A punch-start for 'deaf' Hill

A punch-start for ‘deaf’ Hill
Former Le Mans Jaguar exponent Peter Lumsden of ‘Lumsden/Sargent’ fame, vividly recalled from so many middle-of-the-night Raymond Baxter radio commentaries in more recent years created a wonderful hotel and restaurant named The Old Tollgate in Bramber, near Steyning, Sussex. Regular BRDC area lunches take place there and for their Christmas bash I took along Phil Hill’s son Derek erstwhile Formula 3000 driver and a really good guy (who endured my slithery-sliding our way down there in deep snow in the Land Rover).
Who should we bump into as we walked through the door but former Cooper mechanics Mike Barney and Terry Kitson, who had worked with Phil during his albeit unhappy period as a Cooper works driver in 1964. In fact both Mike and Terry got along well with Phil, and classical music buff Terry the team’s specialist welder vividly recalled the 1961 World Champion demonstrating a brand-new hi-fl set he’d just acquired, in his room at the Nurburgring Sporthotel during the German GP meeting. Terry recalled Phil insisting they appreciate and savour the full tonal range from those brandnew speakers as he cranked up the volume fit to burst: “It was great we were there for hours, Phil really loved his music…”
Mike and Terry also recalled an incident on the starting grid for the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa. Phil had qualified way back 15th in fact and then had trouble starting his car’s Climax V8 engine on the signal. The Cooper lads realised he was trying to start the thing in gear but in the general heat of the moment and the flurry of Formula 1 engines starting up all around him, he didn’t seem to notice. “Phil!” they were bawling. “Knock it out of gear!” Wearing his car plugs and crash helmet he simply didn’t hear them. But just huffing the starter buffon in the firmly chocked car wasn’t working. It seems that Hughie Frankland, the South African mechanic on Phil’s car, then wasted no more time. “He just took the biggest spanner from his tool kit,” Mike recalled, “and whacked Phil across the crash helmet. That got his full affention…”
As well it might. Not sure it would be received today in the helpful spirit intended…