Indy 500 or first F1 win? Jacques Villeneuve gives clear verdict on favourite victory

In any successful driver’s career, there are certain to be certain milestones more special than the rest. First wins, championship titles — it’s clear these are critical. 

But for a driver like Jacques Villeneuve, who has victories in Formula 1 as well as IndyCar to his name, which would you prefer? For the Canadian driver, the answer is simple: The Indianapolis 500.

Jacques Villeneuve: Indy 500 over F1 victory

While countless racers have tried their hand at both IndyCar and Formula 1 over the years, only a handful can be counted as being among the truly successful. One such driver is Jacques Villeneuve.

Son of the iconic Gilles Villeneuve, Jacques had big shoes to fill and has showed his merit by competing in everything from Formula 1 to IndyCar to NASCAR to endurance racing.

After a career in junior formulae in Europe and Japan, Villeneuve made his debut in CART (which, through a series of bankruptcies and mergers, ended up becoming IndyCar) back in 1994.

That first year, he made waves by starting from fourth on the 33-car Indianapolis 500 starting grid, with his second-place finish netting him Rookie of the Year honors. And the next year, when he returned, he clinched victory at the iconic event and went on to take the CART title.

More analysis from PlanetF1.com:

👉 Has McLaren really been playing favourites in Norris v Piastri title fight?

👉 Does F1 have a girlfriend obsession? What Singapore GP coverage actually reveals

Villeneuve then moved to Formula 1 in 1996, joining the Williams Renault outfit and taking his first victory four races into his international open-wheel racing career at none other than the formidable Nurburgring. The year after, in 1997, he won his only F1 title.

But when it comes to comparing his first victory in F1 with his Indy 500 victory, there’s no comparison in Villeneuve’s mind: The Indy 500 wins out.

That very question was posed to Villeneuve this past weekend at the Il Festival dello Sport di Trento, a four-day festival dedicated to celebrating all things sport, including Formula 1’s 75th anniversary.

Asked to choose between an F1 victory and Indianapolis, he relied, “The 500, because it’s the most important race in the world, with 300,000 people watching you.

“It’s a race, but it’s like a championship in itself.”

Not everyone in the room was pleased with that answer, reports Gazzetta dello Sport, and the conversation moved on quite quickly after — to Villeneuve’s championship victory against the inimitable Scuderia Ferrari and Michael Schumacher.

“Winning the championship against Ferrari was something special,” Villeneuve said, “something powerful.

“I know not everyone was happy about it, especially those of you here. But that’s how it was. And you could see it on the smug faces of even those from other teams.”

In a conversation with ESPN back in 2001, Villeneuve admitted of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, “I have great memories here, definitely.

“Having won here opened the door at Williams in 1995. It was a very important race, and I will always remember it, of course.”

That 1995 Indy 500 victory was a tremendous one. Early chaos meant that Villeneuve was two laps down at one point, penalized for accidentally passing the pace car following a horrifying accident at the start of the race. But over the course of 150 laps, Villeneuve was able to not only unlap himself but also race back to the front of the field.

“Normally, Indy is a race where you don’t drive to the limit,” Villeneuve recalled in Autosport back in 2012.

“It’s a long race, it’s dangerous. But there we were, two laps down, and I had to do quali laps the whole way through.”

Villeneuve’s victory at the 1996 European Grand Prix, then, was relatively relaxed by comparison. He bypassed polesitter Damon Hill at the start, then went on to lead every lap on the way to victory.

Read next: 11 totally true Indy 500 facts that sound completely fake