We sprang over the crest of Paddock Hill Bend at 80 or more, the little Lotus Europa cocked way sideways, scrawny tires screaming. I was trying to burrow into the passenger side of the cockpit, jamming my knees against the insides of the legwell, both hands gripping…whatever they could grip. I wasn’t scared, not exactly, but I was very, very alert.

Think of the word tense. Well, Ronnie Peterson was the opposite of that. A tranquil fellow at any time, in this circumstance he appeared nearly torpid, his tall frame slouched low in the seat, one long forearm resting on the center console, pale, slender fingers lightly massaging the gear lever.

The only part of him moving fast was his other hand, the one whipping the Lotus’s little leather steering wheel back and forth, 3 to 9, 3 to 9, chasing the wobbly waggles provoked by the bumpy old Brands Hatch surface.

There we were, heeled over, clocking 80-plus, catching slides…. And my driver was hardly paying attention. He certainly wasn’t looking where we were going.

Out of the corners of my own widened eyes I could see that, all the while we were howling up and over and down the far side of Brands’s famous Paddock Hill Bend, opposite-locking all the way, Ronnie Peterson kept his placid Nordic face swiveled toward me.

He was talking to me. Anything to occupy his mind.

It is truly said that they operate on a different plane, the most gifted of racing drivers, but the statement carries no meaning until you experience it happening with your own life hanging in their hands.

That moment measured the gulf between us, and between ordinary cars and Grand Prix machinery. I was as close to my own limit as that little mid-engined Europa street car was to its limit. Ronnie was.… Ronnie was bored.

Liquid natural speed like a plunging mountain torrent—that’s what Ronnie Peterson looked like in a racing car.

For the whole story, see the March issue of Vintage Racecar.