Motor Sport Magazine, February 2024

Автор: Dunn Joe

Теги: magazine sport motor sport magazine

ISBN: 9781910505885

Год: 2024

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Текст

It isn’t every month that
a new motor racing-themed
film goes on general release.
Here’s what to expect from
Michael Mann’s latest
blockbuster – Ferrari

February
9

THE EDITOR
Joe Dunn on sexism in Formula 1 –
plus, a reader’s search for a bookbinder

MATTERS OF MOMENT
Andros ice races farewell, a Mini to
tackle the Andes and a new WRC film

F1 FRONTLINE: MARK HUGHES
How new regulations always seem
to work in the favour of Adrian Newey
MOTORCYCLES: MAT OXLEY
Why Marc Márquez on a Ducati is
a fearsome pairing for MotoGP in 2024

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

THE ARCHIVES: DOUG NYE
Advanced Concepts Department –
Special Vehicle Activity: behold, the GT40!
ANDREW FRANKEL’S DIARY
Hopes for Formula 1 in 2024, F1
bookies’ odds and the Ineos Grenadier
DRIVEN: VOLVO EX30
What is it about this compact
all-electric SUV that blows fuses?

DRIVEN: QUICK TESTS
Road warrior Mercedes-AMG A45
S and flap your flippers for the BYD Seal

PRECISION
Vertex and IWC doff their caps to
carmakers and a chrome curio from L’Epee
EVENTS
Looking ahead to the Daytona 24
Hours, which will feature Jenson Button

BOOKS
A fact feast on Le Mans and two
volumes on Honda’s Type R badge
INTERVIEW: JIMMY VASSER
The 1996 Champ Car winner tells
us of his major milestones and mishaps

EROS HOAGLAND, CORBIS/FORMULA 1 VIA GETTY IMAGES

Issue No.1182 Volume 100, No.2

CONTENTS

116 Eric Crudgington

Fernihough – possibly
the greatest Briton
you’ve never heard of

MY LIFE IN CARS
Andy Priaulx takes our rapid-fire
questions on his motors, races and rivals

FLASHBACK...
Maurice Hamilton is drinking in
the views at the 1992 Monte Carlo Rally

B E S T O F T H E B E S T: PA R T O N E O F R AC E C A R O F T H E C E N T U R Y

C E L E B RAT I N G 1 0 0 G L O R I O US Y E A R S

1924

LETTERS
Your thoughts on rivalries, Max
Verstappen and DFV-powered boats

2024

The hidden truth at the
heart of the Ferrari story

The movie

FERRARI: ENZO’S WOMEN
As new film Ferrari hits cinemas,
we look at the Old Man’s marital strife

PLUS

Exclusive interview with
director Michael Mann
Recreating the deadly
1957 Mille Miglia

F1 season review
Mark Hughes
on Red Bull’s
extraordinary year

Jimmy Vasser

F E B RUA RY 2 024

‘I finished my
first Indy 500
in hospital’

FERRARI: STUNT DRIVING
Marino Franchitti tells us how the
production team recreated 1957 races

Racing the Reich

The British biking
boffin who took on
Hitler... and won

ON THE COVER

39 Stateside tales
from team owner
Jimmy Vasser
56 Enzo Ferrari
gets the Michael
Mann treatment
78 A recap of the
’23 F1 season and
Abu Dhabi report
116 Britain’s 1930s
two-wheel speed
record chaser

FERRARI: MICHAEL MANN
The director of Ferrari talks about
the high costs involved in authenticity

F1 SEASON REVIEW
How Max Verstappen outclassed
the grid, and Johnny Herbert has his say

MOTOR SPORT ANNIVERSARY
The 100-year celebrations begin
with a look back at our formative years

RACE CAR OF THE CENTURY
Our new centenary series starts
with a car that made the ’20s roar

Fireworks fly for Max
Verstappen – here’s
how the Red Bull No1
driver swept aside the
Formula 1 grid

HONG KONG WORLD RX
We witness the radical rallycross
plan to take racing to the city centre

104

PICTURES OF THE YEAR
WEC to WRC, Extreme E to
Formula E, here are 2023’s iconic images

116

ERIC vs THE FASCISTS
The pre-war British rider who
took on the Germans and Italians and won

127

SHOWROOM
An Aston racer from afar, a
six-figure Carlton and VSCC off-road antics

160

PARTING SHOT
Keeping the Ferrari theme, we
present 375s under construction in 1951
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

ur sport doesn’t half make
life difficult for itself. After a
mammoth Formula 1 season
that culminated in a gruelling
three-race schedule, where
teams were sleepwalking
through time zones, everyone could have done
with some much-needed downtime.
No such luck. No sooner had Max
Verstappen and Red Bull celebrated a truly
extraordinary title-winning year than the FIA
announced it was launching a preliminary
investigation into the conduct of two of racing’s
most high-profile personalities – Mercedes boss
Toto Wolff and his wife Susie Wolff, the longtime women-in-motor-sport campaigner
and boss of the female-only F1 Academy.
The inquiry hinged on a media report that
the married couple had leaked confidential
information to each other resulting in
complaints from other F1 team bosses, the full
details of which quickly became academic.
Because as most readers will now know
that investigation was abandoned after two
days, presumably through lack of evidence –
and in the face of all nine other F1 teams
displaying a rare united front in issuing identical
statements saying that they had not made any
official complaints. It was a truly farcical end
to the season – especially since it came on the
eve of the FIA’s big annual back-slapping endof-season awards jamboree.
The story quickly moved on to how the
episode could be seen as the latest round in the
on-going turf war between FIA president
Mohammed Ben Sulayem and the F1 teams and
Liberty, still smarting from the president’s
involvement in their financial affairs, not to
mention his perceived heavy-handedness in
attempting to foist an 11th team on the grid.
The Kremlinology of all this is explained
masterfully by Mark Hughes in his piece on
the subject on our website, which is worth
searching out. In fact, it seems the rift is now
becoming so wide that there is talk of teams
forming a breakaway championship outside
the regulatory control of the FIA – something
that could become one of the key stories of ’24.
So far, so F1. But what makes this episode
so damaging is the unmistakable whiff of sexism
that permeated throughout the whole affair.
Susie Wolff called it out. She released a
statement saying she was “deeply insulted
but sadly unsurprised” by the allegations
which seem to be “rooted in intimidatory and
misogynistic behaviour, and focused on my
marital status rather than my abilities”.
She added that no one from the FIA had

THE
EDITOR

“Only the FIA
could get
caught up
in such a
sexism row”
contacted her directly about the allegations.
Only the FIA could get caught up in a sexism
row with its own champion of women in motor
sport. But not only are the ‘optics’ terrible, it
also comes at a time when F1 is being left behind
by other sports. As I write, the England Women
cricket team’s test match in India is leading the
sports news with analysts looking forward
to the Women’s T20 World Cup next year; it
is followed by a story previewing Chelsea
Women’s group match in the UEFA Champions
League, women’s football no longer only being
reported at international level. A few days
previously, Guinness announced a sponsorship
deal with the England Women rugby team,
hailed as “a defining moment for the sport”.
Responsibility for our comparative lack of
progress must lie at the top, something Lewis
Hamilton was in no doubt about when
delivering a blistering defence of Wolff. “There
is a constant fight to really improve diversity
and inclusion within the industry,” he said. “It
seems there are certain individuals in the
leadership of the FIA that every time we try

and make a step forward they are trying to pull
us back, and that has to change.”
None of this is helped by the fact that at
beginning of the year Ben Sulayem found
himself at the centre of a media storm when
decade-old comments emerged in which he
was quoted as saying he did “not like women
who think they are smarter than men, for they
are not, in truth”. He and the FIA have since
said the comments do not reflect his views and
were taken out of context.
Go to a grand prix, or to the Silverstone
Festival, read our VSCC column or look up the
demographic of the younger Netflix generation
fans and you will see gender parity that is surely
one of the most significant changes the sport
has seen in a generation. Now look at a
photograph of the grandstands and contrast
that picture with that of the FIA awards
photograph showing all the prize winners from
all the championships worldwide: it features
one woman among scores of men.
It is up to everyone involved in the sport to
nurture the new support and ensure women
are welcome as both fans and participants.
Perhaps 2024 can be the year that this truly
starts to happen. And who knows, maybe one
day we will have a woman F1 world champion
crowned by the FIA, not just a champion of
women being tarnished by them.
I’ve said before that the Letters page is one of
the great joys of this magazine with its mix
of erudition, humour and, let’s face it, proud
pedantry. This month we’ve had a delightful
letter about traditional binding of a year’s
copies of Motor Sport, see page 51.
The remarkable thing is that the writer, Ian
Dussek, an expert on the HRG marque, and his
father have not collected MS from here and
there or bought a complete collection but have
bought the magazine from Issue 1 in 1924.
Can this be the only “one owner” run of
this magazine? We’d love to hear about any
other readers who have a similar run from our
beginnings 100 years ago. Write to us at the
usual address.
In the meantime from all of us here at
Motor Sport, a very Happy New Year!

Joe Dunn, editor
Follow Joe on Twitter @joedunn90
NEXT ISSUE: OUR MARCH ISSUE IS
ON SALE FROM JANUARY 31
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

IN THE SPIRIT OF BOD AND JENKS

Editorial

+44 (0) 20 7349 8484
editorial@motorsportmagazine.com
18-20 Rosemont Road,
London NW3 6NE, UK
EDITOR Joe Dunn
EDITOR-AT-LARGE Gordon Cruickshank
GRAND PRIX EDITOR Mark Hughes
ART EDITOR Owen Norris
CHIEF SUB-EDITOR Lee Gale
DIGITAL EDITOR Dominic Tobin
DIGITAL WRITERS James Elson and Cambridge Kisby
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Andrew Frankel,
Doug Nye and Mat Oxley
SPECIAL CONTRIBUTORS Simon de Burton,
Robert Ladbrook, Damien Smith and Gary Watkins
PICTURE LIBRARIES DPPI, Getty Images
and Grand Prix Photo

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Details matter.

Motor Sport (ISSN No: 0027-2019, USPS No: 021-661) is published monthly by Motor Sport Magazine GBR and distributed in the USA by Asendia USA, 17B S Middlesex Ave, Monroe NJ 08831. Periodicals postage
paid New Brunswick, NJ and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: send address changes to Motor Sport, 701C Ashland Ave, Folcroft PA 19032. UK and rest of the world address changes should be sent to
18-20 Rosemont Road, London, NW3 6NE, UK, or by e-mail to subscriptions@motorsportmagazine.co.uk. Distribution: Marketforce, 161 Marsh Wall, London E14 9AP. Colour origination: All Points Media.
Printing: Precision Colour Printing, Telford, Shropshire, UK. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the Publisher. Copyright © 2023 Motor Sport Magazine Limited,
all rights reserved. We take every care when compiling the contents of this magazine but can assume no responsibility for any effects arising therefrom. Manuscripts and photos submitted entirely at owners’ risk.
Advertisements are accepted by us in good faith as correct at the time of going to press. Motor Sport magazine is printed in England.

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

There’s no escaping it: Adam Driver, left, looks
nothing like Enzo Ferrari. Still, Michael Mann’s
new Ferrari film (page 56) nails it on looks. Italy in
the 1950s is captured like Sicily in The Godfather,
thanks to attention to detail on sets, props – even
hair. Take the barber shop scene. “Adam is being
shaved by the son of the barber who shaved Enzo
in the same chair,” Mann told us of his quest for
authenticity. History? That can be bent to shape
the story. In the movies appearance matters most.

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MATTERS of MOMENT

Ice-racing cup
feels the heat of
climate change
Mario yearns for
Formula 1 return

ometimes you miss being on the road
and being part of the old gang. That
certainly appears to be the case as far
as Mario Andretti is concerned. In a wideranging Motor Sport interview available as
a podcast via our website and YouTube
channel, the 83-year-old confirms that he’s
backing his son Michael in his bid to become
the 11th team on the Formula 1 grid. The
reason is not simply fatherly support but a

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

wish to be a part of a race team again and
see the world.
“Motor racing is our life,” Mario told us.
“We have nothing else. That’s the way we’ve
fed our families from day one. I want [for]
the rest of my life to enjoy going to Formula
1. I want Michael to be able to provide that
for me. That’ll give me a reason to travel
the world again.”
The interview is the first in a new podcast
series with racing greats. Future interviews,
which will be released monthly on the same
day each magazine goes on sale include
Emerson Fittipaldi, Dario Franchitti and Jody
Scheckter. Together they form part of our
ogoing centenary celebrations.

DPPI, GETTY IMAGES, AUDI

The snow-fest Andros Trophy in the French Alps
comes to a close after 35 slippery seasons

The Andros Trophy has
attracted all manner of
machinery since its
inception in 1990, and some
major names – like Alain
Prost, above, left, in 2012

he most-famous ice-racing
championship, the Andros
Trophy, has begun its final
campaign after 35 editions.
Known for attracting some of
motor sport’s biggest names to
try door-to-door ice racing aboard highpowered four-wheel-drive superminis, the
Andros Trophy has been a winter season
highlight since its inception back in 1990.
Its 35th season, which got underway at
Val Thorens in the French Alps on December
9, will however be its last after series bosses
opted to pull the plug due to a mounting
number of organisational issues, including
climate change, a loss of sponsorship and
increasing difficulty in finding host venues.
“Every event has its end, and we regret to
announce that the 35th Trophée Andros will
be the last,” said Max Mamers, championship
president and co-founder, alongside Frédéric
Gervoson. “The more things go [in the
direction of climate change], the more we are
obliged to find races in France above an
elevation of 1500m [4900ft] to be sure of

having ice. This climate story is not just in
France, it’s a global thing.”
The Andros Trophy has attracted over
2000 competitors, including star names such
as Alain Prost, Jacques Villeneuve, Martin
Brundle, Yvan Muller, Olivier Panis, Ari
Vatanen, Sébastien Ogier and Romain
Grosjean. Over 350 races have been held
across France and, briefly, Canada – Andorra
also held a single round in 2005/6. The series
made the switch to all-electric cars in 2020,
and Mamers admitted a further swing to
hydrogen had been discussed.
“Thirty-five seasons is more than a single
adventure, it’s a great life,” added Mamers.
“Let’s not be sad it’s about to end, but rejoice
in these 35 seasons.”
This year’s contest attracted 12 Elite class
crews, with WRC legend Sébastien Loeb,
Le Mans star Benoît Tréluyer and touring car
ace Yann Ehrlacher signed up in cars ranging
from über-powered Renault Zoes to Audi A1s
and Peugeot 208s. The final race takes place
at the Super Besse ski resort in Besse-et-SaintAnastaise on January 27.

Dakar doubles down with tougher format

f you thought the four Dakar events to have
run in Saudi Arabia seemed tough, this
year’s fifth edition in the desert kingdom
aims to take things to a whole new level.
Since the rally raid event moved to Saudi
in 2020, it has evolved with every running,
and the 2024 edition will continue that trend
by featuring 778 competitors, a route in excess
of 4800 miles that will take in 60% new
territory, plus a gruelling 48-hour timed stage.
Dakar 2024 will start from AlUla on January
5 and travel on a huge loop across the country

before finishing at Yanbu on January 19. By far
the toughest new addition is a two-day
marathon through the desert of the Empty
Quarter, which is exactly as it sounds. Crews
must fend for themselves across the 48 hours,
with only a simple bivouac to camp in for a
few hours, and no outside technical assistance
available for the 370-mile duration.
Five-time Dakar winner Nasser Al-Attiyah
will handle a Prodrive Hunter for this edition
before joining Dacia’s works team, alongside
Sébastien Loeb, for 2025.

