On 19 February 1967, the world’s finest drivers gathered at Warwick Farm for the Australian Grand Prix — a race that did not count towards the Formula One World Championship, yet carried genuine international weight.

The Tasman Series was in full flow, running to 2.5-litre regulations at a time when Europe had already embraced the new 3-litre Formula One era. For a few weeks each year, elite drivers moved between two technical frameworks within the same season — lighter, well-integrated Tasman machinery in the southern summer, heavier and more powerful cars in Europe.

That afternoon in Sydney, the race became a distinctly Scottish affair.

Jackie Stewart mastered the flowing Warwick Farm circuit to take victory, with Jim Clark close behind. The dominance of the two Scots prompted the New South Wales Governor to suggest the race be renamed the “Scottish Grand Prix”.

But this was more than a national curiosity.

Clark would go on to secure his second Tasman title that season. Denny Hulme would claim the 1967 Formula One World Championship. And within a year, aerodynamic revolution and commercial change would begin reshaping the sport’s identity.

This episode explores a moment of overlap — when two formulas coexisted, when Stewart asserted control, when Clark demonstrated championship consistency, and when one Australian afternoon briefly felt unmistakably Scottish.

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On 18 February, we mark the birthday of Enzo Ferrari — the founder, the autocrat, and the figure whose name became inseparable from Formula One itself.

In this episode of Chequered Past, we explore a different side of Ferrari. Not the political operator. Not the disciplinarian. But the admirer.

Across half a century of racing, two drivers stood apart in his memory. The pre-war hero Tazio Nuvolari, whose 1935 Nürburgring victory defied machinery and nation alike. And the fearless Canadian Gilles Villeneuve, whose instinctive, uncompromising style rekindled Ferrari’s belief in racing as an act of courage.

Neither man defined Ferrari statistically.

Both defined him emotionally.

This episode examines what those choices reveal about Ferrari himself — and the kind of racing spirit he valued above calculation, politics, and even championships.

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On 17 February 1959, Mike Coughlan was born — an engineer whose career would become forever linked with one of the most explosive controversies in modern Formula One history.

In 2007, a confidential Ferrari technical dossier, a photocopy shop in Surrey, and a bitter intra-team rivalry at McLaren combined to ignite what became known as “Spygate.” What began as a dispute between individuals escalated into High Court action, an extraordinary FIA hearing in Paris, a record-breaking $100 million fine, and the exclusion of McLaren from the Constructors’ Championship.

As Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso and Kimi Räikkönen battled for the Drivers’ title, the sport itself was fighting a parallel battle over governance, integrity and the limits of competitive ambition.

In this episode of Chequered Past, we revisit the scandal that reshaped compliance in Formula One, fractured a championship campaign, and forced the sport to confront where innovation ends and industrial espionage begins.

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