Trivia Question

[NewMrMe]

I heard a really quirky piece of motorsport trivia recently.

There is a driver who in the space of less than 12 months.
1) Turned down the offer of a drive that ended up going to a future F1 World Champion.
2) Accepted a different offer with a future F1 Constructors' Championship winning team but was sacked before racing for them
3) Substituted for a different future F1 World Champion whilst they were injured.
4) Was injured themselves in an accident and replaced by yet another future F1 Champion.

The driver in question never raced in F1.

Anybody know who the driver is? Or at least, have a guess who the World Champions are or the team might be.

[plutoman]

I know this one; he's from 'my' era, and finally a biography has been written about him. Along with Mike Thackwell and Tommy Byrne, given a few tweaks of circumstance he could have been a major star in the 80s.

Spoiler! :

Answers are:

Stephen South

1 - Turned down a Lotus F1 test driver contract, which went to Nigel Mansell
2 - Signed for the Toleman F2 team, which became Benetton, but lost the drive when he tested for McLaren. The drive went to Brian Henton, who won the championship!
3 - Substituted for Alain Prost in the McLaren at Long Beach, but had a bit of a nightmare and didn't qualify
4 - Replaced in Newman Can Am team by Keke Rosberg