A two-day drive through Saudi Arabia’s Empty
Quarter will take Dakar drivers to the limit
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MATTERS of MOMENT
Can David Donohue, left,
take the Hennessey
Venom F5 to 300mph and
beyond? That’s the plan of
John Hennessey, right

Motoring
Literary &
Art Festival
proves a hit

he old saying goes that everything is
bigger in Texas, and American
constructor Hennessey is taking that
literally by aiming to propel its new Venom F5
machine to become the first production car
to officially record a top speed over 300mph.
Sounds a bonkers claim, but Hennessey
has form in this area, with its previous efforts
both making significant waves in a straight
line when the Venom GT clocked a
then-record 270.49mph in 2014,
and its Roadster variant holds the
265.5mph benchmark for a
convertible model – set in 2016.
Bugatti’s Chiron Super
Sport 300+ sits unofficially at
the top of the records, but its
304mph run in August 2019 in
the hands of British driver Andy
Wallace was only recorded one-way.
Hennessey aims to change that, and has
recruited racing driver David Donohue to
help push the new 6.6-litre Venom F5 into a
whole new realm.
The son of Mark Donohue – who himself
set a world record in 1975 when he lapped

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

Alabama’s Talladega in an astonishing 43.3sec
aboard a Roger Penske-engineered Porsche
917/30, inset, hitting an average speed of
221.12mph – David Donohue counts a class
victory at Le Mans aboard a Dodge Viper and
a Time Attack record at Pikes Peak to his list
of achievements.
“I’ve been working behind the scenes with
the team at Hennessey for several months,
allowing me to spend quite a bit of time
behind the wheel of the Venom F5,”
he said. “The 1817bhp ‘Fury’
engine is consistently and
relentlessly breathtaking. It has
explosive power delivery that
is awe-inspiring without being
evil. I may never completely get
used to it.”
Marque founder and CEO John
Hennessey said: “We can now refocus
on achieving speed records, and to complete
those goals we need an experienced worldclass driver who can push a hypercar to its
potential – that’s exactly what David can do.”
Hennessey has yet to publicly announce
when it will attempt its next run.

A BRM gathering was one of
the highlights of the inaugural
Motoring Literary & Art Festival

GETTY IMAGES, GARY HARMAN, MAX O’NEIL

Hennessey signs Donohue
to capture 300mph record

he evenings may have been
drawing in, but the new Motoring
Literary & Art Festival, hosted by
Porter Press in early December,
confirmed there’s still plenty of mileage
in events across the winter.
Held at Silverstone, the festival
showcased all that is great and good
about the motoring-based written word
and fine art. There were also talks from
luminaries such as former McLaren and
Brabham race ace John Watson, world
championship-winning F1 designer Pat
Symonds, and James Hunt’s first GP team
boss Lord Hesketh.
In recognition of its 60th anniversary,
BRM had its cult favourite V16
reproduction on display in the main hall
of the Silverstone Wing, while drivers
Jackie Oliver, Howden Ganley, designer
Tony Southgate and engineer Mike
Pilbeam reminisced about the team and
its long-time boss Louis Stanley.
Motor sport enthusiasts will already
be looking forward to next year’s edition.

Rodin runs
in its new
FZERO on
home turf

odin Cars’ radical new FZERO
project is officially up and running,
with the new hypercar completing
its first track sessions at the brand’s
development facility in New Zealand.
Boasting a close-to-ridiculous power
output of 1013bhp from its twin-turbo V10
and featuring bodywork that would put
Batman to shame, the FZERO is a huge leap
for the small company with big ambition.
Founded by technology
billionaire David Dicker, Rodin’s
first effort was the openwheeled FZED, which came
from the remains of the

Lotus T125. The FZERO is built on a
bespoke carbon chassis, weighing in at less
than 700kg, some 100kg lighter than
current Formula 1 cars. At its heart is a new
4-litre turbocharged V10 engine developed
by Rodin called the RC.TEN. After the first
engine models were built by Neil Brown
Engineering, production has now switched
to Rodin’s facility near Mount Lyford in
New Zealand’s South Island.
Dicker took the wheel for the
first laps of the prototype
FZERO, running on one of
Rodin’s three purpose-built
test tracks.

Dicker said: “While there is a long road
ahead of testing and development, running
the FZERO for the first time gives me
immense pride in what everyone at Rodin
Cars has achieved in bringing this
programme to life. The test went very well,
and we were able to work through our
programme. We’re excited as the FZERO
project enters its next phase. It really is a
car like no other.”
Rodin reckons the FZERO will be
capable of producing around 4000kg of
downforce and reach a top speed in excess
of 224mph. A total of 27 are planned to be
built, and it’s due to cost around £1.8m.

The FZERO is powered by
a 4-litre V10 engine. Inset,
left: protection from the
elements. Above: testing is
taking place in New Zealand

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

000

MATTERS of MOMENT

Mini quest
aims to
scale new
heights

ritish automotive adventurer Ben
Coombs has begun his latest borderhopping expedition – celebrating the
60th anniversary of the Mini Cooper by
driving a Mini 1000 to an unprecedented
6000m (19,685ft) above sea level.
Coombs, from Devon, has form in longdistance motoring adventures. His previous
efforts have included driving from Britain
to Cape Town in a Porsche 944, crossing
Asia in a Corvette and navigating the
length of the Americas in a TVR
Chimaera to visit both the
Ben Coombs will tackle
tracks at almost
20,000ft. Right: the
scenic route. Below right:
room with a view

northernmost and southernmost pubs on
the planet in an epic 27,000-mile trip
termed Pub2Pub.
Coombs’ latest trek, Mini 6000, takes
him to South America in search of roads
that are high enough, with his 1974 Mini
being shipped to Uruguay in early December
before tackling gruelling climbs over the
Andes in Chile and Peru.
To prepare for the trip, Coombs’ Mini
has undergone a nut-and-bolt
restoration, had a roof tent fitted
and also – and perhaps most
importantly – a beer tap
carrying the Mini’s own
special IPA blend, with the
crew hoping to pour
the world’s highest pint
at the finish.
Coombs said: “Finding
the right location to achieve
6000m above sea level was a
challenge in itself. Western Europe tops
out at around 3250m, while North America
evens out at 4347m. Both Chile and Peru
harbour towering volcanoes with old mine
tracks to their summits, such as the
Aucanquilcha stratovolcano, where an
abandoned mine reaches 6176m. We plan
to explore these possibilities and celebrate
the 60th anniversary of the car’s illustrious
forebear six kilometres up!”
The journey is expected
to take two months, with
Coombs accompanied
by three friends and a
1990 Range Rover.
Follow the progress at
detour-roadtrips.com/
mini-6000.

f you’re in need of a winter warmer
early in the New Year, the latest movie
adaptation of a motoring rivalry is due to
land early in January in the form of rallying
film Race for Glory: Audi vs Lancia.
The film focuses on the legendary Group
B battle between Audi and Lancia during
the category’s early days when the Ingolstadt
marque seriously upped the ante by
introducing its four-wheel-drive Quattro. In
the 1983 WRC the Martini and Audi teams
won 10 of the 12 events.

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

The Stefano Mordini-directed film has
attracted some familiar names, with
Riccardo Scamarcio (John Wick: Chapter 2)
playing Lancia team chief Cesare Fiorio,
Daniel Brühl (Rush) as Audi head Roland
Gumpert while Walter Röhrl is played by
Volker Bruch (The Reader).
Whether racing scenes will match up to
the likes of Ford v Ferrari or be more Driven
(which is dreadful) remains to be seen, but
either way a dose of rallying hits the big
screen and on-demand from January 5.

The Lancia 037 and Audi Quattro take leading
roles in the new ‘Group B drama’ Race for Glory

BEN COOMBS

Audi vs Lancia WRC rivalry immortalised in new film

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MONACO . 8 JUNE 2024

MATTERS of MOMENT
Italian lines with American
brawn – just 330 Series I
Iso Grifos were made.
Below: recently restored to
original condition

The scene stealer

Buy this Iso Grifo and your next task will be to find a DVD of
crime flick The Violent Professionals – and look out for your car
onsidering that some still
regard it as a bit of a mongrel,
Italy’s Iso Grifo has a pretty
impressive pedigree. Its sleek,
grand-tourer bodywork was
penned by Giorgetto Giugiaro
(whose CV also includes the Lotus Esprit and
the Volkswagen Golf ); its mechanicals were
designed by Giotto Bizzarrini (who was
responsible for Ferrari’s celebrated 250
GTO); and its powerplant came from the
Chevrolet Corvette.
The brainchild of Iso founder Renzo
Rivolta (whose industrialist forebears made
a fortune from products as diverse as bubble
cars and refrigerators), the sporting twoseater launched in 1965 was to be sold
alongside the two-plus-two Iso Rivolta.
The Grifo, named after the griffin, the
half-lion, half-eagle mythical king of beasts,
was intended to provide serious competition
to the likes of Ferrari and Maserati by
combining the beauty and style for which
Italian GT cars were renowned with the
strength and reliability for which they
weren’t – hence the use of tough American
gearboxes and V8 engines.

The first models used small-block 5.4litre Corvette engines, which, thanks to the
car weighing less than 1000kg, gave a top
speed of around 170mph – instantly making
it the fastest road car of the day. A mere 330
such Series I cars are believed to have been
made, of which this is an example.
Originally sold to an Italian buyer in the
spring of 1967, it achieved a modicum of
celebrity status six years later when it
appeared in Sergio Martino’s 1973 Mafia
crime thriller The Violent Professionals (a film
that could never be accused of breaching
the Trade Descriptions Act).

This was one of the fastest production cars on
the planet in the mid-1960s – top speed: 170mph

It subsequently led a quieter life in the
hands of a Dutch owner with whom it
remained until 2013 before being shipped
to a buyer in New York where it was restored
to the original combination of silver
paintwork and black leather interior.
The current vendor has owned the car
for two years, during which time more than
£15,000 is said to have been spent on
mechanical fettling.
Despite the Grifo’s exotic appearance,
its American drivetrain makes it relatively
simple and economical to maintain and can
be looked after by any competent mechanic.
But cars needing extensive bodywork
refurbishment can prove to be problematic,
especially since there is believed to be only
one person in the world who specialises in
them exclusively – former factory engineer
and test driver Roberto Negri, who restores
the cars at his workshops in Clusone, Italy.
1967 Iso Grifo Series I. On sale with RM
Sotheby’s, Phoenix, Arizona, January 25.
Est: £235,000-£300,000. rmsothebys.com
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

FORMULA 1

MARK HUGHES

“Adrian Newey says the
foundation for his success
is always new regulations”
istening to Adrian Newey talk about
the latest world championshipwinning car with which he’s been
associated (his 16th, encompassing
three different teams), he points
out that the foundation for any
sequence of success he has enjoyed has always
been a new set of technical regulations. His cars
have not always immediately won in the first
season of the new regs, but they have invariably
been the basis for a dynamite succession.
Newey’s response to the mixing up of the
variables marks him out. The way he can
decouple or link in a new way, the intuitive feel
he seems to have for the re-assigned order of
importance of different variables and his
understanding of the levers of control to arrive
at the new optimum mix, are uncanny.
The success of the 2023 Red Bull RB19 was
built upon the fundamentals laid down in the
first season of the current ground effect
regulations in 2022. “What I’ve tried to do,” he
says, “is when there’s a big regulation change
try to read the regs and come up with a car with
a philosophy to suit those regs and as long as
the car is half-decent, evolve it.”
That ‘half-decent’ car was the RB18, winner
of 17 of that season’s 22 races. It was unique in
the way its aerodynamics and suspension were
conceived almost as one system, something that
is only now being fully appreciated elsewhere.
The theoretical maximum downforce available
from these underbodies is not accessible
because of the limitation imposed by bouncing,
both aerodynamic and mechanical. But a floor
design prioritising constantly good downforce
over the full speed and ride height range, one
which keeps pulling like the aerodynamic
equivalent of a big torquey engine rather than
a high-end screamer, is what that car laid down.
To facilitate it, it had the super-tight
platform control required to keep the car level
even with softer springs. Like this, it could run
at ride heights out of bounds to the others, even
if its peak downforce was nothing remarkable.

That Newey had grasped this is suggested
by the fact that he designed the RB18’s
suspension himself. “We put a lot of work into
the fundamentals… architectural layouts, front
and rear suspension layouts, but really we
didn’t start putting all our efforts in developing
the aero of last year’s car until quite late in the
’21 season.” Those fundamentals were built
upon with more aggressive aero for ’23.
The first F1 car with which he is credited,
the 1988 Leyton House March 881, remains one
of his favourites and represented for him a new
set of regulations. It didn’t win anything, but it
came close. More significantly, it was the
blueprint for the cars he designed for Williams
from 1991-94, encompassing two drivers’ titles
and three constructors’.
At a time when all other cars had two
separate wings bolted to a central nose, the
Leyton House featured a combined nose-wing
with an undercut on the
underside, lowering the air
pressure and causing the airflow
to rush to fill the vacuum. It not
only worked the front wing
harder but fed the underbody.
Its endplates were sculpted in a
way which kept the gap between
endplate and tyre consistent as
the wheel was steered. It was
also tiny. It was way more
sophisticated than anything else out there.
There was a big regulation change for ’95.
The undertray had to feature a stepped section
beneath the sidepod. There were reductions
in wing sizes and dimensional changes around
the cockpit. Newey wasn’t happy with the
Williams FW17 but as he re-read the rules, he
spotted a chance. “Although the reference plane
specified a width and the step plane had to be
50mm above that at each side, at no point did
it say the step plane had to extend to the rear
axle, like the reference plane did. So you could
consider the step plane ending at the edge of
the rear wheel. There was this grey area where

you had freedom to cut in above the reference
plane to give a much bigger diffuser exit. The
diffusers were exit-limited and by undercutting
it we got a huge advantage by drawing more
mass flow through it.” The FW17B was
introduced in late ’95. With a bigger diffuser
than the others that advantage carried into the
dominant 1996 FW18 and ’97 FW19.
Coinciding with Newey’s move to McLaren,
there was a big regulation change for ’98, with
narrower cars. When he arrived the team was
already planning to reduce the centre of gravity
by lowering the nose. What Newey added was
the unique chassis shape of the MP4-13. The
regulation stated a simple width and depth
measurement, implying a rectangular section.
By putting a fin on the top edges of the chassis,
the regulation depth could be achieved much
further from the ground, allowing a V-shaped
bottom which cleared a lot more airflow space
beneath. It was the basis of
McLarens to 2001.
It was his Red Bull RB5 which
became the template for the next
few years. Chassis shape was key.
Using fins he was able to meet
the depth requirement allowing
him to round-off the chassis
bottom, facilitating a far more
powerful vortex travelling down
the car than on the square-edged
chassis of other cars. Pull-rod rear suspension
became the new norm after this car, something
he overturned with the pushrod of the RB18.
“As long as you have a decent first year
under the new regs and evolve it, you should
do OK. If you do a clean sheet every year you’re
probably going to struggle because you’re
always a step behind.” They might not be words
Ferrari or Mercedes want to hear…

“His first F1
car, the 1988
Leyton House
March 881, is
one of his
favourites”

Since he began covering grand prix racing in
2000, Mark Hughes has forged a reputation as
the finest Formula 1 analyst of his generation
Follow Mark on Twitter @SportmphMark
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MOTORCYCLES

MAT OXLEY

“Márquez on a Ducati?
It will be an awesome
combination in 2024”
any MotoGP fans were
dubious about Marc
Márquez’s switch from
factory Honda rider to
independent-team Ducati
rider for 2024. The sixtimes MotoGP king hasn’t won the title since
2019, struggling through the last four seasons
with a right-arm injury sustained at the start of
the 2020 MotoGP championship. He’s past his
best, said the doubters.
Four operations followed, including a
humeral osteotomy, which involved surgeons
cutting the humerus in two, rotating the lower
part 30 degrees and plating it back together.
Surely Márquez was done? Surely even his
fiery determination would be quenched by
something as gruesome as that?
And yet no one in the MotoGP paddock had
any doubts. Those in the know don’t judge
riders entirely by results. They see the struggles
they’re going through – on and off their
motorcycles – and see beyond the results.
Márquez won six titles with Honda in seven
seasons, even though the company’s RC213V
was never the best bike on the grid. That’s why
he was always a sight to behold – pushing like
hell, flirting with disaster at every corner,
overriding the bike to get the results he wanted.
In fact, the results he needed. Márquez lives
for crushing his rivals.
That spectacular modus operandi ceased
to be enough during the past few seasons, due
to the vast strides made by Ducati and MotoGP’s
other European manufacturers, who have
transformed the championship with new-wave
technology inspired by Formula 1: downforce
aerodynamics, tuned mass dampers and
ride-height adjusters.
During the 2023 MotoGP season Márquez
crashed more than ever – 29 tumbles during
the 20-round season, essentially because he
was racing a bike against two-wheeled F1 cars.
Thus the sense of anticipation when he
climbed aboard a Gresini Ducati Desmosedici
22

