Interestingly, the Ligier driver went quickest in a somewhat unrepresentative warm-up session on Sunday morning, and felt bullish about what was to come.
“When I woke up in the morning, I cheered when I opened the windows and I saw the rain,” Panis told F1’s official site.
“I said to my wife, ‘I’ll finish on the podium today’. She said: ‘Yeah, yeah. I think you’re crazy, you’re starting 14th in Monaco!’
“I said: ‘Yeah, but it’s raining, and you never know what is going to happen! I believed in it. I just convinced myself it was possible.”
“When I did the best lap time in the warm-up, everybody thought we had low fuel and blah blah blah, all the bulls*** all the time people are talking, and I was so confident and so happy with my car and… I let the people talk.”
Ferrari’s Michael Schumacher had taken a remarkable pole position from championship leader Damon Hill, with a half-a-second gap, as the Benettons of Jean Alesi and Gerhard Berger made up the second row.
Race start
Still, halfway through the race, victory looked but an elusive dream, with Panis 49 seconds behind Hill and 22 seconds down on Alesi. But a warning light showed up on the Briton’s dashboard and an engine failure eventually struck him down on lap 41. Then, 20 tours later, a rear suspension failure ended Alesi’s hope for a second F1 victory.
“I overtook seven cars in the wet,” Panis told Autosport in somewhat hyperbolic fashion, “and after my pitstops, I made some more places. Everything I tried was a bit of a risk – when I passed Irvine I touched him and I thought I’d destroyed the front wing, but it was OK and I knew it was my day!”
“I was so destroyed, you know,” one-time grand prix winner Alesi told F1. “When I came out of the car, I went to my mechanics and I was just very sad. I was personally more affected because I wanted not just to win the race, also to start a winning process with Benetton. And that never happened.”
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Having survived a spin on Hill’s oil, Panis led Coulthard by five seconds with 15 laps remaining; Herbert, Villeneuve, Hakkinen and Salo were close together, but over 20 seconds down.
Chaos perdured. Villeneuve, who had qualified only 10th and was having a mediocre weekend given Williams’ dominance, collided with the race’s backmarker, Luca Badoer, when lapping the Forti driver.
“I wasn’t thinking about the win at that point, I didn’t have the pace, but it was [about] getting as many points on Damon as possible,” Villeneuve told F1. “Obviously, crashing with a backmarker – a guy who was five laps down – was very frustrating. I wasn’t fighting anyone for position, it was just a question of reaching the end of the race and scoring the points.
Jacques Villeneuve, Williams
Some luck definitely was involved. Panis savvily stopped using sixth gear, resorted to lifting and coasting, and the two-hour limit proved useful as the chequered flag was waved three laps early.
As the Monaco Grand Prix winner, the Frenchman was invited to the dinner hosted by Prince Rainier that night, in keeping with tradition. He never expected to win and hadn’t brought a suit, so had to acquire one at the last minute.
There were more attire-related shenanigans. “With Mika we ended up at Rascasse bar as the sun was coming up,” Coulthard told F1. “I had the kilt on for going to the gala dinner, and at the end of the night, Mika was wearing the kilt and I was wearing the suit, so everything got a bit crazy.”
Regardless, it was Ligier’s first victory since Jacques Laffite won the 1981 Canadian GP – and the last, carrying particular significance. “It was fantastic for me and for the team because it meant they could sell the team for more,” Panis told Autosport. “Alain Prost tells me I am the driver who cost him the most!”
Alain Prost, Prost Grand Prix, Olivier Panis, Prost Grand Prix
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