When you’re just a kid, your heroes aren’t supposed to die.
Mine did.
The date, now engraved like a tattoo, was May 8, 1982.
I was 14.
Gilles Villeneuve was the world’s most daring race car driver and for many years—next to my father—the most important man in my life. My bedroom walls were covered with Villeneuve posters, so he was the first person I’d see in the morning and the last I’d see at night. One depicted him in his brilliant red Ferrari, head tilted to the side as he swept around Loews Corner in Monaco. Another featured his car in a signature position: opposite lock, a high-speed turn where the back-end of the car is bent like a fish trying to wiggle off a hook. That wasn’t Villeneuve on the verge of a wreck. No, that was him in complete control.
I saw Villeneuve for the first time when my dad took me and my older brother to the 1977 Canadian Grand Prix, near Bowmanville, Ont. At the time, he was a prodigy, having soundly defeated then–world champion James Hunt in a Formula Atlantic race in Trois-Rivières, Que., the racing equivalent of an amateur tennis player sweeping Federer in straight sets. Villeneuve had been recruited by the most famous and successful racing team in the world: Ferrari. Formula One drivers were always British, French or German—not Canadian. Yet, here was one of ours, and he was driving the finest car. I was hooked immediately.
The truth about Villeneuve was that he didn’t win very much. At the time of his death, he had never won a World Championship, and had just six Grand Prix victories to his name. But Formula One was different then. Today, the machines rule. Sebastian Vettel wins most races, and efficient pit stops—not aggressive passing—have become the difference between winning and losing. When Villeneuve raced, the driver mattered. He carved a legend with his style, not his results.
The finest illustration of his bravado took place during the 1979 French Grand Prix at Dijon. In an epic duel for second place, Villeneuve battled Frenchman René Arnoux as if they’d been placed in the octagon. Lap after lap, they tangled in a high-speed chase, banging wheels at ridiculous speeds—extremely dangerous in open-wheel racing. If Villeneuve couldn’t find a gap on the track, he’d simply pass Arnoux on the grass. In the end, Villeneuve beat Arnoux to the checkered flag and claimed second place. The performance created such a stir within the sport that few bother to remember the actual race winner: Jean-Pierre Jabouille.
That year, Villeneuve may have been the best driver in Formula One. But this is a sport that maintains a hierarchy within its teams, and at Ferrari, Villeneuve was the No. 2 driver to Jody Scheckter. That meant the team backed Scheckter in an attempt to win the World Championship, and Villeneuve obliged, without complaint. Scheckter won his title. Villeneuve finished second.
It was a similar arrangement that, some say, ultimately drove Villeneuve to his death. By 1982, Villeneuve had succeeded Scheckter as team leader, and Didier Pironi settled in to the second seat. In the San Marino Grand Prix, Villeneuve led Pironi in the closing laps, and the orders were to hold position. But Pironi went past Villeneuve on the final lap to steal a victory. Villeneuve vowed never to speak to him again.
Two weeks later, still seething and determined to be faster then Pironi at the Belgian Grand Prix, Villeneuve came up on the slower car of Jochen Mass. Unable—or perhaps unwilling—to slow down, he drove into the back of Mass’s car. The Ferrari was hurled in the air and cartwheeled across the track, snapping the seat belts that held Villeneuve inside.
My hero was thrown violently to his death.
Those who followed his career quietly assumed something like this was bound to happen. Villeneuve always crashed hard, but, until then, he always walked away.
My mom was the first to tell me the news after she’d heard a report on the radio. I cried all day.
To try and erase the pain, my brother—also a Villeneuve fanatic—and I became maniacal flag-wavers for Gilles. We scribbled his name on every bathroom wall and the occasional paved road. We dutifully followed his younger brother Jacques (not to be confused with his son Jacques) from Mosport to Montreal. I found a crest bearing his name, had my mom sew it on the front of a black jacket, and wore it constantly. When Villeneuve was posthumously inducted into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame, my brother and I snuck backstage and introduced ourselves to his family. I asked all of them to autograph my program, and found it odd that Villeneuve’s son Jacques—then 11 years old—wrote his last name first.
We also made a pact. Someday, one of us would have a son and name him after Villeneuve.
A few years ago, I saw the reputable magazine MotorSport sitting on a newsstand with a front page trumpeting the top 100 Formula One drivers of all time. If you didn’t know much about racing, you’d expect those with the heavy resumés—the men with multiple World Championships and double-digit victories like Fangio, Senna and Schumacher—to fill the top 10. But I knew better. I flipped through the pages to find: No. 2—Gilles Villeneuve.
Thirty years later, I still miss him. Thankfully, the pact was fulfilled. Jack Redmond Villeneuve Campbell will turn four next fall.
He’s a crazy little devil.
Just like Gilles.
This article originally appeared in Sportsnet magazine.