In Part 2 of our special look back at the 1996 Formula One season, thirty years on, Chequered Past turns from control established to control understood.

While Williams executed a championship defined by clarity and composure, the rest of Formula One was being reshaped in response. Michael Schumacher won races for Ferrari without mounting a title challenge — and in doing so laid the foundations for something far more significant. Elsewhere, the space for outsiders narrowed, unpredictability became exceptional rather than expected, and success increasingly depended on organisation rather than inspiration.

From Ferrari’s patient rebuilding under Jean Todt, through Monaco’s famous interruption and the limits of individual brilliance, to the season’s closing races in Portugal and Japan, this episode explores what 1996 changed — not just in who won, but in how Formula One learned to win.

This is the story of a season that mattered less for what it delivered immediately, and more for what it put in motion.

A quiet turning point.
And a blueprint for the modern era.

Cover image: By BWard 1997 - Own work, CC BY 4.0, Link

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Music by #Mubert Music Rendering