Clark’s first race in a monoposto was dispiriting. The battery of his ill-handling Formula Junior Gemini was as flat as his mood at the cold, damp Boxing Day Brands Hatch meeting of 1959. Resorting to a push-start, he finished eighth. And that might have been that but for the coaxing of friends convinced of his talent.

His second race, fewer than three months later, would change his life forever while setting out a road map for the sport for a new decade: he won at Goodwood in March 1960 in a Lotus 18 – Chapman’s first design with its engine behind the driver – powered by a Ford production engine modified by Cosworth Engineering; the latter’s Keith Duckworth could work with Chapman – just not under the same roof.

Junior was a recent Italian construct for promoting its young driving talent. It had, however, in short order become the third rung in Britain’s rapid ascent. Within months Clark would have stood on all three: Junior, Formula 2 and Formula 1. By April 1961 he had won in all three.