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

for the first time during November’s first postseason tests was immense.
In cool, tricky conditions at Valencia it took
the 30-year-old Spaniard just 42 laps to be the
fastest man on track. He ended the day fourth
quickest, 0.17sec off the top, with a lap time
0.15sec slower than the best qualifying lap he
had managed with his RC213V at the previous
weekend’s season finale at the track. And he
looked like he was hardly trying – his bull-in-achina-shop antics already a thing of the past.
The Ducati is a longer, lower motorcycle,
which makes it easier to control. The marque’s
current number one, ‘Pecco’ Bagnaia – winner
of the 2022 and 2023 MotoGP crowns – says the
bike’s most important feature is its riderfriendliness: “The best thing is the smoothness
you feel, everywhere.”
During the Valencia tests Márquez looked
like he was sat in a comfy armchair, not perched
on a razor blade. His riding had a
smooth flow to it, which means
two things: the Ducati works best
that way and he’s already worked
that out. Márquez will be one of
eight Ducati riders on the 2024
grid and he won’t even have the
latest machinery – that’s how
much he wanted to leave Honda,
which has had a disastrous past
few seasons, its engineers discombobulated by
the sudden advance of the Europeans.
Bagnaia and Jorge Martin, the Italian’s
strongest rival last season, and two others will
ride GP24s this season, while Márquez and
three others will race second-hand GP23s. The
differences between the two machines will be
small. Off-season testing is so limited that Ducati
understands big changes are risky. Computer
simulations are less accurate in MotoGP than
F1, so track time is everything and it’s easy for
engineers to find themselves heading down the
wrong road if they try anything too radical.
When news of Márquez’s defection first
broke, Ducati’s other riders greeted the news

with delight, not dismay. (At least in public.)
Ducati has a policy of full data sharing between
its riders, so they can all spy on each other when
they return to the garage after each run. At
Valencia they all noticed that he was already
the fastest Ducati rider through Turn Eight.
And the next day he took himself off to
hospital for more surgery, to cure an arm-pump
problem in his right arm. This was one reason
why he didn’t do many laps during the Valencia
tests. The other was to save tyres.
Ducati has been so successful in recent
years – winning the past two riders’ titles and
the past four constructors’ crowns – that Ducati
riders get a third fewer tyres for testing than
those of the least successful manufacturers,
Yamaha and Honda, which finished fourth and
fifth in the 2023 constructors’ points, behind
Ducati, KTM and Aprilia.
Beyond his spellbinding talent and Sennalike aggression, Márquez’s
strongest feature is his intelligence:
why waste tyres at chilly Valencia
when you can save them for
February’s testing at Sepang,
Malaysia, and Losail in Qatar.
Márquez and a Ducati will be
an awesome combination. Even
more so with his new crew chief
Frankie Carchedie, the British
engineer who guided Joan Mir to the 2020
MotoGP title and last season transformed Fabio
Di Giannantonio from also-ran to MotoGP
winner. Carchedie is hugely experienced, very
bright and very good with the human part of
motorcycle racing, which is so important.
Funnily enough, when he first started working
with Gresini Ducati at the end of 2022 he told
me, “If Márquez ever gets on one of these
things, no one will see which way he went.”

“He looked
like he was
sat on a sofa,
rather than a
razor blade”

Mat Oxley has covered motorcycle racing
for many years – and also has the distinction
of being an Isle of Man TT winner
Follow Mat on Twitter @matoxley

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Racing In Europe This Year?
You may now need an ATA Carnet to temporarily import your car into the EU.
SINCE BREXIT
Non-UK registered Race Cars will require an ATA Carnet
UK registered vehicles and Race Cars being transported by a commercial operator
(including a Race Team) will require an ATA Carnet
CARS have formed a partnership with the Bristol Chamber of Commerce and are able to
issue ATA Carnets at a heavily discounted price.
Please contact Sukie Duhaney (sukie@carseurope.net) for further information.

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THE ARCHIVES

DOUG NYE

“Bruce McLaren drove
the GT, commenting,
‘It’s starting to feel right’”
have just unearthed a part-forgotten
60-year-old Ford GT file covering the
original development programme
of 1963-64. The basics are familiar.
America’s Ford Motor Company had
been rebuffed in its 1962-63 attempt to
take over Ferrari, so launched its own Le Mans
24 Hours-targeted programme in conjunction
with Eric Broadley and his British Lola-Ford
GT concept. The document grandly entitled
Advanced Concepts Department – Special Vehicle
Activity was compiled by engineer Roy Lunn
and minuted the following:
“The design of the Ford GT race car is
nearing completion and it is now entering
the procurement stages… A major factor in
the development was the installation of
experimental components in the Lola
car which determined the final design
ingredients… all efforts are being directed
towards completing the first car in an
unpainted and untrimmed condition, ready
for shipping to Dearborn, prior to the end of
February, 1964.
“It has been arranged with Styling that at
least the first prototype should be painted
and trimmed by them at the end of February,
1964… It is aimed to ship the first vehicle to
Sebring for testing at the end of the first week
in March, 1964. Private testing is scheduled
for the second week in March. It will be the
results of this testing that will determine
whether we enter the actual Sebring race…”
– on March 21.
After the original programme and its
objectives had been finalised as early as June
1963 the file traces initial development
testing – using two Lola GTs – initially at
Brands Hatch, then Goodwood, then Monza
and… Snetterton.
“Mr Bruce McLaren was engaged as
development driver in October, and Mr Eric
Broadley and Mr Roy Salvadori also
participated in the test driving. The test
program [sic] was directed at establishing

component principles for incorporation in
the final design…”
On August 31, 1963, the first test session at
Brands Hatch saw Lola head and designer
Eric Broadley driving two cars, No1 being
(surprisingly for Ford) “the Chevrolet-engined
John Mecom car”, and No2 “the Cobra Fairlane
-powered version of the same design”. Both
used Colotti transaxles, No1 running Dunlop
R6-pattern D12 compound tyres and No2 R6
D9s. Using the short circuit Eric’s best time
was 59.5sec in No2 but “the car was felt to be
improperly geared for this course. Second gear
was used almost entirely, with only one
opportunity to use third gear… rev limit 5800”.
Before the next test session – at Goodwood
circuit on October 9, 1963 – “the ‘Indianapolis’
Fairlane engine was installed”. Plus modified
front and rear suspensions. Eric again drove,
with a fastest lap of 1min 36.2sec. Bruce then
took over but on his first flying lap the inboard
right-side drive-shaft flange clattered against
a lower suspension arm, ending
the run. Bruce still commented,
diplomatically perhaps (?) “…it
rolled a fair amount but the rear
end held very well… you could
throw it out and hold it”.
Back at Goodwood, Eric
clocked 1min 35.8sec before
Bruce took over, put in a 1min
32.8sec first time round, then
hammered his times down to
1min 25.8sec…. Since Brands Hatch and
Goodwood testing had been “…confined to
maximum speeds of approximately 145mph…
Monza (Italy) offers a series of high speed
bends as well as straightaway speeds of
170mph and it is felt an ideal circuit for the
present stage of component development”.
Using the 3.56-mile road circuit Eric, Bruce
and Roy Salvadori all drove the No2 car with
Hilborn fuel-injected engine. Salvadori first
reported “steering heavy, ‘kick’ through wheel
over bumpy road surfaces – it feels as though

rear end is lifting”. October 30, after five laps
with Eric Broadley driving, “the rear section
of the body flew off”. Bruce: “Handling seems
about right – rear-end of vehicle seems to be
lifting a little. 7500rpm attained at end of
pitstraight (approx. 176mph)”.
So to Snetterton on November 27 and 28:
“…a high-speed 2.71-mile course chosen for
its rough and undulating surface – cold, foggy,
course damp at start from morning mist…”
Bruce and Eric drove, the former taking Ford
engineers Roy Lunn and Chuck Mountain as
wide-eyed passengers, clocking 1min 46.6sec,
and commenting “This is starting to feel right”.
In his detailed report to Ford, Bruce wrote:
“The steering was much improved over earlier
trials, there was no tendency to deviate from
a straight line, either under heavy braking at
high speed, or when using the edge of the road
before or after a corner. The car had been
bump-steering, but is not now… The steering
ratio still feels high (quick); only a movement
of the wrists is necessary to
correct a high speed slide and it
is difficult to do this accurately;
the high-speed bend on the
Mulsanne straight at Le Mans
would need only pressure on the
steering wheel rather than
movement” – he warned – “a
lower gear ratio is essential for
Le Mans, the present ratio could
suit Sebring…”
What the file doesn’t record is Chuck
Mountain’s own account of how Bruce later
took him out on a French country road, to
experience a high-speed misfire troubling the
team during Le Mans practice. “He wound it
right up in top then bawled at me ‘There!
D’you hear it missin’?’. ‘Hear it missin’??!! Man!
Ah could hear angels singing!”.

“The rear
end held
very well...
you could
throw it out
and hold it”

Doug Nye is the UK’s leading motor racing
historian and has been writing authoritatively
about the sport since the 1960s
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

DIARY

ANDREW FRANKEL
“The odds quoted for next
year’s F1 world champion
are curious to say the least”
here are plenty saying the 2024
Formula 1 season is a foregone
conclusion. They point to recent
periods of power by Mercedes,
Red Bull and back to Ferrari
which won respectively eight,
four and six constructors’ titles on the trot in
their dominant eras. So it would seem that Red
Bull’s current winning streak, on paper the
most dominant team since Alfa’s clean sweep
in 1950 (which was only six races long if you
exclude the Indy 500), is just getting going.
And the reason for this, they continue,
is that Red Bull would have known early on
that the title was theirs, so they’d have been
able to divert human and financial resources
to their 2024 car while everyone else was piling
their resources into closing the gap.
I’m not so sure. Because it’s not just Red
Bull that must have known the final destination
of both titles long in advance, and were you
one of its rivals, would you chuck everything
you had at what you already knew to be a lost
cause? Or would you simply accept the
inevitable and turn your attention to next year’s
car too? Of course it’s not as simplistic as that
and we saw from some of the extraordinary
see-sawing of form behind the Red Bulls,
particularly from the McLaren and Aston Martin
teams, that some were clearly very focused on
the current season and the financial rewards
of doing well in the championship race.
But I still think we’re in for a far better
season next year and while I fully expect Red
Bull to win again, will it be by such a massive
margin as we saw in 2023? I think not.
Another thing likely – but not guaranteed – to
take place in 2024 is a general election. And
while I can raise precisely zero enthusiasm for
any of the available options, I’ll still be
following closely because I have a great interest
in politics as a subject, if not politicians as
individuals. What I don’t understand is the
credence given to polling data. If you want to
26

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

know who’s going to win, why not ask
a bookmaker instead? Unlike psephologists,
bookies have to put their money where their
mouths are, so who’s more likely to get it right?
Even so, the odds currently quoted for next
year’s driver’s world champion are curious to
say the least. As I write this the best I can find
for Max is 1/3 which is fair enough. But who
would you say was second favourite? It’s not
Checo, Lewis, Fernando or Charles, despite
them finishing respective second, third, fourth
and fifth in the 2023 title chase. It’s Lando, at
8/1. Lewis is down at 12/1, you can get 33/1 on
Charles and 40/1 on Fernando. The only one
who looks expensive is Checo at 28/1 because
unless some calamity befalls Max, I’d say there
were few people on the entire grid less likely
to take the 2024 crown.
Generally I am not a betting
man but who’d find my fiver if
I were? George Russell, at 25/1,
looks like the best value on the
grid. Yes, it’s true that Lewis had
the better season in 2023, though
I’d say George just had the edge
in 2022. And the raw speed is not
in doubt: in the qualifying headto-head in 2023 he and his teammate ended up 11-11, a team-mate generally
regarded to be the best driver of his generation.
But every passing year helps George as it
hinders Lewis, who will turn 39 before the
start of the season. If Lewis wins the title he’ll
be the oldest to do so since Graham Hill in ’68.
So of course I think Max will win, and on
balance I’d say Lewis might outpoint George
again, but if I was looking for a big return from
a small investment, it is the younger Mercedes
driver who’d get my money. Or Leclerc.

important than cobbling something together
in five minutes flat just so it can appear a little
sooner. Indeed there are publications so
desperate to be ‘first’ to review a new car its
journalists are reduced to writing in advance
by making educated guesses based on extant
press materials and experience, then making
rapid adjustments once they’ve driven the car.
Even so, and even if you’re not going to
publish first, there is a certain frisson that
comes with being the first journalist in the
world to drive a new car and I’d be lying if
I said I’d never felt it myself. But actually – and
there was a time in my life when I’d never
imagine I might say this – these days I enjoy
just as much being last to a new car. The car
itself has to have attracted strong opinions and,
ideally, for those opinions often
to be violently at odds with each
other. And it’s been a long time
since a better example has come
along than the Ineos Grenadier.
I missed its launch in January
because I was chasing the Dakar,
so watched from afar as the
verdicts came in. There was a
four-star review, derisory twos,
a three and a three and a half.
This car is so different, with its ladder
chassis construction, beam axle suspension
and recirculating ball steering that no
consensus has emerged. So is it a pointless
alternative to a current Land Rover Defender
from a brand of which people know little and
care less, or a brilliant cut-price alternative to
the greatest cult SUV of them all, the MercedesBenz Geländewagen G-Class? Well there’s one
parked outside right now and tomorrow I’m
heading off across Wales in it, both on road
and off. I’ll tell all next month.

“Is the Ineos
Grenadier
a brilliant
alternative
to the
G-Class?”

Car journalists and editors in particular ascribe
far more importance to ‘being first’ to review
a new car than the general public. And it has
long been the commendable view of this title
that publishing the right review is far more

A former editor of Motor Sport, Andrew splits
his time between testing the latest road cars
and racing (mostly) historic machinery
Follow Andrew on Twitter @Andrew_Frankel

Enjoy the Grand Prix in Holland
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© Monique van Middelkoop - Instagram: @uniki64

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Enjoy this exclusive offer
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REVIEWS

ROAD CAR TESTS

They’ve nailed the styling:
Volvo’s new EX30 is one of
the brand’s best-looking
offerings currently, and comes
at an appealing price point

That’s a design
blindspot, Volvo
The EX30 is a looker, affordable, a great
example of engineering, and should be best
in class. But it isn’t, explains Andrew Frankel
his is the most important new
Volvo in years. Decades possibly.
At least to Volvo. The EX30 is
Volvo’s first crack at the compact
crossover EV market, a sector
that is likely to come to dominate
the sales charts in years to come. More
importantly still, if it gets this right the
young professionals expected to buy it may
stay with the brand for years. Decades possibly.
You see the point I’m making: sell one now,
sell 10 other Volvos later.
28

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

First impressions count. I’m no greater
judge of looks than you, but I think it looks
great. Then the price: the range starts at
£33,795, which is £1700 more than the very
cheapest electric Vauxhall Corsa. Compared
to the class benchmark Volkswagen ID.3, the
base EX30 offers 272bhp as opposed to
204bhp for the entry level ID.3 and is £3500
cheaper. Clearly keen to make an impression
on a market in which it has no current
footprint, Volvo is aiming to create headlines
with its pricing strategy.

The car I drove came from the other end
of the range, the ‘Twin Motor Performance’
model, complete with all-wheel drive, 422bhp
and a 0-62mph time of 3.6sec, the same time
I was once quite proud to have squeezed out
of a Jaguar XJ220. But it still costs £44,495. Yes
that is £1500 more than the most expensive
ID.3, but the VW has only two-wheel drive and
less than half the power. That said, the Volvo
has a quoted range of just 280 miles, the VW
some 356, which is worth bearing in mind if
completing distances is important.
The news gets better. The EX30’s interior
is startlingly uncluttered, light and classy. It
feels wholesome, healthy somehow, and very,
very Volvo. There’s more space in the back
than I was expecting too.
It is of course a strong performer, though
you’ll only be given access to full power in its
performance mode. But such is the immediacy
and strength of its response even the fastest
hot hatch on sale – the Mercedes A45 S
reviewed elsewhere on these pages, would be
hard-pressed to keep up with it until well into
licence-losing territory. But its greatest
strength is its chassis. I can remember lumpen
ride quality ruining entire generations of
Volvos – the otherwise excellent 850 series
and its descendants among them – but the

And here it all falls down:
the interior is classy, but the
instruments are so poorly
located it defies logic

“Trebles all round? Not quite, as
this car has a fundamental flaw”
EX30 is exceptional. It’s not absurdly soft and
pillowy because that would make it wallow
around; instead its wheel movements are just
expertly controlled resulting not only in
exceptional body control by the admittedly
unremarkable standards of this category, but
I would say the most comfortable ride too.
Trebles all round? Not quite. For this
car has a flaw. Some reviewers see it as so
fundamental it represents grounds all by itself
to not buy the car. Imagine, if you will, Ronnie
O’Sullivan having to play snooker with a floor
mop instead of cue, or Usain Bolt lining up for
the 100 metres in Doc Martens. ‘Hobbled’
barely begins to cover it. And the most
remarkable aspect of it all is that it’s Volvo itself
which has done it.
I’ll explain. So keen has Volvo been to
create an uncluttered interior it has all but
banned buttons. There are switches for the
electric windows, the hazard warning lights
and that’s about it. There are some haptic pads
on the steering wheel which allow you to
change volume and set the cruise control, but
if you want to do anything else, even something
as vital as switching on your fog lights, you’ll
have to go via the menus on the central screen.

