Then Stewart began his fight-back, winning at the disastrous Belgian GP, at Zolder, where the track surface completely fell apart following an eleventh hour circuit upgrade. Only 9 cars were still running at the finish. The race nearly didn’t happen, with drivers refusing to even get in their cars on first citing the peeling surface. They wanted the organisers to call the whole thing off. The situation became extremely political, the spectators didn’t know if the race would take place, and neither did anyone else. Eventually, they relented. Cevert charged away to build a huge margin over the chasing pack until he spun when his brakes failed, but he finished second to his team mate.

Stewart then won at Monaco, and suddenly Fittipaldi only held a 4 point lead. Amazingly, no driver other than Stewart or Fittipaldi had won a World Championship Grand Prix since July 1972, but after the spectacular, but so far luckless, Ronnie Peterson claimed his fourth pole from seven races, Denny Hulme brought his McLaren M23 home first at Anderstorp. In front of 55,000 home fans, Peterson led all but the final 1 ½ laps, a deflating tyre sinking his hopes. Stewart clipped Fittipaldi’s lead to just 2 points, after finishing fifth. The Tyrrell driver slowed towards the end with brake trouble, but the Brazilian didn’t make the finish at all, when his gearbox failed. This was the first time Sweden had held a Formula 1 Grand Prix, and Peterson looked sure to claim his first Grand Prix victory, but the script didn’t quite go to plan.