Nelson Piquet took pole, fastest lap and his first career race win to dominate the weekend in his gleaming blue and white Brabham.

The race would be the last in Formula One for Swiss driver Clay Regazzoni, who suffered spinal damage when he lost the brakes in his Ensign approaching the Queen’s Hairpin, and struck a parked Brabham in the run-off followed by a concrete barrier and tires head on at 150 mph (240 km/h).

Piquet was easily the fastest man on the circuit, using Goodyear tires, but Championship leader René Arnoux grabbed second place in his Renault with an early run on soft Michelins.

This opportunity came about when French rookie driver Alain Prost broke his wrist during practice for the South African Grand Prix, and was not fully fit to drive at Long Beach.

The team's main sponsor, Marlboro, offered half the figure but negotiations ended after Hunt broke his leg while skiing.

Pironi slipped to ninth by the end of the session, while the Ferraris of Gilles Villeneuve and Jody Scheckter, so dominant here the year before, struggled to 10th and 16th, and Emerson Fittipaldi just managed to scramble onto the grid in the 24th and final spot.

On lap 4, Giacomelli lost control of his Alfa Romeo under braking for the hairpin at the beginning of Shoreline Drive, and slid sideways across the racing line.

Mass was able to get going again, and he, Jabouille, Laffite, Rosberg, Regazzoni, Fittipaldi and Watson just managed to squeeze through the carnage, and the marshals somehow got the track cleared before the leaders came around, avoiding a red flag to stop the race.

Gilles Villeneuve had managed to get the ill handling Ferrari into a good fourth place but his transmission failed on lap 46 and he was out of the race.

Lap 50 saw a horrific accident which would ultimately end the career of Clay Regazzoni, the brakes on his Ensign N180 car failed on the long start finish straight, unable to reduce speed, he hit the stationary Brabham of Ricardo Zunino which had been left at the run off of the Queen’s hairpin since lap 1, and then head on into a concrete wall.

[3] On lap 63, Arnoux had his right rear tire go completely flat, and by the time he was able to make it back to the pits for a replacement, he had dropped all the way to ninth place.