STAR LETTER
Your excellent interview with Riccardo Patrese [The Motor Sport Interview, September] contained one small, but important, factual slip. The wording stated: “After the accident at Monza in 1978 [when Patrese’s Arrows clipped James Hunt’s McLaren at the start, triggering a mass pile-up]…”
The use of the word ‘clipped’ is incorrect. The loss of Ronnie Peterson in the aftermath of the Monza accident was, naturally, a hugely emotive subject. James Hunt, who so bravely pulled his friend from the burning Lotus, claimed in his column that Patrese “barged over on me, pushing me into Ronnie”. Film and photographic evidence gathered by magazine in Italy unequivocally proved there was no contact between Patrese’s Arrows and the McLaren. Of course views differed as to what happened at the start of the race but as Riccardo has stated many times, his own conscience is clear and in October 1981, a lengthy legal inquiry finally and fully rejected the charge of manslaughter brought
