Great Read

John Godfrey Parry Thomas, holder of the Land Speed Record for nine months in 1926/7 (and 10 days in 1924), was cut from a very different cloth to his more…

Jan Magnussen is under few illusions about his Formula 1 career. "I let myself down," he says, "and that always hurts. I planned to be world champion and it didn't…

On 17 July 1937, during practice for the German GP, Bernd Rosemeyer fought his wayward Auto Union round the Nürburgring in 9min 46.2sec, a time that staggered the pitlane. By…

Argentinian Grand Prix, Buenos Aires, 1979 I've always considered Argentina in 1979 to be my first real Grand Prix victory. I'd won in Sweden in 1977, but only because of…

You are Peter Collins. Young, handsome, living a glamorous life with a film star wife — and quick. You have heaps of respect for Fangio, but today, it would seem,…

The Hamilton phenomenon has rewritten the Formula 1 record books. But Lewis’s meteoric progress doesn’t diminish the achievements, 37 years ago, of a Brazilian tyro called Emerson Fittipaldi. Emerson was…

United States GP (East), Watkins Glen, October 5th 1980 From start to finish, the 1980 season was an unbelievable one for me. It was an amazing year because I won…

Between this year's Australian and Malaysian grands prix, Mrs C and I used up a free week with our first visit to New Zealand. On our travels around the wonderful…

No racing driver has ever survived such a big accident. And it’s unlikely that a grand prix car will ever again be allowed to run flat out into an earth…

Appropriately, it is November 29 as I write, and – just as in 1975 – there is a thick crust of frost on the windscreen of my car. That evening,…

Once again the Grand Prix teams of cars and drivers came together to pit their skill and endurance against the fabulous Nurburgring, for the German GP is seldom a split-second…

Lorenzo Bandini... Such a mellifluous name for a racing driver, it always seemed to me, like Clay Regazzoni or Johnny Servoz-Gavin. And they all looked the part, too. Bandini was…

When Colin Chapman was invited to the 1962 Indianapolis 500 by Dan Gurney, the Lotus founder surveyed the front-engined 'dinosaurs' on show there and famously remarked, "All you've got to…

How would a 1906 Renault or a 1939 Mercedes fare against last year's McLaren MP4-21? How would they relate to each other? Would a current car have as big a…

Since Hans Tak kicked off Mercedes-Benz's rally career by winning the 1954 Tulip Rally with the light, powerful, spaceframe 300SL gull-wing, the Three-Pointed Star has been in and out of…

In the end, it is just a car. You sit with a steering wheel in your hands. You change gear by shifting a lever fore and aft, working your way…

Whenever I am in Italy, I visit my old friend Romolo Tavoni at his home outside Modena. Tavoni is now 85, in poor health and in receipt of hospital treatment,…