If you want to fathom the true mystique of a Triple Crown for a Formula One driver, just ask Jacques Villeneuve. In the annals of motorsport, nobody has come closer than the fast-talking, fast-living Canadian to emulating the feat, immortalised by Graham Hill, of winning the world championship, the Indianapolis 500 and the Le Mans 24 Hours.

In 2008, he was poised to tie a ribbon on this fabled trilogy, only for his Peugeot team to squander a vast investment in that summer’s Le Mans by finishing second. The near-miss is, he says, “something that I’ll carry to the grave”.

Such details of history are hardwired into Villeneuve, a racer to his bones. They could scarcely be otherwise, when, as son of the celebrated Gilles, the former Ferrari driver killed in qualifying for the 1982 Belgian Grand Prix, he finds himself the custodian of a noble lineage. It is one he has honoured abundantly, with his triumph at Indianapolis in 1995 followed two years later by the F1 world title.