I was in the lift at my hotel a couple of days before the race and a guy walked in and stared at me, and then began to smile. 'How are you going to do then, Damon?' he asked me. I was a bit ambivalent, mumbling something about not holding out that much hope. The guy didn't stop smiling for a moment, but he looked surprised. 'You're in the race, aren't you?' he said. 'Yes,' I replied, and the guy smiled even more. 'Well then, you've got a chance,' he said, and got out at the next floor. By the time I reached my room, I was feeling more bullish than ever, and as it turned out, I nearly got on the podium. Golden rule: anything can happen in Formula One -just don't give up hope. The race in Montreal was restarted after an enormous accident and that set the pattern for the afternoon. It seemed like a driver was going off just about every lap and, by the simple expedient of keeping clear of trouble, I managed to get up to third place before my first pit-stop. Everything was looking good for a top-three finish, which would have done everybody at Jordan, including myself, the power of good. Then our bad luck struck again and the car dribbled to a halt.

If that was disappointing, then what happened after the race had finished was depressingly familiar. I had had a little battle with Michael Schumacher when we were contesting second place and, before I knew it, he had said in a press conference that I had tried to kill him by weaving all over the road when he was trying to pass me. He really did say that. He suggested, with a straight face, that my driving could have killed him. No matter that, in the same race, Michael had knocked Heinz-Harald Frentzen off the track, or that he himself had weaved in front of me lots of times in the past. No, he said that I had done my best to kill him and everybody listened agog. Not surprisingly, the world's Press absolutely feasted on the story. Hill and Schumacher were, it seemed, back at each other's throats, which was just the sort of story that everybody loves.

In fact, it wasn't the first time we had clashed in the season. At the first race, in Melbourne, I came out of the pits while Michael was on a quick lap and I got in his way at the first corner. I tried my hardest to leave him a way through, but it wasn't enough. There was nothing I could do about it, but, on television, it looked for all the world as if I was deliberately holding him up. It looked like it to Schumacher, too, because he drove alongside me, shaking his fist.

How many times have we seen that before from Michael? Personally, I have seen it more than enough, so I thought to myself 'I'm not taking this' and drove off. Lo and behold, the next thing I know, he's racing me into the next corner, obviously wound up. And at that precise moment, the television cameras picked us up and started broadcasting our little tiff to the whole world.

Formula One is about sport and it's about entertainment. It's about giving people what they want, satisfying all their curiosities and keeping them gripped. There are a lot of sides to that, but, as with any other sport, one of the aspects that spectators like to see is a good bit of rivalry. They want to see drivers battling against each other with a bit of bite. And, this being Formula One, they normally get it.

Rivalries develop as time goes by. Drivers tend, at some point, to give their opinion on other drivers and they also tend not to be too complimentary while they're at it. That's part of the fabric of the sport.

It is just about impossible for any driver to compliment another one without being made to feel that he has stepped out of line. It's just not the done thing, because we're all worried about seeming weak. The natural reaction is to play down the skill of the others and hope that, in turn, your own reputation goes up.

That might sound like quite acceptable business practice but, as time passes, all those comments begin to grate. It gets on your nerves to constantly hear yourself being bad-mouthed and criticised, and eventually something inside snaps. If somebody keeps having a go at you, then your reaction is to say: 'I'll show him.'

There is a difference, though, between spats - where it's just a couple of drivers who have had a few words about something - and genuine, hard-fought rivalries that have a real edge. For them, you need some extra factor that has thrown a couple of guys together, something that makes them want to beat each other more than anybody else in the field. What that normally means is that they are either team-mates or they are the two challengers for the world championship, because those are the key conflicts that make up Formula One.

There have been two of them in my Formula One career, two rivalries that have been played out in front of a worldwide audience. Both of them have been keenly fought, and both of them taught me a lot about the way the sport operates. The other drivers involved in them? Jacques Villeneuve and, of course, Michael Schumacher.

I have lost count of the number of times I have tussled with Michael over the past four seasons, and there is no doubt that our rivalry has come under a lot of scrutiny at various times. But I also had a great year when I was battling at the front with Jacques Villeneuve, a season that ended with me edging him out to become world champion. From the outside, the battles might have looked similar, but from my point of view there was a world of difference.

With Jacques, most obviously, we were fighting as teammates and also fighting for the championship. It's hard enough to deal with a fast team-mate, but when that guy is also your rival for the title, then there's a lot at stake. You have to do your best to stay on top of everything, to stay in control.

