Books

Tough brief – the whole century of the Le Mans 24 Hours in one hit, and not from a publisher you might expect. But while the mainstream format short-changes us…

Couldn’t make it up? Of course you could, if you were writing an overblown novel: wealthy aristocrat backer, dashing driver coming from nowhere, yachts, champagne, parties, and then beating established…

It’s clear from the outset who this book is aimed at: those fans of F1 who came to the sport via the smash-hit Netflix docuseries Drive to Survive. The clue…

It was a bold adventure – resurrecting a defunct marque with a huge story behind it, and for a while it seemed to have succeeded. Then everything went wrong for…

Confession time: I’m not much interested in F1 drivers’ wages, their social media blunders or their ‘mental challenges for the forthcoming season’. I am interested in the racing, and especially…

Hallowed. A good way of avoiding the overused word ‘golden’ to pin down a period when everything looked at its finest, at least from our later viewpoint. That half a…

I don’t want it to be hurtful to anyone,” says Joann Villeneuve in the opening moments of the new feature-length documentary on her husband Gilles and his friend, team-mate and eventual…

So is it a new firm, this Audi lot? Or is it a DKW? What has Auto Union got to do with it? That was the branding muddle Audi had…

They’re among the ugliest cars ever to compete at Le Mans but they appear here in one of the most beautiful books I’ve seen. Not only is it vast but…

I’m glad I’m not a judge. Paul Griffin, a city lawyer as well as a historic racer, hangs his book round a number of high-profile car disputes: it’s obvious that…

Paddock rumours of skulduggery from mild cheating to murder have always been popular gossip, but Crispian Besley has decided to pin down a bookful of those which have the evidence…

One of my treasured books as a young lad was The Boys’ Book of Motors (it’s still on the shelf behind me). As well as the various four-wheeled excitements I…

Back in a time when the ageing 328 and the flashy Testarossa were the best that Ferrari had to offer, and before the company suddenly remembered that you could still…

Forty years of Group C? It’s the anniversary that just keeps on giving. If the heavyweight triple-volume celebration of works Porsche 962s reviewed in this space last month, Ultimate Works…

First, a declaration. It was Andrew Marriott who got me started in the writing racket almost 60 years ago by recruiting me as a freelancer at Motoring News. We shared…

Everyone wants to drive the ’Ring – it’s implicit in the membership badge of the Petrolhead Club. We also all know that it’s almost impossible to learn all of it,…

Remember Drake Olson? Not sure we did. Briefly a rising star in IMSA, Olson made a single start in a works Rothmans Porsche 962, sharing No3 (chassis 002) with Vern…