This is also where all the information you
need such as, you know, how fast you’re going,
is displayed. So if you want to know literally
anything, you have to take your eyes off the
road. In a Volvo. And, no, there is no option
of a head-up display. In this regard it is no
worse than a Tesla Model 3, but at least the
Tesla doesn’t scold you for taking your eyes
off the road to look at information in the only
place the Volvo provides it. Because while you
have to take your eyes off the road, the Volvo
never takes its eyes off you, and if the little
black box sees you doing something it is
forcing you to do, like see how fast you’re
going, it will flash up a little admonition to stop
you doing it again. Even the indicator lights
are here, far from your natural line of sight,
quite small and rather quiet so if you’re playing
music you may find it hard to hear them.
The idea of any car forcing you to spend
so long doing one of the least safe things a
driver can do – i.e. not looking where he or
she is going – is bad enough, but that it should
be a Volvo, a company that has built its
reputation on safety, is little less than shocking.
Telling you off for doing it is only adding
considerable insult to potential injury.

One reviewer was so incensed he gave the
XC30 the same score as the appalling Citroën
Ami, and while I don’t agree, I can see where
he’s coming from. With a sensible HMI (human
machine interface) the XC30 would have been
the best car of its kind I have driven. As it is,
it’s fine car saddled with a terrible flaw. It’s not
bad enough to render all its many strengths
null and void, but I’d urge everyone in the
market to make sure it’s not a deal-breaker.
For many, it undoubtedly will be.
VOLVO EX30

● Price £44,495 ● Engine Front and
rear electric motors, 69 kWh battery
● Power 422bhp ● Torque 400lb ft
● Weight 1960kg
● Power to weight 215bhp per tonne
● Transmission Single-speed automatic,
four-wheel drive ● 0-62mph 3.6sec
● Top speed 112mph
● Range 280 miles (WLTP)
● Charging speed 153kW
● Verdict Snatching defeat from victory.

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

REVIEWS

ROAD CAR TESTS

Excess in
brilliance
AMG’s new hard-core hatch
shouldn’t work, but it does
here are some amazing statistics
in the spec of this car: a 2-litre
engine producing 416bhp, a sub4sec 0-62mph time and a 168mph
top speed to name but three. But
all pale beside the big one: this is
a hot hatchback that costs £63,285. Put another
way, a Porsche Cayman and more than 10
grand spare in your back pocket. Put a third
way, almost exactly twice the price of the entry
level A-class from which it is derived.
It’s a shame. Because this is one of those
cars I really shouldn’t like. It’s so far from the
simple, lightweight, affordable formula that
created the genre it feels like it doesn’t belong.
But it’s brilliant. The engine and gearbox are
superb, the former not just powerful, but
responsive and sonorous too, the latter whipcrack fast. The chassis has that same skateboard
feel as my old Renault 5 GT Turbo, despite
weighing twice as much. Hooning around is
fabulous, and when you’re done being an idiot,
it’ll cruise quietly and comfortably home.

New kid on
the block
Never heard of BYD? You soon
will, and it’s off to a strong start

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

With over 400bhp from a
production four-pot, the A45
S is a true road brute that’s
also usable every day

I have also spent a bit of time in an A35,
which is a diet version of the same car, shorn
of 100bhp yet when equipped like the A45
S, still costs over £50,000. It’s nice enough
but I really can’t see the point. The A35 is
merely an expensive hatchback while the
A45 S is an out-and-out road warrior that
just happens to come in hatchback form.
The price may be silly, but the car to which
it is attached is anything but. AF

t is possible you’ve never heard of BYD,
let alone the Seal, the third of three
curiously titled cars to be put on sale
here – the others being the Dolphin and
Atto 3. So here’s what you need to know:
BYD – Build Your Dreams – is not some
new start-up chancing its arm. It’s existed as a
company for 20 years and last year sold 1.8
million cars, which isn’t far off Mercedes-Benz.
Add in the buses, trucks and every other kind
of vehicle it makes and that figure rises to 3.3
million. It is the best-selling car brand in China.
So although the names might sound silly,
this is a company you need to take seriously,
as the following facts about the Seal I’ve been
driving will now demonstrate. It has 523bhp,
four-wheel drive, twin electric motors and is
quicker to 62mph than a Porsche Taycan 4S.
There are elements of it which need
refining: the ride is adequate, the chassis
inert (though no more so than many other
EVs), there’s limited space in the back, the
infotainment system is needlessly complex,
the range is not the longest and its charging

MERCEDES-AMG A45 S
● Price £63,285 ● Engine 2 litres,
four cylinders, petrol, turbocharged
● Power 416bhp ● Torque 368lb ft
● Weight 1550kg
● Power to weight 268bhp per tonne
● Transmission Eight-speed double
clutch, four-wheel drive ● 0-60mph
3.9sec ● Top speed 168mph ● Economy
30.8 mpg (WLTP) ● CO2 208g/km (WLTP)
● Verdict Expensive but brilliant

speed not the fastest. But none of these are
dealbreakers and even combined cannot
dent the impression that this is an impressive
and capable new entrant, so far as cars in
this class are concerned. Yes, I’d prefer a
Tesla Model 3, a BMW i4 or Polestar 2, but
by nothing like the margin you’d imagine.
And if this is BYD’s first attempt at cracking
this market, just think how good the next
one could be. AF
BYD SEAL
● Price £48,695 ● Engine Front and rear
electric motors, 82 kWh battery
● Power 523bhp ● Torque 494lb ft
● Weight 2210kg ● Power to weight
237bhp per tonne ● Transmission
Single-speed automatic, four-wheel drive
● 0-60mph 3.8sec
● Top speed 112mph ● Range 323 miles
(WLTP) ● Charging speed 150 kW
● Verdict A good car and a brand to watch

Classic Car Insurance
the Goodwood Way

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REVIEWS

PRECISION

How to
capture a
moment
in time
Vertex, sponsor of the
Caterham Roadsport
Championship, pays tribute to
the maker of the 7 with a 50th
anniversary watch. But be
quick – it’s limited to 50 pieces
on Cochrane hit on an unusual
marketing method when he
decided to re-establish the
historic British watchmaker
Vertex a whole century after it
was set up in 1916 by his great
grandfather, Claude Lyons.
Cochrane initially invited 60 specific
individuals to become owners, giving them a
purchase code that enabled them to buy the
hand-wound M100 launch model through
the firm’s website. Each buyer was then entitled
to invite five further individuals, all of whom
could invite one more person – beyond which
only owners of original Vertex watches or
military personnel could apply.
It was odd, but it worked, establishing the
foundation from which Cochrane has since
been able to develop the modern-day Vertex
into a well-regarded dial name specialising in
interpretations of the type of military watches
it made between the late 1940s and 1970s, after
which the original business shut down.
The line-up now includes
automatic versions of the M100 in
either plain or blackened steel; the
MP45 single-button chronograph
with a choice of hand-wound or
automatic movements and the highspecification AquaLion dive watch.
Before he got into the watch game,
however, Cochrane was heavily involved in the
automotive world, variously working for Tesla,
Jaguar, Land Rover and Aston Martin – through
which he has developed an enviable list of carworld contacts that last year led to Vertex
becoming the title sponsor of the Caterham
Roadsport Championship.
32

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

Caterham Cars was originally a leading
Lotus 7 dealer before company founder
Graham Nearn acquired the rights to the design
from Lotus boss Colin Chapman in 1973, after
Chapman decided to stop building the nowcelebrated seat-of-the-pants sports car.
The following year Caterham built its first
7s, inset, and now, to help mark these
milestones, Vertex has produced this limitededition watch based on the MP45.
The MP45 C50 differs from the regular
version in having a tachymeter scale printed
around the edge of the dial for speed and
distance calculations plus the distinctive
‘Caterham 50’ logo at the six o’clock position.
The main hands, central seconds hand and
subdial indicators, meanwhile, are finished in
Caterham’s signature acid green and the
sapphire crystal back of each of the 50 available
watches carries its unique edition number.
As well as being delivered in useful custommade Pelican waterproof cases, the watches
are supplied with a trio of straps – one in
vintage-look leather, one in rubber and
a third that’s made from fabric.
With almost 25,000 Caterham
7s sold since production began it
seems unlikely that the 50 available
Vertex MP45 C50s are going to hang
around for very long, and any that
subsequently appear on the pre-owned
market may well command a premium.
So if you’re a Caterham fan, check out the
Vertex website asap. Or take a wind-in-the-hair
drive to the brand’s recently opened and
decidedly bijoux boutique at Shepherd Market
in London’s Mayfair.
Vertex MP45 C50, £3450. vertex-watches.com

IWC is well known for its aviation-inspired
watches, but it is also a partner of both
Mercedes F1 and AMG. The brand chose
November’s Las Vegas GP to unveil a brace
of watches dedicated to the partnerships,
with the one here being the AMG version.
It features a case made from lightweight
titanium – a material IWC pioneered in
watchmaking in 1980 – and is powered by
the brand’s 242-part 69385 chronograph
movement. It can be had on a matching
titanium bracelet or a black rubber strap.
IWC Pilot’s Watch Performance
Chronograph 41 AMG, from £8650.
iwc.com

L’Epee is a Swiss maker of mechanical
marvels that brings true art to the science
of horology, and at the end of 2023 its
Time Fast II in chrome won the mechanical
clock prize at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie
de Genève. It takes the form of a 1950s
racing car with a driver’s seat containing
a mechanical clock wound by an ignition
key that also winds a separate movement
to power an animation of the V8 engine.
An ingenious ‘gearbox’ makes it possible
to choose which of the two movements
the key connects to.
L’Epee 1839 Time Fast II, £30,730.
lepee1839.ch
Precision is written by renowned luxury
goods specialist Simon de Burton

Perpetual lunacy

The extraordinary new C1 Moonphase from Christopher Ward. A watch that
tracks the moon for 128 years – without missing a beat. With an aventurine
glass dial infused with copper oxide to represent the night sky. And a 3D
‘moon’ sculpted from Globolight© – a luminous ceramic – that precisely
follows the real moon’s journey across the sky. A watch this advanced can
cost up to £45,000. But the C1 Moonphase starts from less than £2,000.
As someone once said, you don’t have to be mad to work here…
Do your research.

christopherward.com

EVENTS JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2024

The IMSA SportsCar
season literally roars into
action at the Daytona 24
Hours – with some Florida
winter sunshine to boot

VSCC – MEASHAM RALLY
Shirl Heath, Leominster, January 13-14

The year’s first event for the Vintage
Sports-Car Club, the Measham Rally
is one of the great challenges of
vintage competition motoring.
The mixture of navigational rallying
combined with tricky seasonal
conditions and mid-winter darkness
makes the rally an enthusiasts’
favourite: finishing is a reward in itself.

WRC – MONTE CARLO RALLY
Gap, Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, France,
January 25-28

Daytona-bound Button
In a packed 60-car grid, the Daytona 24 Hours welcomes Jenson
as he makes his first appearance in the season-starting enduro

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

FORMULA E – DIRIYAH ePRIX
Diriyah Street Circuit, Saudi Arabia,
January 26-27

The team came into controversy over last
year’s win in Florida after it was found to be
manipulating tyre pressure data during the
race. It was fined £40,000 by IMSA and
deducted 200 points in the drivers’
and teams’ championship standings, but
kept the race win.
Meyer Shanks’s decision not to return
means four-time IndyCar title winner Hélio
Castroneves will not be competing in this
year’s event. Castroneves became only the
second driver to win three consecutive
Daytona 24 Hours.
Regardless of the disappointment of
Castroneves not racing, the Daytona 24
Hours gives nail-biting action round the clock
– and with more than 60 cars on the grid,
there’s a lot going on.

Formula E makes an early start in
warmer climes, easing the withdrawal
symptoms of F1 fans across the winter
break. The season gets underway in
Mexico City before heading to the
Middle East for Rounds 2 and 3 –
headlined as a “double-header in the
dark”. The circuit is regarded as one of
the trickier ones on the season
schedule, with 21 twists and turns.

ASIAN LE MANS – ABU DHABI
FOUR HOURS
Yas Marina Circuit, UAE, February 9-11

After Asian Le Mans’ opening rounds
in Malaysia (double-header) and Dubai,
the series moves on to its fourth and
fifth (and final) races of its short
season, held at the Yas Marina Circuit.
With a variety of LMP and GT cars on
track, the series has caught the
attention of an international field due
to the presence of former Formula 1
driver Nikita Mazepin on the grid.
MORE EVENTS

Could Jenson Button join a
long list of British winners
at the Florida enduro

Feb 4
NASCAR, Coliseum, Los Angeles
Feb 10
Snetterton Stage Rally, Norfolk
Feb 16-18 FRME, Dubai Autodrome, UAE

WORDS: HAMISH BAILEY. IMAGES: IMSA/LAT, GETTY IMAGES

Daytona International Speedway, Florida January 27-28

he 2009 F1 world champion
Jenson Button is due to make
his debut in the 2024 Daytona
24 Hours driving for Wayne
Taylor Racing with Andretti.
The Brit has a reasonable
amount of experience in endurance racing,
notably driving for the Garage 56 programme
in last year’s Le Mans 24 Hours. He also took
the wheel of a JDC-Miller MotorSport Porsche
963 for one round of the 2023 IMSA
SportsCar Championship, at the end-of-theseason Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta.
Button won’t be the only world-class
driver to be making his debut in the GTP
class at Daytona in January; Josef Newgarden
will be appearing for Porsche Penske.
Newgarden, who raced in the LMP2 class in
2022, will be joined by IndyCar stalwarts Scott
Dixon (Chip Ganassi) and Colton Herta
(alongside Button). Dixon will be hoping to
become the seventh driver in the history of
the Daytona 24 Hours to win more than three
times – his last victory here was in 2020.
However, despite winning the last two
Daytona 24 Hours, Meyer Shank Racing has
decided not to enter, stepping away from
IMSA for 2024 to focus on IndyCar, but
intending to return at some point.

The Monte Carlo Rally remains the
jewel in the FIA World Rally
Championship – and this will be its
92nd running. Eight-times WRC
champion Sébastien Ogier was the
winner last year for Toyota; the
Frenchman has finished on the podium
here every year since 2013. A win here
for three-times WRC title runner-up
Elfyn Evans would be a shot in the arm
for his championship aspirations.
Could this be his year?

