3 March in Ferrari history: Gilles Villeneuve’s Kyalami victory
3 March marks a successful beginning for one of Ferrari’s championship-winning cars. At the 1979 South African Grand Prix, Gilles Villeneuve led Jody Scheckter home in a one-two finish on the Ferrari 312 T4’s race debut.
1979: Gilles Villeneuve wins at Kyalami
Gilles Villeneuve completed the 78-lap race 3.420 seconds ahead of his team-mate. Jean-Pierre Jarier finished third for Tyrrell, leaving Ferrari with both leading positions at the chequered flag.
For Jody Scheckter, second place came at his home Grand Prix. For Ferrari, the result demonstrated the new car’s potential at the beginning of a season that would eventually bring both world championships.
The pairing repeated its first-and-second finishing order at Long Beach in the following round. Kyalami therefore began consecutive one-two finishes with Gilles Villeneuve leading the way.
2002: Michael Schumacher wins the Australian opener
On 3 March 2002, Michael Schumacher won the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne. Rubens Barrichello retired in the other Ferrari, giving the team contrasting outcomes at the opening race of the season.
The two anniversaries connect a winning car debut with a winning start to another championship campaign. Explore the earlier winner’s career in our Gilles Villeneuve Formula 1 records.
Ferrari events on 3 March
March 3 in Ferrari Formula 1 history
Explore Ferrari Grand Prix results, qualifying and Sprint sessions, driver birthdays, remembrance dates and selected milestones connected with this day.
Ferrari Grands Prix held on March 3
Race, qualifying, Sprint and Ferrari driver biographical dates are generated from the locally processed F1DB dataset. Session anniversaries are shown only when an explicit session date is available in the source. Selected non-race Ferrari milestones are curated separately from Ferrari sources. Historical shared-car result rows are preserved without inventing additional Grand Prix starts.
Discover more race anniversaries in the Ferrari history calendar.
