Great Read

Ambition is a funny thing. For some it burns so bright it sears a lasting scar on their personalities. Others look as if they don't have a scrap of it…

The image is clear in my mind's eye: a ball of first-lap spray containing two Williams-Renaults, Karl Wendlinger's Sauber, Michael Schumacher's Benetton and Ayrton Senna's trim McLaren MP4/8 tagging on…

Formula 1 in 1973 boiled down to Lotus versus Tyrrell: Lithe and balanced 72 versus stubby and twitchy 005-006. But were either the best car of the season? Silverstone that…

So here it sits. McLaren M6A-1. Not McLaren’s first effort at building a sports car, nor even its first Can-Am car - that particular honour fell to the M1B -…

There was a lot to think about. But Bruce Leslie McLaren — boss / designer / engineer / tester / racer — preferred it that way. Three years of his…

Emerson Fittipaldi's language dates him, reminding you of a time in motor-racing more violent and dangerous, yet also gentler, less hard-nosed. 'Dice', for example, is a favourite word of his,…

Österreichring, austria, August 13, 1972 It is easy to forget that the permanent race-track, in the hills overlooking the village of Zeltweg, was opened only three years ago. Even before…

As US Air Force One touched safely down, STP Pontiac number 43 raced past it on the parallel back straight of Daytona. Its driver was in the midst of one…

Even before you meet Mario Andretti, the bare statistics tell you this man is unique. In a full-time career lasting an astonishing 35 seasons, he was a winner in F1,…

So many victories slipped from his grasp that Nigel Mansell could perhaps fill this series on his own. Indeed he could single-handedly keep The Championship That Got Away going for…

I’m sitting outside a bistro in the warm Paris sunshine, enjoying a pre-lunch aperitif with Henri Pescarolo. Not for nothing is this man known as Monsieur Le Mans. He has…

The true value of most great technological breakthroughs can usually only be appreciated with the benefit of hindsight. Life didn’t change the moment Karl Benz first swung his Motorwagen into…

"For a single decade, racing was my life. During my years in the cockpit I built friendships and rivalries with flamboyant drivers, eccentric team owners - and the odd character…

The first world title 1963 The year of Profumo, great train robbers, ‘loveable mop tops’ – and the grassy knoll. In its midst, a quiet Scottish hill farmer delivered on…

We’ve noted before the potency of the motor-racing gene, the father-and-son successions such as the Hills and the Villeneuves, and dynasties from the Unsers to the Andrettis. More rarely, a…

Just imagine for a moment that it’s the spring of 1962. The telephone rings and your friend and employer on the other end asks you to fly to Italy and…

In 1928, having taken the Land Speed Record four times but recently lost it once more, Campbell is determined to regain it and is searching for a suitable course to unleash…