THE WORLD’S MOST EXCLUSIVE
MOTORSPORT EVENT
13–14 APRIL 2024
go o dwood.com

REVIEWS

BOOKS

Fancy a fact deluge about
the Le Mans enduro?
100 Years of Legends is
the book for you. Above:
speaking of legends, here’s
Tom Kristensen, centre

The greatest race on
earth – and here’s why
Gordon Cruickshank augments his fact-crammed brain with
this dip-in-and-outable celebration of the Le Mans 24 Hours
lanning a book covering this
significant century can’t have
been easy, but this quadrupleauthored book takes a bold
approach, dividing into multiple
short sections livened by bold
graphics and diagrams. Visually dull it isn’t.
You’d expect sections on the drivers and
manufacturers, but here you also get
individual cars including the wacky ones,
technological experiments and advances and
much information about the structure
of the event – changing regulations, circuit
alterations, race organisation – and of course
in among all that are the actual results and
records. It’s a big book but not unwieldy,
and the varied graphics make it very tempting
to dip into. On one page there is a discussion
about pole positions (only since 1963); on
another the “curiosities” – smallest engine to
enter (Simca, 1937), Nardi’s catamaran, the
pugnacious Mini Marcos which despite its
1275cc finished 15th – and dead last.
Elsewhere there are sections on tyres,
including wins by make, driver clothing, and
American entries. I found myself getting quite
nerdy over the ‘24 Hours in figures’ pages:
36

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

I expect I’ll bore everyone in the office by
saying “did you know?” – that 60,000 gallons
of fuel are delivered to the circuit or that 40
doctors and three X-ray operators attend.
More seriously, the authors list the 2015
revenue as £19m, almost half from marketing
and venue rental and only a third from ticket
sales. As you see, it’s by no means a decade
by decade history. The four co-authors all
have long associations with the famous
endurance test, and it’s published in
collaboration with the Automobile Club de
l’Ouest which has organised the event since
it was first raised as an excitingly daft idea in
1922. That story (previously mentioned in
Richard Williams’ centenary book) is aired
here, alongside other racing at the time and
mention of “other shrines of motor racing”
– which doesn’t include Brooklands!
The great drivers get their biographies,
topped by ‘Mr Le Mans’ Tom Kristensen, but
so do rookie winners and there is a section
100 Years of Legends

Denis Bernard, Basil Davoine,
Julien Holtz & Gérard Holtz
Evro Publishing, £70
ISBN 9781910505885

on female drivers. We are still waiting to see
Odette Siko’s fourth place bettered by another
woman – and that was way back in 1932.
All in all it’s an inventive and inviting way
to tackle such a varied and extensive subject
– for example, one section is ‘24 words about
the 24 Hours’ offering you brief outlines
describing, to pick just a few, Garage 56,
categories, hospitality, the stints that drivers
endure between changes and those thrilling
but dangerous (perhaps thrilling because
they’re dangerous) Le Mans-style echelon
starts which tested a driver’s sprinting ability
as well as his skills at the wheel. And those
don’t go back to the beginning: the first
couple of races started with a two by two grid
just as we have in Formula 1 today.
There must have been some major
brainstorming sessions to decide how to chop
up this rich story. I’ve not seen many other
books that describe the effect on Le Mans
town of this petrol-fuelled jamboree, but here
are photos of the Grand Parade showing off
the drivers to the crowd, the Walk of Fame
pavement plaques that last year’s winners
unveil before the start of each race, and
scrutineering, always a popular session which
takes place in the centre of town, giving
spectators a chance to see the cars up close
even if they aren’t going to buy a ticket.
One downside of the sectional
presentation is that it’s not always easy to
track down information; I wanted to remind
myself when maximum driving hours
regulations came in, but though I knew I had
seen that box I couldn’t quickly find it again.
Still, that’s a minor cavil compared to the
lively way the book comes across.

Better by volumes
Honda’s Type R performance badge gets the full treatment,
overwhelming Gordon Cruickshank – but in a good way
ype R is Honda’s performance
label and in these two large
volumes Lionel Lucas takes us
through the whole story of a
Japanese firm’s search for speed
from efficient road cars and its
first tentative dabble in lukewarm performance
waters to the great year when Honda engines
propelled Ayrton Senna and Alan Prost to 15
wins out of 16 races. It’s a massive collection
of pictures and facts, partly because it’s a duallanguage edition with main text in French and
shorter translations into English, often in grey
type and not so readable.
I’d forgotten how many variations of model
the Japanese giant has offered over the years
until flicking through this avalanche of images,
diagrams and many magazine covers and
articles. Unfortunately the effect of so many
short text blocks for both languages, often laid
out on the slant, is distracting, giving a bitty
appearance that makes it hard to read through.
It can be entertaining – I enjoyed Lucas’s
attempt to compare driving a Type R Honda
to the umami flavour in food, and there is an
excellent and rather beautiful page in Volume
1 illustrating how to heel and toe.
Volume 2 is where the single-seater racing
cars live, though it does begin with a tour of

the Swindon factory before it moves on to
assembling the touring cars which have kept
the sun rising on the race track for many years.
There’s a lot of interest in the early years of
Soichiro Honda himself, mad on cars and
engineering from youth, which leads into the
focus on racing, on two wheels and four.
The layout calms down here, making it easier
to read of F2 with Brabham followed by the
bold move into Formula 1 with a 1500cc V12.
Honda has stepped in and out of so many
arenas of racing: seasons of success in F2 Ralts
contrasting with the overweight Spirit-Honda
effort of 1983, before Williams and McLaren
pushed the Japanese name to P1, as Red Bull
later would. But even this is a small part of this
big work as we dive into development of the
NSX, the quasi-prototype Super GT and then
drop back to basic Preludes and on again to
road car technology, IndyCar, BAR-Honda…
it’s a bit like walking in a hailstorm but with
lovely views around you. Not a relaxing read,
then, but it renewed my admiration for Honda’s
engineering and innovation.
Honda Type R Story
Collector’s Box
Lionel Lucas
Redrunner, £220
Vol 1 and 2 also sold separately

THE LEGEND OF
THE FORMULA
FORD FESTIVAL
Ben Evans
Ben Evans’ Afterword sums up the
most amazing thing about Formula
Ford – its 50-year life. In that time it
has brought on countless drivers who
arrived at different levels of the sport,
including F1, by offering intense
competitive racing at an attainable
level. Focusing on the FF Festival
which tops the formula’s activities,
Evans traces it from baby steps to its
glory days in the 1980s and onto its
quieter present years as a club event.
Not many photos but plenty of
reporting on its battles and intrigues.
Simon Arron would have loved it. GC
Pitch, £25
ISBN 9781801501798

HITLER’S MOTORCARS
John Starkey
Without Adolf Hitler’s own car
enthusiasm we might not
have had the great Silver Arrows. No,
they don’t figure here, but I was
intrigued to learn of Hitler’s keenness.
John Starkey quotes a letter written
from prison asking Mercedes for a
discount, though he became very
wealthy even before taking power so
could afford ever grander machines.
It includes a full run-down of the cars
of the dictator, with fascinating images
– including some on-boards. GC
Frontline Books, £22
ISBN 9781399071413

AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES, NEWSPRESS

GREAT BRITISH
RACING DRIVERS

Ayrton Senna was involved
in the later development
stages of the Honda NSX,
launched in 1990

Indira Flack
You’d expect a book of
photographic portraits to be the work
of a motor sport snapper, but Indira
Flack comes at our world from a very
different angle. Her great drivers range
from champions to junior karters, while
her left-field approach sees them
stretched on sofas, hanging from trees,
sitting on a scooter or a rearing horse.
Perry McCarthy at the piano is among
intriguing and insightful images. GC
Narrative Media, £38.98
ISBN 9781920452155
FOR THE LATEST MOTORING BOOKS GO TO

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Drivers included in our special calendar include Alberto Ascari, Jim Clark and Tony Brooks from the
golden era of GP racing, through to James Hunt, Jackie Stewart and Nigel Mansell amid a cacophony
of DFVs, right up to Lewis Hamilton in his Mercedes F1 prime. Order your limited edition calendar
now by going online to the Motor Sport shop or ring the number below. Price: £32.99.

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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

RACING LIVES

THE MOTOR SPORT INTERVIEW

GETTY IMAGES

Jimmy Vasser

Champ Car title winner on tricky team-mates, winning the Indy 500
as a team owner and Stefan Johansson’s super-strong coffee
INTERVIEW: ROB WIDDOWS

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

immy Vasser has been making
headlines in American motor racing
for more than 30 years and today he
remains in the winner’s circle with
his Lexus GT3 team in the IMSA
sports car series.
As a teenager he won America’s Formula
Ford championship, graduating to Indy
Lights in 1988 and CART/Champ Car in 1992
before getting his big break with Chip
Ganassi in 1995 and winning the
championship in ’96. Along the way he
flirted with Formula 3000 in Europe, was
thwarted in his dream of Formula 1, and
returned to the States to build a career in
CART and IndyCar that lasted until 2008.
As a team co-owner with Kevin
Kalkhoven he won the Indy 500 when Tony
Kanaan claimed victory in 2013 by less than
a second for KV Racing. Today his Vasser
Sullivan IMSA team is flying high – GTD Pro

Jimmy Vasser’s first Indy
500 (1992) ended in
disaster. Below: he spent
1992-94 with HayhoeCole in Champ Car

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

champions with British drivers Jack
Hawksworth and Ben Barnicoat – and there
are plans afoot to go IndyCar racing too.
Motor Sport: You did your first Indy 500 with
a year-old Hayhoe-Cole Racing Lola-Chevy
in 1992. A huge experience as a rookie?
Jimmy Vasser: Oh, yeah, the 500 is such a
big deal, especially for a young American.
When you’re young and bushy-tailed
everything seems so big, almost wondrous.
I’d come up through the ranks, winning the
Formula Ford series, and even then
I thought, you know, Roger Penske must
know who I am by now. That’s how excited
you are. Then there was Formula Atlantic,
an F3000 test at Brands Hatch which went
really well ahead of a possible season with
Crypton in 92. Angelo Ferro from Genoa
Racing had been helping me right through
those early days and I wanted the chance

to do Formula 1. I soon realised that was
going to be pretty tough sledding. There
weren’t many American drivers in Europe
back then, and there wasn’t any kind of open
arms policy for Americans in F1 at that time.
Back home I had the offer of doing the
Indy 500, so I went that way. It was a great
experience… until I crashed in Turn 1 and
broke my leg after 93 laps. It was a cold day,
the coldest in history, and on a re-start with
cold tyres I lost it, hit the wall, and finished
my first Indy 500 in the hospital with a
compound fracture. Not a great start.
You joined Chip Ganassi’s team in 1995
and the following year you won the
championship. What did Ganassi give you
that was such a big boost for your career?
JV: Racing is all about the people and Chip
had spent years building a winning team.
He’s always been 100% committed to giving

RACING LIVES Jimmy Vasser
his people all the tools they need to win
races. Over the years he’d acquired some
very good engineers so there was brain
power, people with good ideas. Of course
you can have all the good ideas in the world,
but if you don’t have the money to execute
them then you’re screwed, so Ganassi really
took off when he got Target as his primary
sponsor. In ’95 we had the Reynard 95I with
the Ford XB engine and then in ’96 we
got the Honda engine. Alex Zanardi joined
me as team-mate and we were looking good.
How tough was that 1996 season for you?
After a great start it was no easy run to the
title, was it?
JV: No, not at all. I got off to a great start,
winning four races, but then I had a big
shunt in practice at Detroit, backwards into
the concrete wall real hard. I didn’t know it
immediately but the concussion was really

bad and in the race, on the last lap, the
vertigo hit me, and I barely made it back to
the pits. I had a couple of weeks to recover,
we did a test at Mid-Ohio, but my whole
world was turning upside down with the
vertigo. It was tough to do a single lap. Back
then it was ‘suck it up, get in
the car, we need the points’ but
it took time to get back in the
game. Meanwhile my teammate Alex Zanardi was just
kicking my ass, catching me
up. My points lead was eroding
fast. That was tough, people
didn’t realise what I was going
through, the vertigo, the
concussion. It stalled me for a while.
My relationship with Alessandro [Alex]
was good, it was blossoming, we were good
friends from the start, the atmosphere in
the team was really great, like a racing team

should be. Maybe I was too nice, but in
America beating your team-mate was never
as important as it’s always been in Formula
1, and I was always racing for the team as
much as racing for myself. It was exciting,
we were on top, Alessandro was winning,
I’d been winning, and in the
end I was able to close it out
and win the championship.
In the years after that I
won some, he won some. He
struggled on the short ovals so
I wish there’d been more of
those... but he was an animal,
he kicked my ass in some of the
road races. The team won
three championships in a row. It was a
magical time, and then Alessandro went
back to Europe to give Formula 1 a shot.
When he left I thought, thank God, he’s got
his one-way ticket to F1, he’ll be battling

“I finished my
first Indy 500
in hospital
with a leg
fracture“

GETTY IMAGES, INDYCAR

Vasser won four of his first six
Champ Car races in 1996, then
had to fight off a determined
assault from Michael Andretti
and team-mate Alex Zanardi

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

RACING LIVES Jimmy Vasser

Chip Ganassi and his team,
combined with Reynard chassis
and Honda engines, set the
benchmark in ’90s Champ Car

Winning the title in ’96 must have been
a life-changing moment for you just three
years into your Champ Car career?
JV: Yeah, it was life-changing, but you’re
constantly having to prove yourself, to make
your mark on the sport, build a
career. You think everyone
knows how good you are, that
you’ve already proven yourself,
but on every step of the ladder
you have to keep on getting
better. Sure, we had some
extra dollars, security for the
family, but you just want more
of it, more winning.
It’s kinda like a disease, the need to win,
and if you don’t it’s frustrating. The arena is
just so competitive. You may have won races
and championships on the way up but hey,
you have to keep on proving to people
that you are as good as you think you are.

Sometimes my team-mates, like Zanardi or
Juan Pablo Montoya, they’d beat me when
I thought I was on top of my game, and that
was frustrating when you don’t know why.
I’d keep scoring points, which was good for
the team – Chip liked that. And like I say, you
gotta keep proving yourself however good
you think you are.
So, Zanardi left Ganassi in 1998, and
along comes Montoya as your new teammate. How was that for you going into the
new season?
JV: I knew a bit about him, his
exploits in Europe. Along comes
this cheeky, snotty-nosed kid,
and this was my new nightmare.
I mean, this kid was so bloody
fast, and now I’ve got another
really quick team-mate and
going up against these guys is
never easy. I tell you, it was
easier for me to beat him on a road course
than it was on the short ovals where I was
on top of my game, so he was pushing me
to be better. I said to him, ‘Hey man, you’re
doing things out there you shouldn’t
be doing – you’ll end up in the wall.’ He’d

“I said to
Montoya,
‘Hey man,
you’ll end up
in the wall’“

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

say, ‘Nah, nah, it’s OK, Vasser,’ but he’d be
driving the thing sideways on an oval. You
just don’t do that.
One time, in St Louis in ’99, we went
testing, I did the driving, got the car into
good shape. At the end of the day he jumped
in the car and – about the fifth time by – he
was already right on top of my times. St Louis
is a very short lap, so he’s had less than five
minutes in the car, and I thought, ‘Oh, shit,’
and scampered off to the airport. Come the
race he put it on pole and I was, like, seventh
or something, so now I’m looking at the data
sheets and he’s sitting there flicking little
balls of paper at me. So yeah, Juan was yet
another tough team-mate and he did a
fantastic job for Ganassi.
You raced right through the era of the
fall-out between IRL and Champ Car. How
frustrating were those politics for a driver?
JV: I don’t dwell on it, and I didn’t at the
time. I was just happy to be at the top of
the sport, doing what I always wanted to do.
In some ways it gave us other opportunities
to win the big 500-milers and 300-milers
that were the alternative to the Indy 500.
These were $1m races, and we won a few,

GETTY IMAGES

with Schumacher – that’s Michael, not Ralf
– and it was well-deserved. His transition to
F1 didn’t really work out but I believe
Alessandro was for sure one of the very best
on the planet and now I wasn’t going to have
to beat him any more.

Vasser’s 10th and final Champ Car
victory came in 2002 with Team
Rahal at the Fontana oval. He’s
photographed two weeks later, in
Mexico City – his last Rahal drive
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

By 2003, Vasser was
driving for Stefan
Johansson in Champ Car,
fuelled by the Swede team
owner’s caffeine kicks

Vasser was never an Indy
500 winner as a driver, but
was as a team owner – here
with Tony Kanaan in 2013

the feeling is euphoric, to win those big races
when you’ve come up through the school
of hard knocks. Remember, the driver
doesn’t get all the prize money. It’s split with
the team, maybe 60-40 driver and team
owner – everyone participates.
So yeah, I focused on the
racing, not on the split in
the sport, and that was six good
years with Ganassi, getting a
championship, a runner-up,
and a third from 1996 through
to 1998. Good times.

history. I nearly went to him in ’99 but then
when Zanardi left Ganassi I thought, ‘Why
am I leaving such a good situation?’ The
chance came again in 2002 after an average
year with Pat Patrick and it was a tough year.
The Cosworth engine was
down on power by this time.
We had pole at Long Beach,
fell foul of a regulation on fuel
stops, and came back out
second behind Michael
[Andretti] who had a better
strategy. I just couldn’t get
around Michael, it was
frustrating. He was so crafty
that day. He had got himself in the lead and
he smelt blood in the water. At the end of
the year we won on the oval at Fontana and
for 2003 I joined Stefan’s team. He was
already a good friend. He helped me out a

“Bobby Rahal
was a role
model for
me when
I was young“

After the days of the big
teams you drove for both Bobby Rahal and
Stefan Johansson, two racers with huge
experience of the sport in America.
JV: Bobby was a role model for me when
I was young. He’s a class act, part of IndyCar
44

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

lot in ’96 when I won the championship. He
introduced me to his super-powerful
coffees. I was like the rat going for the drug
in the lab test, knocking on his door first
thing in the morning for my shot of coffee.
There was still this battle going on
between IRL and Champ Car, the big split,
Honda and Toyota had gone, and the
Reynard was a bit of a dinosaur. Also, we
couldn’t get the new Lola, and I was getting
closer to 40 years old.
We had some podiums and I was
mentoring a new young team-mate called
Ryan Hunter-Reay who won his first race at
Surfers Paradise at the end of that year. He’s
gone on to win a lot of races, the Indy 500
and the championship. We had a good time,
Stefan has a great outlook on life, makes
good wristwatches, paints good pictures.
He’s not just all about motor racing.

