the event, link courteously provided by Facebook poster Ryan Casillas. Thanks Ryan!