Sometimes, competitive team-mates can mean double-trouble for a team. Giancarlo Fisichella, for example, clearly did not hit it off with Ralf Schumacher at all well at Jordan last year and that probably did not help them. Both of them were desperate to win their own personal duel and, instead of concentrating all their attention on the races, they both spent rather too long thinking of ways to beat each other. For everybody involved, that's a difficult situation to deal with.

Sometimes, though, it can be very healthy, and that was the case during my battles with Jacques while we were together at Williams in 1996. Even though we were both fighting for the biggest prizes, we didn't end up hating each other or trying to knock each other off the track. It was a good battle, a good rivalry and it provided people with good entertainment.

I like Jacques and I respect him. He has a very strong sense of sportsmanship and he is always keen to maintain that element of fairness that some of the other drivers don't worry about. If you beat Jacques in a race or outdo him somehow, he doesn't take it personally. He's big enough to shake your hand and say well done. To him, that's part of life and part of the sport, and it means that if he beats you in the next race, you return the compliment.

Now, despite all this friendship, there was still plenty of competition between us. Sure we got on well as teammates, but the rivalry was still intense within the team and we were both desperate to win. I wanted to win the world championship and so did he, and there was no way that either of us was going to lose sight of that.

He would never offer to help me, and I would never offer to help him, and we both knew that those were the rules. To him, it was a case of all being fair in love and war, and he wouldn't hesitate to try to distract me somehow. If something annoyed me or put me off, I always expected Jacques to take advantage of that and exploit it, but I never felt bitter. On the track, I always knew he would be fair, but I would never expect him to wave me past. That's what makes for a good rivalry and, after I had beaten him to the championship, Jacques offered me a warm handshake to say well done. The following season, I was pleased to see him succeed me as world champion.

I have a similar relationship with Ralf Schmacher now and I'm delighted that it has developed that way. We are both aware that neither of us is going to make it easy for the other guy, but at the same time we are not going to be stupid about it and deliberately try to withhold information or be pig-headed. There is a line that, as team-mates, you shouldn't cross.

The important thing in a rivalry is that you try to understand the other person and get a handle on how they behave. Motor racing is a lot safer these days, but it remains a dangerous sport, and I feel a lot happier if I'm racing hard against someone whom I respect.

The acid test is whether the person you're up against is the sort of guy who is going to be able to get out of his car at the end of the race and say 'I enjoyed that.' He might go on to say 'You shouldn't have done that' or 'I'm sorry, but I shouldn't have done that', but if you can sit down and have a chat and a laugh afterwards, then that's as much as you can realistically ask for. An ideal relationship is one where you have a certain regard for your competitors and earn their respect by your own performance. Jacques is a great example of somebody who acts properly when he is racing with you. I'm not so sure about a few others.

A couple of years ago, Jacques overtook Michael Schu-macher while they were going round the outside of a bend in Estoril. It was a brilliant piece of driving and it got people up out of their seats and cheering all over the world. When I saw a replay of it on television a little later on, I was pretty impressed myself, because it was a brave, instinctive manoeuvre - just what motor racing at the very top level is all about.

The two of them were running very close and Michael got himself tangled up, briefly, with a backmarker. Immediately, Jacques seized the opportunity and took the corner, but Michael just couldn't bring himself to say well done after the race had finished.

What Michael should have said was 'that was close but well done, you caught me napping.' Instead, he complained to him about it and claimed Jacques' manoeuvre was dangerous. While everybody else was patting Jacques on the back, Michael was trying to rubbish him. If he had considered Jacques' move to be dangerous, then he should have backed off instead of waiting to moan about it. Michael felt he had to criticise Jacques for what he did simply because, on the day, he had been beaten fair and square - and that is not the right approach at all.

There are two things that set Michael apart from the rest of the drivers in Formula One - his sheer talent and his attitude. I am full of admiration for the former, but the latter leaves me cold.

When it comes to his driving, though, I don't mind being complimentary. He is perceived to be the most extraordinarily talented driver in Formula One and it would be daft to pretend that he is not very good. That does not mean he cannot be beaten or challenged, though, because it would mean more to beat him than anybody else because he is perceived to be the best.

Eddie Irvine, who has been his team-mate at Ferrari for the past three years, is not somebody I normally agree with, but he has got one thing right. Irvine takes the view that Michael is incredible and he accepts that and tries to get on with the job of approaching him for speed.

Other team-mates, up until then, have been totally out-psyched by their inability to cope with being second to Michael and being soundly beaten. They might have been given lesser equipment or shown less interest by the team, but they have made matters worse by not coming to terms with that. From the start, Irvine grasped the nettle and said okay, I have to make it my objective to be as close as I can. That is the only way a driver can cope with being put up against Schumacher.

1994 was the year when the rivalry between Michael and me came to a head, and that was the year when I first became really aware of what a talent he has.