RACING LIVES Jimmy Vasser

MATT FRAVER, GETTY IMAGES

Vasser, bottom, is now part-owner
of Vasser Sullivan, which won the
IMSA GTD Pro class in 2023

You never won the Indy 500, having lost
so many chances during the split between
IRL and Champ Car. Is that a regret?
JV: I never won as a driver but would you
say that Chip Ganassi has won Indy? That
Roger Penske has won Indy? Of course you
would. Well, so have I, as a team owner,
when Tony Kanaan won in 2013 for the KV
team owned by me and Kevin Kalkhoven.
It’s one of the absolute best memories of my
whole career, driving into Victory Lane
sitting on the sidepod of that car with Tony.
I just wasn’t the meat between the pedals
and the firewall that day but it was a terrific
high to win at the Speedway.
You have a Toyota dealership and now
you’re a team owner in the IMSA series with
James Sullivan, running the GT3 Lexus. Are
you enjoying yet another new challenge?

JV: I am. It’s our fifth season, and this time
we won the championship with our Pro
car, and we also have a Pro-Am car. We
work very closely with Toyota Racing
Development and their senior managing
engineer Steve Hallam. It’s a very serious
full-time project, and we parked our IndyCar
aspirations to focus on bringing victory in
the championship to Lexus.
When we took over this project it was
not in great shape, not properly competitive,
and now we’re winning and there’s nothing
better than this, celebrating with the team
after years of hard work. It’s actually one
of the high points of my career along with
racing with Zanardi at Ganassi and winning
the Indy 500 with Kanaan. We still hope to
get back to Indy this year. We have a car for
it, but right now it’s heads down to keep
bringing it home for Lexus.
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

RACING LIVES
MY LIFE IN CARS

Andy
Priaulx
My family car as a child...
A Ferrari Dino! My father was a Ferrari
dealer in Guernsey and I still remember the
day when he came home from work in this
beautiful Dino. It was Ferrari red with cream
upholstery and I just fell in love with that car.

Sprint race...

My first road car...
A Suzuki jeep SJ410 but I soon upgraded
that for something a lot faster, a Fiat Strada
Abarth, inset, right, the hot hatch of its time,
twin cam, twin carbs – a class leader in
the mid-1980s.

My first ever win was...
My first title was when I was taking part in
the British HillClimb series – I won the
championship in 1995. In my circuit racing
the first race win came at Donington Park
in 1999 in the Renault Spider race [Renault
Spider Cup, which ran from 1996-99].
I went on to win every race that season
and won the championship.
Andy Priaulx in V8 Supercars at the 2013
Bathurst 1000 – one of his favourite events

Senna or Prost?
Senna.
Oversteer or
understeer?
Good balance.
Brands Hatch or
Silverstone?
Silverstone.

The win I remember
the most was...
The one I treasure most
is World Touring Cars at
Macau in 2007, inset, below.
That was always felt a special place for
me – it suited my driving style and
I won all my world titles there. My fourth
consecutive title [European champion in
2004, then world champion in 2005-07]
was the big moment. It was a tough and
competitive field, with success
ballast and reverse grid, so no
car domination like F1.
Nobody could call it lucky.
My favourite racing car is...
The Pilbeam sports hillclimb
car. It was such a pretty sports
car and was also driven by my
good friend Tim Thomson and
Martin Bolsover.
My greatest rival
Rival, and friend – the young Augusto
Farfus. He was a very strong team-mate
[at BMW in the WTCC, 2007-10], supercompetitive, and he brought out the best
in me. I guess we improved each other.

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

If I could race in any era...
It would be the 1990s. That was a great time
in Super Touring cars. It was very special
because there were so many good
opportunities for pro racers. There was no
grading system so if you were good, if you
were fast, you had a great chance.
If I could take part in one more big race
it would be...
The V8 Supercars 1000 at Bathurst. That
race has such a great atmosphere,
and the cars are tricky and
challenging. I liked driving
different cars – it makes you
more versatile, you always
learn something, like new
ideas and a new approach.
The best piece of advice I’ve
ever been given was...
To be your own worst critic, but do so
in a positive way. This makes you work
harder, keeps you more realistic and gives
you a direction to improve your driving.
Racing requires so much application,
physically, mentally and technically and
I’ve had so many great mentors during
my racing career.

INTERVIEW: ROB WIDDOWS. IMAGES: JOAKIM ÅSTRÖM, DPPI, GETTY IMAGES, ALAMY

I was hooked on
racing when...
It was watching Formula 1 in
the 1980s and ’90s and
I became a huge fan of Nigel
Mansell. I loved his lion heart
– at Ferrari they called him
Il Leone. I admired his totally
committed approach to racing and
I think it’s so important to have role models
like Mansell, Ayrton Senna, Steve Soper
and Anthony Reid.

Lewis or Max?
Lewis.

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RACING LIVES

Flashback...

It’s 1992 and Maurice Hamilton starts his week at Special Stage 14
of the Monte Carlo Rally – a coffee in hand and a view to savour
he Monte Carlo Rally caught my
imagination in 1956 when
Ronnie Adams hefted a Jaguar
Mark VII (manual, no overdrive
or power steering) from
Glasgow to Monaco, the textile
manufacturer from Northern Ireland
accompanied by two co-drivers. The fever
really took hold in January 1964 when the
Belfast Telegraph was plastered back and front
with the story of Paddy Hopkirk’s magnificent
victory in the Mini Cooper S. Two decades
later, there was never any doubt about
persuading my sports editor that we really
needed to cover this motor sport classic.
The first trip, paid for by Austin Rover in
1986, came close to disaster when the Metro
6R4s of Tony Pond and Malcolm Wilson failed
to reach Monte Carlo on the concentration
run from Paris and a beleaguered bloke from

AR threatened to send the British press posse
home. A few of us stayed on thanks to the
intervention of the astute Baroness Jean
Denton, head of AR’s PR and a former
competitor. Visits to the awesome Alpine
stages ensured the Monte would become a
permanent part of my winter itinerary.
As with the RAC Rally (see last month’s
Flashback...), the secret was to travel with
seasoned journalists who knew their way
around. I was fortunate to fall in with Jerry
Williams (Daily Mail) and the erudite and
much-missed David Williams (aka ‘DKW’, to
use his Motoring News acronym). DKW knew
rallying inside out and Jerry was familiar with
the best restaurants; a perfect combination
– and a formidable one as I was to discover
when nursing a hangover while heading off
for a special stage at some unearthly hour
the following morning.

The early start was essential to beat road
closures and the threat of being stuck in traffic
on the side of a mountain. It didn’t always
work because there was never a means of
avoiding a stroppy gendarme taking it upon
himself to refuse access with an imperious
“Non!” and an infuriating wave of an index
finger. No amount of stabbing at a media road
book would do the trick.
When it worked, however, we found our
way to places such as this in 1992. Having stood
a metre or so from the start line of Special
Stage 14 to witness the Toyota Celicas and
Lancia Deltas launch themselves into the 15km
from Clumanc to Lambruisse, it was time to
grab a welcome coffee, climb above the burger
van in the foreground, pause for a moment
and take in the magnificent scenery. Not a bad
way to spend a Monday morning. I can smell
the barbecue and coffee from here.
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

LETTERS
Like it or not, Max, you
are part of the Formula 1
circus, and that includes
Las Vegas’s razzmatazz

BERNARD CAHIER/GETTY IMAGES

find it interesting that Max Verstappen was quoted in various media outlets as
not being enthusiastic about the promotional hype surrounding the recent grand
prix in Las Vegas.
Be careful what you wish for, Max. Like it or not, Liberty Media is a commercial
operation, and its intention is to make Formula 1 the focal point of a circus, to attract
spectators and money into the operation. Anecdotally and from what I see here at
the Australian GP, a huge proportion of the spectators are there for the social event,
of which two hours is consumed with a race for F1 cars. The balance of the day is
V8 supercars, celebrity races and partying.
If Liberty Media weren’t generating huge TV audiences, with the associated
income and advertising opportunities, the teams who now essentially provide
high-speed promotional/advertising billboards, Max and many other top drivers
wouldn’t be earning multiple millions. They might have to drive touring cars in the
support races to top up their income.
The mere fact that any F1 team can afford to outlay that sort of money is simply
due to the fact that the sponsors (read advertisers) are prepared to fund much of
that, with the balance coming from Liberty Media, from TV rights. It’s quite simple:
Liberty management are probably not motor racing enthusiasts, but they have seen
its potential to create a lot of money.
Max, you are part of the circus, part of the entertainment, and you can’t simply
be a faceless personality, simply driving a car very fast.
LINDSAY TAYLOR, SORRENTO, AUSTRALIA

otor Sport’s concise road tests often
cover high-performance cars, fitted
of course with ultra-wide wheels
and low-profile tyres. Even more modest
models from the likes of Audi, BMW, Mercedes
and Jaguar have fashionable wide wheels and
tyres. While these perform admirably under
most conditions, a sprinkling of snow and ice
renders the car virtually undriveable – zero
traction and ineffective steering and braking,
despite traction control, ABS and constantly
flashing dashboard lights.
This applies to my current Audi A5, and a
few years ago my S-type Jaguar had to be
pushed off a perfectly level but icy car park
when, despite the gentlest of throttle control,
the rear wheels simply spun.
I do know how to drive, and ‘winter’ tyres
did make a huge difference on an Alfa Romeo,
but the cost, inconvenience and storage of
temporarily swapping tyres is hard to justify
when the UK normally has only a handful of
snowy days each year.
My Audi A5 has 245/40ZR18 tyres. My
partner’s Audi A3 has 205/55R16 tyres and
is driveable and comparatively safe in most
conditions. Early in my motoring career
I had a 1950s ‘sit-up-and-beg’ Ford Popular
(1172cc side-valve) with huge-diameter wheels
and tyres practically the width of a
pushbike’s, and that would happily chug up
any hill and make steady progress in any
conditions, embarrassing the most
sophisticated of vehicles.
Should many modern cars bear a notice
“WARNING – Do Not Use In Slippery
Conditions”? Surely motor manufacturers can
find a better compromise between aesthetics
and usability, to provide a good-looking
vehicle that is safe to drive in most conditions?
JIM SCOTT, SUNDERLAND

read January’s story on team rivalries
[The enemy within] with interest. Surely
the greatest rivalry was between
Hawthorn, Collins and Musso when all

Three’s a crowd... Peter Collins, Mike Hawthorn
and Luigi Musso at the fatal German GP of 1958
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

LETTERS
three raced for Ferrari in 1958. Musso hated
both of his team-mates and was killed at the
French Grand Prix that season trying to keep
up with the eventual winner Hawthorn.
Musso’s fiancée was quoted as saying
that she “hated both of them”. When they
themselves were both killed, Collins at
the German Grand Prix and Hawthorn
on the A3 in Surrey, she announced that she
had now found peace.

The long way home:
transgressors in MotoGP are
made to run a wide line on
one selected corner

SIMON BREWER, FULHAM, LONDON

y friendly bookbinder has died and
I am hitting a brick wall locally in
Hampshire as regards binding
Volume 99. Normally I wouldn’t worry, but
my Motor Sports start at Vol 1 No 1.
The problem is simply that
few bookbinders have big
enough guillotines to
handle the thickness of
a dozen issues.
Can any readers
recommend bookbinders
who might be able to help?
If they happened to be local
so much the better, as these
volumes are quite literally
not to be taken lightly!
For the record, the set
has not been ‘collected’ but
bought by father and son,
month by month, since 1924.
IAN DUSSEK, HAMPSHIRE

Ed: email us at the usual address if you
can help and we will gladly forward the
details!

ooking at the January edition’s Parting
Shot picture, some of the audience
look less than riveted. Derek Warwick
for one (middle right by the windows, head

on hand) looks like he’s
dreaming of that ever elusive
podium top step, while Martin
Brundle (centre) seems to be
cribbing someone else’s
answers, and the chap behind
him looks like he’s been in the
‘land of nod’ for quite some time.
WAKE UP AT THE BACK!
ROB GENT, SPALDING, LINCS

’ve just watched the Formula 1 season
finale in which Sergio Pérez picked up a
five-second penalty for a collision with
Lando Norris. It ultimately cost him third
place despite Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc
letting him by late on in an attempt to help
him open up the magic five-second gap to
demote George Russell. It didn’t work out
for Pérez this time. However, on several
occasions this past season we have seen
penalised drivers successfully overcome the
deficit and maintain their finishing position.
It is about time Formula 1 adopted the
‘long lap’ penalty used in Moto GP [when
penalised riders have to take a longer route
round a chosen corner on one lap]. This
would cause the offending driver to lose
track position and make a penalty a
punishment and not a joke.

have been achieved on a racetrack. Missing
from the article was probably the most
spectacular and incredible application of
all which raced in an international series.
I am referring to the Hodges-built catamaran
in which a DFV was installed (inboard) with
a Mercruiser sterndrive unit. This raced in
the OZ (unlimited) class circuit powerboats
driven by Jackie Wilson.
The boat was supported and the
drivetrain developed by Cosworth, and was
beautifully finished in a blue and silver
‘metalflake’ paint. In 1978 Wilson was fourth
overall at the Bristol GP (a little like Monaco
on water). It ran at one time with a Formula
1-style rear aerofoil. I was lucky enough to
be there at the time and see it race – what a
sight and sound.
I saw both versions in Bristol and later
saw the boat in storage when I was at
Cosworth during 1984 and it still looked
beautiful. I wonder where it is now.
Bill Petty later commissioned a Seebold
hull with a DFV. Earl Bentz drove it at the
Miami Marine Stadium and successfully
wiped out KT Racing in the USA after lapping
the whole field twice in the first heat.
Great magazine.
MARTIN EMSLEY, BRISTOL

It may be a Formula 1 drivers briefing, but just like
school not everybody appears fully focused…
52

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

omething missing surely, Motor Sport!
A super article on the Cosworth DFV
in the January edition [Power to the
people], but not all of the DFV successes

DPPI, GETTY IMAGES

STEPHEN LILLY, BY EMAIL

W I L L I A M S F W 13 B  0 8
The Grand Prix winning Williams FW13B-08 driven by Thierry
Boutsen in 14 rounds of the 1990 F1 World Championship.
Now available through Private Sales by Collecting Cars.
Bespoke sales for the worlds most exclusive cars and collections.

CO L L E C T I N G C A R S . CO M

B E S T O F T H E B E S T: PA R T O N E O F R AC E C A R O F T H E C E N T U R Y
C E L E B RAT I N G 1 0 0 G L O R I O US Y E A R S

1924

2024

The hidden truth at the
heart of the Ferrari story

The movie
PLUS

Exclusive interview with
director Michael Mann
Recreating the deadly
1957 Mille Miglia

F1 season review
Mark Hughes
on Red Bull’s
extraordinary year

Jimmy Vasser
‘I finished my
first Indy 500
in hospital’

F E B RUA RY 2 024
£6.49

Racing the Reich

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

The British biking
boffin who took on
Hitler... and won

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FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

SIPA/SHUTTERSTOCK

MR & MRS FERRARI

A new film explores the
relationship between
Ferrari’s enigmatic founder
and his wife Laura.
Richard Williams reveals
the true story behind their
tumultuous marriage

The
driving
force
behind
Enzo’s
empire
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Michael Mann’s Ferrari
focuses on a few turbulent
months in 1957. Below: Enzo
Ferrari’s wife Laura is played
by Penélope Cruz

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

MR & MRS FERRARI

EROS HOAGLAND, ALAMY, SPITZLEY ZAGARI ARCHIVE

Enzo Ferrari
liked women.
That’s a fact.

