From the archive: Two of the best laps of F1 racing you'll ever see

It would truly take something monumental to overshadow the first Formula 1 win for a team or the first for a revolutionary technology, let alone both at once.

Yet what stood out in the 1979 French Grand Prix was not Jean-Pierre Jabouille winning in his turbocharged Renault RS11 but the battle behind him over the last three laps.

Almost immediately after the finish, the Renault team manager, Gérard Larrousse, took aside his junior driver, René Arnoux.

This was only the young Frenchman's 13th start in the sport, and third place at Dijon behind Jabouille and Ferrari's Gilles Villeneuve represented not just his first podium but also his first points finish.

Arnoux's boss did so not to praise him, but to invite him to watch the footage of himself battling the Ferrari 312T4 over the final three laps. You should do the same, especially if you never have before. (It's easy to find on YouTube.)

"Larrousse winked at the crowd gathering around," Autocar's Peter Windsor wrote in his after-race report. “And so they ran the film – of Villeneuve diving inside the Renault with two laps to go.

"Smoke shrouds the Ferrari as it peels into the apex, but Gilles is there and René drops back to third place. 

"René opens his eyes wide, a young kid waiting for the next bit of action. Larrousse sits impassively, the master in charge.

"Next lap – and it is the last lap – it is Arnoux inside Villeneuve. He has the line at the end of the straight, but the Ferrari follows him right round the outside, and the two bash wheels as they vie to become the first to apply their power.

"Arnoux looks sideways and gives Larrousse a grin. Larrousse pats him on the shoulder.

"But then comes the real action. Arnoux has the line for an instant. Then it is Villeneuve sweeping to the other side for the downhill plunge, looking perfectly set up for the apex. He is so, and Arnoux runs wide – in fourth gear – over the kerb, into the dirt and off the throttle.