I had a conversation with Michael in the paddock and I told him that I thought he had a lot of talent. It was just after Benetton had had all their stuff impounded amid allegations that they were using traction control. I said to him that he was good enough not to need any kind of illegal help and it would not help him in the long run. He is there to win however he can do it. Some of his victories are brilliant. Some of his methods, though, are very questionable.

The difference between the rivalry between Ayrton Senna and Alain Proust and mine with Michael is that I was never held in esteem by Michael. His attitude is a bit like Goliath. He is full of disdain for his enemies and the challenge they present, as if he is saying, 'Why do you bring me these mere mortals?' It doesn't rest easily with him to pay compliments to his rivals.

Throughout the 1994 season, there had been suggestions and rumours that Michael had not been playing it straight, so it was acrimonious from the start. Then you add to that his problems with ignoring the black flag in Silverstone and you could see how it was taking shape.

The whole season was acted out under a cloud from Imola, where Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger had both died in crashes. After that came Michael's attempts to undermine me through the papers by saying I was not a very good driver. It all added to the rivalry and, of course, a lot of people loved it.

Formula One can be a little like boxing. It usually comes down to a conflict between two drivers for the championship and, as in boxing, it is more interesting to see a fight between two guys who hate each other's guts than two blokes who think the world of each other. I remember seeing Nigel Benn and Chris Eubank on a chat show before a fight and they were being set up to show they had respect for each other, but it didn't ring true and consequently it diffused the whole event. You need someone like Moham-mad Ali to say 'I'm the greatest and the other guy is ugly and slow.' He, however, managed to do it in a way that endeared him to people.

In 1994, we had a climax whereby the championship would be over if I didn't beat Michael in the penultimate race. I beat him fair and square in Japan in the rain and I believe to this day that we had equal machinery then. I even did one pit-stop where they could not get one of the rear tyres off, so I had one tyre that did the whole race. It was exciting and it set up the final race in Adelaide as the decider. I went away on a high and Michael had to delay his celebrations.

We all know what happened next in Adelaide. He was forced to push so hard that he made a mistake which could have cost him the world championship if it was not for the fact that his car had enough left in it so that he could drive into me as I went to pass him. I didn't have to say anything. Everyone saw what had happened and I just knew there was no point in saying anything at that time. I was not going to let the season end with people calling me a sore loser. It had been a pretty tragic season anyway and everyone was already outraged at what he had done. I just thought I would leave it at that.

At the time, I couldn't believe that he would do such a thing but, with hindsight, I think I was being a little na'ive. I was not going to accuse him of doing the dirty on me, because I regarded it as an error of judgment on my part. I simply had not understood how far some drivers - and one driver in particular - would go in order to win. I was shocked that anybody would resort to that, but there was nothing I could accomplish. I simply filed it away for future reference.

I was new to the game. It was only my second season in Formula One and I was not sure how to deal with all the questions. My friends around me told me not to say a thing and that was the best advice I was given. It was not necessary for me to say anything and it would not have changed what happened.

What it did do was to make Michael champion, but at the same time it painted him pretty much as the villain in many people's eyes, particularly in the UK. He was the champion, no doubt about that, but he had not achieved it in the way that a champion should.

The rivalry was kept alive, not out of any deliberate intention on my part, but because we happened to be the protagonists again the following year. The whole season was a repeat performance of Adelaide and the Press were always trying to get me to say what I thought about him.

My line was 'Don't get mad, get even'. The scene was set in 1995 for it to be a return match. As it turned out, it was one of the worst seasons I have ever had.

A juvenile part of me wanted to have a rivalry and I was quite happy for it to be Damon v Michael, because everyone was singing his praises and telling me what a great driver he was. I wanted to beat Michael and earn some respect for myself. But I misjudged the situation and, in a way, it put me in the same predicament as some of his team-mates, in that I was his preferred victim. If you lose to him, you tend to find yourself in the firing line while the other guys do not even get a mention. There is a price to pay for pitching yourself against the best. You have to win and the pressure is greater. In 1995, I didn't win. In fact, I came off very badly.

I was not experienced enough and I didn't appreciate what Frank Williams and Patrick Head wanted and how they worked. My mistake was to assume that they would back me up in my personal battle in the drivers' championship against Schumacher. Where it seems I got things wrong was in assuming that they were interested in the drivers' championship at all. To them, Formula One is about providing the best equipment to the drivers and then letting them get on with it. The constructors' championship, with its fringe benefits, such as where a team can park in the paddock and garage their cars, the bonuses paid by sponsors and manufacturers, moving up the pecking order for new deals and, of course, the satisfaction of outperforming a rival, is everything to a team owner.