Ask Gerhard Berger when he was happiest
in his career as a racing driver and he’ll talk
about 1987, his first year at Ferrari, when
the car was quick and after a race the Old
Man would take him to lunch at the
Cavallino, across the road from the factory,
and ask him about the girls he’d had that
weekend. When Enzo died the following
year, aged 90, joining his father, mother,
wife and first son in the family tomb, he left
two mistresses along with a second son.
Perhaps the best thing about Michael
Mann’s Ferrari, particularly for those who
can ignore the fast-and-loose treatment of
certain historical facts and don’t care that
the film’s depiction of the Mille Miglia –
where the story reaches its climax – makes
the mighty sports car classic look more like
the final of the Formula Ford Festival, is the
attention it pays to the women. That aspect,
rather than the portrayal of the racing world
of 1957, the year in which the action is
concentrated, is where it justifies its
existence as a Hollywood drama and might
even have something interesting to offer.
Three of the most important women in
Ferrari’s life are given due prominence. The
great Spanish actress Penélope Cruz dials
down her natural beauty to play Laura,
Enzo’s wife, as a figure bruised and vengeful
after 30 years of a turbulent marriage: “She
was a different creature then,” her husband
says, reflecting on their early days together,
“but so was I.” His mother, Adalgisa, is
played by the veteran Italian actress Daniela
Piperno as a caricature of the eternally
suspicious and critical mamma. Most
impressive is the American actress Shailene
Woodley, who quietly brings life, depth
and vigour to the role of Lina Lardi, the
long-term mistress, a figure previously
condemned to a shadowy existence in
accounts of Enzo’s life.
It’s unlikely that Laura ever fired a pistol
in the general direction of her husband, as
the film suggests, or that Enzo (played by
Adam Driver with great presence but none
of the man’s private ribaldry) ever gave her
a half-share of the company and then had
to bribe her to get it back. Michael Mann
and his screenwriter, Troy Kennedy Martin,
based their narrative on Brock Yates’s
1991 biography Ferrari: The Man and the
Machine, in which fact and speculation are
scrupulously separated. But in their search

Enzo and Laura in 1923
– the year the couple
married – at Alfa Romeo’s
Portello plant in Milan

for what creative people call emotional
truth, their film sometimes privileges drama
over actual history.
In real life, Ferrari’s first encounter with
his wife-to-be took place on a side street
near Turin’s Porta Nuova train station one
evening shortly after the end of the Great
War. He was aged 20 and working for a
company that converted wartime trucks into
cars for road use, delivering each rolling
chassis to a coachbuilder in Milan. Laura
Garello was a couple of years younger than
Ferrari, working as a dancer, and she struck
a young man away from home and in need
of female company as “beautiful, blonde,
elegant, petite, and with lovely eyes”.
More than one Ferrari historian has
wondered what had led these two to those
insalubrious Turin streets that night in 1921,

questioning in particular the true nature
of Laura’s occupation.
By the time Enzo’s ambitions started
to become reality, they were a couple,
sharing his apartment in Modena while
he divided his working hours between
establishing a bodybuilding company of his
own and driving in races for the works Alfa
Romeo team. They would not be married
until 1923, but a private collection of letters
and other documents, to which Motor Sport
has been granted access, shows that long
before their wedding he was addressing the
envelopes containing his letters to her,
whenever she went off to spend time with
her sister or took a break by the sea in
Rimini, as to “Laura Ferrari”. It was the start
of a partnership that would see her play a
significant and eventually controversial
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Some historical facts have
been blurred in Mann’s films
but the cars themselves have
been painstakingly built for
racing accuracy

“Ferrari’s mother stayed away from the marriage
ceremony and the service that followed it”
role in the company’s history, and that was
played out against a background of quarrels
and estrangements.
When, after 40 years of marriage, Enzo
presented his wife with a first edition of his
autobiography, the message he wrote on the
title page of Le Mie Gioie Terribili (My Terrible
Joys) in 1962 was not what might have been
expected. There was no “To my darling
wife”, “To dearest Laura” or “To the woman
who has been by my side through thick and
thin”. Or even “To Bibi”, which had been
his pet name for her. Instead, in his flowing
script and his favourite violet ink, he
dedicated her copy “To the mother of Dino.”
After four decades together, that was how
60

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

he saw her, as the woman who had given
him the precious son whose death from
muscular dystrophy at the age of 24 had left
a wound in his heart that refused to heal.
As man and wife, they could both be
difficult people. Enzo, gregarious in
nature – at least with his close circle of
friends – and gifted as an organiser of men,
could be tricky and manipulative. As the
years went by he grew more and more
reluctant to leave Modena, where he
continued to live, or nearby Maranello,
where he built his factory. Not even the sight
of his cars competing in Europe’s greatest
races could drag him to Monaco, the
Nürburgring or Le Mans. His seeming

reclusiveness and the habitual wearing of
dark glasses contributed to an aura of
mystery that worked to the commercial
advantage of the man who would become
known as the ‘Pope of the North’ – albeit a
pope without a vow of celibacy.
Laura, however, had no such scruples
about facing the outside world. She travelled
as she had done during the days of their
courtship, which took place against the
background noise of disapproval from both
sides: from his recently widowed mother
and from the Garello family, who were not
initially enthused by the idea of their
daughter marrying a young racing driver
with an uncertain future. She travelled not

MR & MRS FERRARI

EROS HOAGLAND, BERNARD CAHIER/GETTY IMAGES

Whereas Enzo kept away from
the track, Laura would often
be present – here at the 1960
Portuguese Grand Prix

just to the racing events but, as her surviving
correspondence with Enzo demonstrates,
to resorts where she could rest and recover
from bouts of depression induced by
emotional stress.
During the weeks, stretching to months,
that she spent at a hotel in the fashionable
town of Santa Margherita Ligure on the
Italian Riviera in the winter of 1921-22, Enzo
wrote long letters in which he addressed
her as “Cara Laura” or “Laura carissima”.
Some of the letters contained money; in one
he enclosed a press cutting in which his
company, Carrozzeria Emilia, was praised
for the elegance of the bodywork it had
exhibited on an Alfa Romeo chassis at the
Milan motor show.
Alas, such optimism was misplaced, at
least in the short term. By the time she
returned to Modena in the spring, the little
company was in trouble and in the early
stages of liquidation. As it closed its doors,
Enzo needed his mother’s help to meet his

debts. Laura retreated to Sestola, 3000ft up
in the Emilian hills, for clean air and further
rest while he recovered from his business
reverse by deepening his links with Alfa
Romeo. After she had returned from another
winter stay on the Riviera, they were
married in Turin on April 28, 1923. His
mother stayed away from the civil ceremony
and the religious service that followed it,

Laura, far right, at the 1960 British Grand Prix,
handing a prize to Tony Brooks, second from right

where the congregation consisted of the
bride’s family and friends.
Although Enzo was still racing regularly,
more of his time was now taken up by his
involvement in the running of the racing
team, to which he helped recruit the
engineers Luigi Bazzi and Vittorio Jano from
Fiat, both of whom would play significant
roles in his own future endeavours. Laura
continued to suffer from her problems,
spending her first winter as a married
woman back in the hotel on the Riviera
while Enzo was in Geneva, helping the
company’s Swiss agent with the development
of a potentially important market.
Laura’s jealousy, aroused by the way
other young women tended to gather round
racing drivers, soon became a source of
friction in a relationship that was already
losing the warmth of its early days.
Occasionally she came to a race: she was
with him early in 1924 when he beat Tazio
Nuvolari in the Circuit of Rovigo. More
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Much of the filming took place
around Brescia in October
2022. Above: Scuderia Ferrari
Alfa Romeos at the 1934
Monaco Grand Prix

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

MR & MRS FERRARI

EROS HOAGLAND, HERITAGE IMAGES/GETTY IMAGES

Door-to-door jostling in
Mann’s recreation of the 1957
Mille Miglia. Right: the
Scuderia’s first win – the 1930
Trieste-Opicina hillclimb

“There was a showdown in which
they discussed a separation”
often she was either in the hills, at the
seaside or with her family in Turin, on
the pretext of needing rest.
Enzo’s letters acquired an accusatory
tone. “Laura…” was how some of them
began – no “Cara” or “Carissima”, never
mind “Bibi” – including the one in which he
delivered an ultimatum that seemed to
persuade her to return to his side, at least
in body if not always in spirit. He still raced,
but less frequently, his thoughts increasingly
devoted to the creation of his own team,
with the aid of a few wealthy backers and
the income from a group of carefully
selected trade sponsors, and a headquarters
in Modena’s Viale Ciro Menotti, on the
corner of the Via Emilia.
When the newly launched Scuderia
Ferrari celebrated its very first win, in the
Trieste-Opicina hillclimb in 1930, Laura was
there. For the victory photograph, the team
boss’s wife stood smiling alongside
Nuvolari’s winning Alfa P2, with her proud
husband on the other side. But at the end
of a debut season in which the team won
nine of the 22 races it entered, there was
another domestic showdown in which they
discussed a separation before deciding to

try and patch things up. Although she began
to take a greater interest in the workings of
the new team, with specific concern for its
expenditure, she was still spending much
of her time, after the death of her parents,
with her sister in Turin.
Enzo’s mother now lived on the Corso
Canalgrande in Modena, only a few hundred
yards away from the Scuderia, but her
relationship with her daughter-in-law was
never cordial. Her son, however, had
other things on his mind. Alfa Romeo’s
management had decided to close their
racing department and transfer the running
of their works team to the Scuderia Ferrari
for 1934, with Achille Varzi, Louis Chiron
and the Algerian prodigy Guy Moll as their
drivers. Ferrari travelled to the opening race
of the season, in Monaco, where Moll, at the
wheel of one of the previous year’s P3s, took
a brilliant victory. A week later Varzi won
the Mille Miglia. Moll, alas, would be killed
later in the season in the Coppa Acerbo.
By now he had encountered a second
young woman who would play a major role
in his life. Lina Lardi degli Aleardi, the
19-year-old daughter of a Modenese family,
was working as a secretary at Carrozzeria
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MR & MRS FERRARI

nzo had given up hope of
becoming a father when Laura
told him, 12 years after their
first meeting and eight years
since their wedding, that she
was pregnant. A few weeks
later, after finishing second to Nuvolari in
the Circuito di Tre Provinci, he finally called
a halt to his career as a driver. Their son was
born in January 1932 and named Alfredo
(informally shortened to Dino) after Enzo’s
father and his older brother, who had both
died of pneumonia in 1916, 11 months apart.
Soon after Dino’s birth, the family moved
into an apartment above the Scuderia’s
garage and workshops, on the street whose
name would soon be changed to Viale
Trento e Trieste, and from where Enzo, now
Alfa Romeo’s official agent in Emilia,
Romagna and the Marche, would receive
his wealthy customers.
For the next few years Laura’s priority
was Dino, who would grow up in a spacious
apartment in a building on Largo Garibaldi,
close to the Scuderia. Enzo set up his
mistress in a pleasant detached house with
a garden in Castelvetro di Modena, a small
medieval town three miles from Maranello,
making it a convenient stop on his drive
home from the factory. His visits to Lina
became almost as much a part of his daily
routine as the post-breakfast visit to
his barber and friend, Antonio D’Elia, on
the Corso Canalgrande.
Dino was aged 13 when Lina Lardi gave
birth to his half-brother, Piero, in 1945. The
elder boy showed promise at school and
college before joining his father to work
as a designer, but from childhood he had
shown worrying symptoms which were
eventually diagnosed as muscular dystrophy,
progressively robbing him of his strength
as he grew to adulthood.
After his death in 1956, his father’s
routine for starting the day was extended
to incorporate a trip to the family tomb in
the cemetery of San Cataldo. The tragedy
widened the already considerable rift
between Laura and Enzo, exacerbated by
the knowledge that the particular strain
of MS, known as Duchenne Muscular
Dystrophy, or DMD, which at first enfeebled
64

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

and then killed their precious son, was a
genetic inheritance passed on via one of the
mother’s chromosomes.
Deprived of her son, Laura’s concern
for the company’s finances became more
evident as she freely criticised expenditure
that she considered unnecessary, often
joining the team at the race meetings to keep
tabs on their activities.
The resentment created by her
increasingly frequent interference was
destined to explode at the end of the 1961
season – one in which, ironically enough,
the Scuderia’s Formula 1 cars had triumphed

Enzo’s other family – son
Piero and mistress Lina
Lardi. Below: Piero, now
in his late seventies, is
vice-chairman of Ferrari

in the F1 world drivers’ and constructors’
championships while their sports cars had
won the Sebring 12 Hours, the Targa Florio
and the Le Mans 24 Hours.
Via a lawyer, eight senior managers
wrote to Enzo to complain about her
behaviour. An enraged Ferrari responded
by firing them all. They included Romolo
Tavoni, the team manager, Carlo Chiti, the
chief designer, and Giotto Bizzarrini,
the head of experimental engineering. The
result of this upheaval was a far less
successful 1962 season, although the
surprise promotion of the young engineer

Mauro Forghieri to replace Chiti would
eventually earn a handsome dividend.
For Enzo, the house in Castelvetro would
provide a haven of calm. Michael Mann’s
film carries Piero Ferrari’s endorsement,
seeming to guarantee a kind portrayal of
his mother, but we already knew that, by
comparison with Laura, Lina offered a more
emollient and much less demanding
temperament – something she passed on to
her son, who inherited his father’s eyes
but not his ruthlessness in business. In a
touching performance, Shailene Woodley
uses Troy Kennedy Martin’s script to put
flesh on the bones of Lina’s character, giving
her a gentle resilience to match her sweeter
nature and helping to explain to those
outside the family how Ferrari might have
managed to maintain both households
for so long.
Laura died in 1978, after a long illness
and 55 years of marriage. The film relies for
much of its narrative tension on the claim
that, in the early days, Enzo had given his
wife half of the company’s shares. He
asks for them back when he begins
negotiations for a merger with Fiat in 1957,
prompting her to demand a cheque for half
a million dollars in recompense, along with
a promise that Piero would not be allowed
to use the Ferrari name until after her death.
The half-share is a complete fiction, and
the negotiations with Fiat (and also Ford)
did not begin until 1963, although Fiat’s
Vittorio Valletta had assured Enzo, during
a crisis in 1956, that if things got really bad,
the Turin giant would always be there
to help. The promise was real enough,
however, ensuring that Piero Lardi did not
become Piero Ferrari until he was 32 years
old, at which point he and his mother went
to live with Enzo in the house on the Largo
Garibaldi once occupied by Laura and Dino.
ong before the deaths of Laura
and Lina (in 2006), Ferrari had
become obsessed with another
woman, whose story lies just
outside the film’s time-frame. In
1958 another of his drivers, Luigi
Musso, was killed in the French GP, leaving
behind the beautiful young actress Fiamma
Breschi for whom the Roman ace had left
his wife and children. Enzo comforted her
to the extent of setting her up with shops
first in Bologna and then in Florence and
eventually imploring her, in dozens of letters
and countless phone calls, to marry him,
despite a 35-year age gap. “According to his
letters,” Breschi said before her death in
2015, “I was the first woman in his life.”

KLEMANTASKI COLLECTION/GETTY IMAGES

Orlandi, where Enzo sometimes ordered
bodywork for his Alfas. Soon she was
transferring her skills to Ferrari’s offices and
accompanying him on business trips to
Milan. After initial opposition, her family
came to accept her role as the mistress of a
man who was clearly making something
substantial of his career.

Lunch before the 1956
Syracuse Grand Prix, from left:
Luigi Musso, his girlfriend
Fiamma Breschi, Louis
Klemantaski, Peter Collins and
Motor Sport’s much-travelled
scribe Denis Jenkinson

“Enzo implored Fiamma, in dozens of letters
and countless phone calls, to marry him”

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

LORENZO SISTI

Film director Michael Mann, left,
has recreated 1957 for Ferrari,
his new biopic about Enzo.
Opposite: Marino Franchitti
– or is it Eugenio Castellotti?

MARINO FRANCHITTI

Lights,
camera,
action!

Damien Smith speaks
to Marino Franchitti
about stunt driving in
Ferrari, and how the
director convinced him
to take on an acting role
hen Marino Franchitti
jumped on a call with
Michael Mann, the
director of Ferrari,
the Scot thought that
any potential role he
might have in the making of the movie would
be limited to a bit of driving. What he hadn’t
expected was for Mann to pitch him into an
acting role – as dashing Italian racing hero
Eugenio Castellotti.
“My first thought was ‘God no!’” smiles
Franchitti. “But Michael is persuasive. Then
you think, ‘How much would I regret not
saying yes to that? Working with Michael
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Mann on a Hollywood movie…’ I thought I was
just going to drive the Maserati 250F, which
I race regularly and is owned by my father-inlaw Nick Mason, as a double for Jean Behra.
I told him I’d never acted, but he said, ‘Don’t
worry, I’ll direct you.’”
The younger brother of three-time Indy 500
winner Dario is quick to point out an obvious
physical difference to Castellotti. “Obviously
I don’t have the hair… so I had a wig fitting.
Patrick Dempsey plays Piero Taruffi in the
movie. We’re old friends and he was getting his
hair bleached blond/grey at the same time, so
we had some fun with that.”

