A lot has changed in the 25 years since Champ Cars last raced at Brands Hatch, but the basics are the same. So before looking forward to Monday's London Champ Car Trophy on the seven-turn, 1.192-mile Brands Hatch short circuit, let's look back to 1978.

A young, not-quite-rookie driver was the winner on that October day. It was the third victory of a breakout season for Rick Mears, who went on to become one of the all-time Champ Car greats.

Most of the Champ Cars that Mears and the rest of the 16-car field drove were powered by 2.65-liter turbocharged Cosworth V-8, running 80 inches of boost in qualifying trim. Road racing returned to USAC's Champ Car series in 1978 after an eight-year absence, but the cars were still designed almost strictly for ovals, with asymmetrical suspension and crude four-speed gearboxes.

"Of course we have problems getting the car through the right-hand corners," Mears told Autosport after testing his Penske PC-6 at Brands in August. "All the fuel is on the left side of the car and that tends to make the car want to pull to the outside of a right hand turn. We're also downshifting a lot more than we do at home, but it's a lot of fun."

Al Unser took the pole in a Lola-Cosworth with a 40.95-second lap but Danny Ongais was dominant on race day until his Parnelli broke a gearbox on Lap 83 of 100. That allowed Mears to win by 29 seconds over his teammate Tom Sneva. Johnny Rutherford was third, one lap down followed by A.J. Foyt (-2 laps) and Wally Dallenbach (-5 laps).