In effect, I was left to my own devices to beat the Schumacher-Benetton war machine. Benetton's focus was on the drivers' championship and giving Michael every advantage wherever possible, even if that meant the other driver in the team lost out, and they ended up winning both the drivers' and constructors' titles. That was when the seeds of my departure from Williams the following season were sown, because I ended the year as a beaten man. As a campaign, 1995 nearly ended my career as a Grand Prix driver, all because I lost to my main rival.

In Formula One, the driving is the easy bit - politics and all the other outside stresses are what really test a modern driver. It is about how you can stay unaffected by all the other aspects of the sport and it is not so easy to push all those concerns to one side. It is the difference between walking along a tightrope when it's a foot off the ground, and doing it when it's slung between two buildings 500 feet up in the air. That's when the people who can are sorted from those who just think they can.

For some people, the political side to the sport comes as second nature and that gives them a big advantage over the rest. They can deal with all the battles that are going on behind the scenes and manipulate them to their own advantage. While the rest of the field are fretting and worrying, there are normally a couple of canny drivers who have everything worked out. Put somebody like that into a bitter rivalry, and it's something to behold!

Alain Prost was a master at dealing with all those outside influences and pressures, so when he was paired with Ayrton Senna at McLaren their battle was destined to be a classic.

With both those men behind the wheel of a good car (with what was easily the best engine), McLaren won all but one of the races in 1988 and only some very bad luck prevented them winning the other race as well. It was complete domination, an absolute two-horse race, and a lot of people took the view that it was not very interesting. I thought it was fascinating to watch because you didn't know which man would win each race, but you could see they both wanted desperately to come out on top.

The fact that the two best drivers of the time were in the same team created a tinderbox situation because they had this ferocious rivalry, which was nearly all aggravated by Ayrton.

He had a vulnerability about him, as I discovered when we worked together in 1994. He readily flew off the handle if he suspected he was being mistreated and, at times in 1988, he obviously felt that Alain, somehow or other, was pulling a fast one on him. Ayrton would come out with these emotional outbursts, demanding justice but, more than that, showing his weak points to everybody around. The more angry Ayrton got, the more obvious it was to Alain, and everybody else, that he was worried.

The story of their rivalry became even more interesting to me because I worked with both drivers in the following years. Alain was my Williams team-mate in 1993 and Ayrton replaced him the next year and I discovered for myself that they were entirely different characters. Alain was a more considered, thoughtful person, someone who made his point through innuendo rather than thumping the table. Ayrton, on the other hand, was impulsive and much more likely to do something without thinking of the consequences.

In that amazing 1988 season you got the impression that Alain was a little bit smarter at playing with politics and more in control. Ayrton, by contrast, always seemed to be at his limit all the time, always wound up and ready to let go. That was how Ayrton was anyway, but Prost managed to push him into corners and get him excited and frustrated, playing on his flaws.

Ayrton's volatile nature has revealed itself a few times over the years. A couple of seasons later, for instance, Ayrton hit Eddie Irvine in the face after a race because he was angry with him. If he had been in control, Ayrton would not have given him the time of day, but he was goaded into doing it by a mischievous Gerhard Berger, his teammate at the time. Ayrton couldn't help it, because that was the way he was, but it gave Prost a chink in the Senna armour that he could exploit. And, of course, he exploited it to the full.

Their rivalry was an absolute classic. It featured two great characters and it had a purpose. It wasn't just that they were team-mates, not even that they were both fighting for the world championship. Instead, it was all about the two of them trying to outdo each other and prove to the world which of them was the best racing driver in Formula One.

Ayrton was the pretender because, at that time, Alain was the one who had the bigger reputation. He was regarded as the best driver around and, as Ayrton well knew, if you want to become the best, you have to beat the best. You have to demolish other people's icon, the person who has become popular and a model of perfection. If you can't do that, then the question of who is top-dog comes down to conjecture and personal preference. If you thrash your nearest rival, nobody doubts that you are the best.

So how do you create a good rivalry? Certainly not by hatred. I have never felt that hatred for the other guy is a healthy emotion. I think intense desire to beat someone, perhaps stemming from dislike, is fine, but you shouldn't be motivated by out and out hatred.

You have to harness your emotions if you are to be effective. You cannot let them rule you or else you are out of control and in no fit state to be racing. Mario Andretti got it right when he said that you have to be angry, but you should not get angry in a racing car. You need controlled aggression. If you get angry, you're in the wall.

It doesn't matter what sport it is, you normally get a better performance out of two guys who have an intense rivalry. Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett, for instance. It was always a showdown. Two men give their absolute best when they know they can't afford to lose.