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

Franchitti needed a wig
to become Castellotti,
left. The cars are faithful
replicas with bodies by
Campana and drivetrains
by Caterham. But the
250F, top left, is real

“A car was
launched into
the air with a
dummy version
of me in it”

GETTY IMAGES, MARINO FRANCHITTI, RITA CAMPANA, EROS HOAGLAND

ranchitti had met Mann several
times in the past at the Long Beach
Grand Prix and was aware of the
auteur’s deep interest in motor
sport. “That’s the thing, Michael has
a passion for cars and racing. He
raced Ferrari Challenge in the States quite a
long time ago and he really gets it from a driver’s
point of view. He and his team went to great
efforts to make the film as good as they possibly
could for people like us.”
As Mann has said, Ferrari is not a racing
movie per se. A highly charged relationship
triangle, rather than the cars, is core to the
story’s appeal to a targeted wider audience.
“Of course, there are things that people like us
who know the detail can pick out,” says
Franchitti. “This is Michael’s vision. But how it
strives to be authentic is the effort of someone
passionate about our sport. Michael did a
fantastic job of bringing the racing to life and
using that as part of the whole story. And there
is plenty in the movie for us to enjoy.”
On the attention to detail, Franchitti was
astonished at the lengths Mann’s production
team went to, particularly on the recreated cars.
There was always going to be an inevitable limit
on the use of rare and unspeakably valuable
originals, although Mason’s 250F was employed
dynamically in filming and several real cars
have been included in ‘safe’ Mille Miglia scenes,
including the winning Ferrari 315 S from 1957.
But Hollywood uses other ways and means for
the throaty action.
The impressive replicas were made by Neil
Layton, who also worked on the No Time to Die
James Bond film. They are tubular chassis fitted
to Caterham drivetrains with aluminium handbeaten bodies made by the ‘right’ people:
Campana of Modena. “They did an incredible
job,” says Marino, who – as Motor Sport readers
will know – has vast experience of driving and
racing many of the real things thanks to his
passion for historic motor sport. “They laserscanned the original bodies and then these were
hand-made. For what, remember, is not a racing

MARINO FRANCHITTI

You could easily be fooled
for thinking this is a period
photo... It was taken by
Franchitti during filming

movie. All hand-beaten and beautiful. Even the
cars that were destroyed for accidents looked
correct. And we were running on crossply tyres
from the period so the cars move about
properly, often all for a split second on screen.”
As Caterhams in disguise, it’s no surprise
Marino reports they were “fun” to drive – but
aurally they clearly fell a little way short of
sonorous Ferrari and Maserati period sound.
So recordings of correct engines were made
through access to cars belonging to Nick Mason
and Lord Bamford. “They used a guy called
Chris Jojo who does audio for video games,”
says Marino. “It’s ferocious and the match-up
is so clear, precise and well done.”
Location shooting took place in Italy, on a
mix of country roads and at Imola, while the
Modena Autodrome – where Castellotti meets
his violent end – was recreated at an old airfield.
The grisly scene is one of the most dramatic
in the movie, but is said to have been recreated
from eye-witness accounts. Franchitti wasn’t
actually driving for that bit… “It was very
interesting to see a car launched into the
stratosphere with a dummy version of me in
it,” he says of ‘his death’.
Castellotti’s role in the movie is all too
tragically short and playing a racing driver
wasn’t a great stretch for Franchitti. Still, he
pulls off what little acting is required with
aplomb, and as a student of racing history
says he felt an affinity for his character, partly
because they share something across the
decades. Marino’s headline achievement from
racing was winning the Sebring 12 Hours with
Chip Ganassi in 2014. Castellotti too won the
Florida classic, partnering Juan Manuel Fangio
in 1956. “He was a muscular, handsome Italian,
so we didn’t have much in common! But he
won Sebring, so I could relate to that. He was
a privateer like Stirling Moss who used his skill
to get himself into a factory programme.”
x-Stig Ben Collins plays Moss, while
Derek Hill – son of late Ferrari F1
hero Phil – is Behra. Marc Gene
also pops up, and Franchitti
name-checks the actor who
plays Alfonso de Portago – Gabriel
Leone, who depicts Ayrton Senna in a new
docudrama, Senna, coming soon to Netflix.
“It’s crazy when you look at this threemonth period the film covers,” says Franchitti.
“There was more going on in that span during
1957 than some people have in a lifetime. To
immerse yourself so fully in such a short period
of time, you realise it’s amazing Ferrari was as
successful as it was with everything that was
going on. But that racing mentality of doing
everything you can to make it happen must
have carried it through.”
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MICHAEL MANN

“I had to
make the
film the
right way
otherwise
I didn’t want
to make it
at all”
Hollywood director
Michael Mann spent 30
years trying to make his
Ferrari movie. Finally, he
has achieved his ambition.
In an exclusive interview,
he tells Damien Smith
how, and why it matters

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Michael Mann’s attention
to detail meant Ferrari
was an expensive film to
make. Right: a mix of
genuine cars and clever
recreations are used

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

MICHAEL MANN
Enzo Ferrari (Adam
Driver) leans in for a
word with Peter Collins
on the set of the film as
photographer passenger
Louis Klemantaski braces
himself for more action

he release of Ferrari this month
is the culmination of an odyssey
that spans 30 years for director
and Hollywood big-hitter
Michael Mann. The film-maker
was in his fifties when he and
his friend, fellow auteur Sydney Pollack, first
started work with screenwriter Troy Kennedy
Martin on a story based on Brock Yates’s
colourful biography Enzo Ferrari: The Man
and the Machine. The revered Pollack died
in 2008, but Mann, now 80, has finally
achieved that ambition of bringing his vision
of Enzo Ferrari – set in a tight three-month
timeframe during 1957 – to life on the silver
screen. This one was personal.
For years stories would emerge about this
movie, then vanish. Robert de Niro, with
whom Mann worked on his masterful crime
thriller Heat, was an early candidate to play
Enzo. Much later, in 2015, Batman star
Christian Bale was in line, but was said to
have pulled out because he didn’t have
enough time to put on the weight he felt was
essential to become Enzo. Hugh Jackman (aka
Wolverine) was subsequently on board, until
40-year-old Adam Driver, among the finest
actors of his generation and best known for
playing Kylo Ren in recent Star Wars films,
took the role. So why did it take so long?
“No car racing movie – and this is
categorised in that sub-genre – had ever done
well at the box office. Ever,” emphasises
Mann – who enthusiastically agreed to speak
to Motor Sport exclusively for this story
because he happens to be a reader. He
cites the two big racing pictures, John
Frankenheimer’s Grand Prix and Steve

lead with Matt Damon as Carroll Shelby. What
was key to its success to a wider audience far
beyond car enthusiasts, says Mann, was
“unusual characters” that “resonate with
how life really is”. That’s also key to Ferrari’s
long-awaited existence.
Driver is one of Hollywood’s bankable
A-listers – and Mann reveals both he and his
lead, plus other key producers, took “a
radical salary cut” to get Ferrari off the
blocks. “But it could only be made the right
way,” says Mann. “It was an expensive movie
to make” – the budget was said to be £75m
– “because we had to build replica cars. I shot
it to a relatively quick schedule, too – 58 days,
when it should have been typically 75-80.
But it had to be made the right way otherwise
I didn’t want to make it at all, which meant
being up in the ozone of budgets.”
Driver looks nothing like Enzo Ferrari and
from what we can tell didn’t bulk up in the
way Bale apparently felt was necessary. But
he does deliver an intensely magnetic
performance, laced with pleasing hints of
Enzo’s dark humour. “Adam has within him
this power and strength that was there in the
core of Enzo,” says Mann. “There’s a specific
moment in time as described in the Richard
Williams book [Enzo Ferrari: A Life], when
Enzo was sitting on a park bench in Turin in
1918 when he had been turned down by Fiat
for a job. He’s bereft and cold, brushes snow
off a bench. His father and brother are dead,
he has little education and no money. As he
says in his autobiography he openly wept, in
a moment of crushing despair. But he asked
himself one question: who shall I be in this
world? And that’s such a romantic notion.

LORENZO SISTI, EROS HOAGLAND

“Adam is grounded in a gritty
reality. He was the perfect Enzo”
McQueen’s Le Mans – upon which his father’s
second cousin, Saul Bass, worked – as the
prime culprits for turning Hollywood off
motor sport. “The visual romantic allure of
racing was always there, but those earlier
films didn’t have a story,” says Mann.
“Beautiful visuals will keep your attention
for about eight minutes and that’s it, then
the story better show up.
“The first one that really had a great story
was Ford vs Ferrari (aka Le Mans ’66).” Mann
was “tangentially involved” as an executive
producer on the 2019 movie in which Bale
did star, as a skinny Ken Miles, sharing the

“Ferrari had a belief he could transcend
static class hierarchies in Italy in 1918 and
make of himself what he wanted to be. The
first incarnation was as a race car driver in
the 1920s. At the core of Adam Driver is that
same raw ambition. He applied to Juilliard”
– New York’s famous performing arts college
– “straight after high school and got rejected,
went to the marines for three years, came
back and did make it to Juilliard. He has lived
in the world, is grounded in a tough and gritty
reality. To me he was the perfect Enzo.”
As you’ll have gathered if you’ve read
Richard Williams’s story elsewhere in this
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MICHAEL MANN

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

From top: Michele Savoia
plays a convincing Carlo
Chiti, left. Michael Mann,
right, with Piero Ferrari, the
only living son of Enzo, at the
Venice Film Festival, 2023

EROS HOAGLAND, GETTY IMAGES

issue, Ferrari is far from a straight car movie.
Rather, it’s an emotional drama surrounding
Enzo, his wife Laura – played with a wonderful
mix of power and vulnerability by the superb
Penélope Cruz – and the so-called mistress,
Lina, portrayed with subtlety by the equally
adept Shailene Woodley. This is a film that’s
as much about the women as Enzo, and it’s
all the better for it.
“The stories of Enzo and Laura are
legendary,” says Mann. “There’s a restaurant
in Piazza Roma in Modena called Oreste. The
former owner recounted to us how Enzo and
Laura would argue at great volume in there.
It’s a relationship that exists in life, then Troy,
Adam, Penélope and myself made drama out
of it. These are two people who can’t live
apart, can’t live together. Enzo described her
when he met her, how he fell head over heels
in love when she was singing in cabaret. They
formed this family together, had their son
Dino. She pawned his wedding gift to buy the
rest of the components for his first car. She
was a partner, sharp and smart – cynical, but
also primal in her beliefs.
“But that extrovert woman became
locked in a silo of mourning after Dino died,
with Enzo in his own. There’s this cloying
term of ‘healing’, but there was no healing.
Losing a child is the most unnatural thing.
They exist outside of psychology – it’s not
like they would go to a therapist. It continued
for years, this relationship of hostility, anger,
dependency. But when he was having his
biggest fights with her the person he still
called about business was always Laura.”
There are other sources beyond the Yates
biography. “We met Laura’s doctor who was
quite elderly and he showed us letters no

one had ever seen, letters Enzo had written
to Laura in the middle 1970s [she died in
1978]. They are incredibly affectionate. It’s
a really compelling dynamic and no one
could personify Laura better than Penélope
Cruz. I knew in four minutes on a Zoom call
with her that she was Laura. She had a total
understanding of this woman.”
The movie centres around Laura
discovering the existence of Lina – and of
Enzo’s illegitimate son, Piero. Once confined
to being known as Piero Lardi until Laura
had died, Piero Ferrari gave Mann his full
blessing. “I can’t imagine the anticipatory
anxiety he must have felt,” says the grateful
director. “Here we are making a motion
picture about his life as an illegitimate
12-year-old. We’re portraying his mother;
Laura with whom he had a difficult
relationship; and his father. I’ve known Piero
for more than 20 years and I am the
beneficiary of a lot of personal trust. We
spent a lot of time together, including in preproduction talking about the kind of details
that are critical while making such a film.
Like what time did your father get up? Did
he wear pyjamas? What kind of pyjamas?
“We learnt a lot about Lina that’s not in
the books, primarily from her niece –
everyone says she is a lot like her. Lina was
very contemporary. She’s described as a
mistress because people don’t know what to
call her, but she wasn’t one. It really was a
second family, she was a second wife. When
Enzo had important clients he was friendly
with he’d take them home to Lina’s, and she’d
home-cook a dinner for eight people. The
only images of Enzo in repose, lying on
the grass with his shirt open, are at Lina’s

house. I don’t think single mothers were all
that unusual in Italy 10 years after the war.”
The film evokes 1950s Italy beautifully
and there’s loving detail in every frame. But
as Richard Williams has touched upon,
Ferrari plays fast and loose with racing and
company history in a manner that’s likely to
make readers blanche. Examples? Jean Behra
(played by Derek Hill, son of Ferrari world
champion Phil) is built up as the Maserati
rival Ferrari must beat to win the Mille Miglia
– until he trundles down a bank, smacks a
rock and retires. Piero Taruffi (an underused
Patrick Dempsey) stops to give Behra a ride
– in a race the Frenchman never actually
started. In reality, a broken wrist incurred
during a practice crash ruled him out. Then
again, perhaps historical accuracy is overrated… Scroll back to Denis Jenkinson’s
report for Motor Sport in the July 1957 edition,
see overleaf, and you’d never know the
accident that killed Alfonso de Portago and
his co-driver Ed Nelson also claimed the lives
of nine spectators, five of them children.
Jenks pays passing brief tribute to the crew,
but makes no mention of the horror that
ultimately called time on the 1000-mile road
race. So much for the organ of record.
What Mann says he has been careful
about is the depiction of that accident, which
occurred at Guidizzolo, less than 40 miles
from the finish in Brescia. He’s a director

who has rarely shied away from contextual
violence and here he’s chosen an unflinching
approach to the terrible brutality of the
tragedy. It fully earns the movie’s rating as a
15 in the UK. “It’s faithful to what happened,
both out of respect and the meaning of that
accident,” he maintains.
Police and investigation reports were his
source – plus, he reveals, one very special
eye-witness. “We visited the site at
Guidizzolo. While we were there, an elderly
gentleman with a cane came out. He asked
what we were doing. When we explained,
he said: ‘I was there.’ He said his family were
having their Sunday dinner when they heard
the first cars come through. ‘My older
brother, who was nine, ran out,’ he told us.
I was three. I ran after him, I was slower and
he got to the edge of the road – and my
brother got killed. I saw the whole accident.’
That inspired the scene of the farm family
with the three-year-old toddler.”
How it’s shot, with an inevitably heavy
use of obvious CGI, is also influenced by
period footage of another racing tragedy.
“The famous accident at Le Mans in 1955,”
says Mann. “The way that comes to you in
the existing film footage is the way I wanted
to see this. The horror is in how plainly it’s
shot. No artifice, not a lot of cutting.
The honesty of the news reel footage of the
Le Mans accident influenced how I shot it.

For Mann, Ford v Ferrari,
below, mixed racing
authenticity with a winning
story – unlike Grand Prix, lower,
which the Ferrari director
partially blames for turning the
US public off racing movies

“Lina is described as a mistress
but really she was a second wife”
Maserati vs Ferrari in
Mann’s recreation of
the 1957 Mille Miglia.
Right: genuine artisan
skill was employed to
create the racing replicas

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MICHAEL MANN

Gabriel Leone plays tragic Alfonso de Portago,
foreground, with Jack O’Connell as Peter Collins

A simple pan shot and you see what happens,
no games and no tricks.”
The final shot lingers on what’s left of
de Portago, played by Gabriel Leone. “That
was absolutely the way to show it,” Mann
insists. “It’s horrible. What happens in such
an incident is what happens to human bodies
when they fall out of aeroplanes, how they
come apart. I left out some of it and the
gruesome details of what happened to Ed
Nelson but I also didn’t want to censor it. We
move on to Brescia and Taruffi’s victory. Of
course, they have no idea this has happened.”
Mann says he drew on his own limited
racing experience for the other action
sequences, which share a style recognisable
from Ford vs Ferrari and perhaps also Ron

engineers, designers, executives and people
from the Ferrari race team,” he says. “They
had a positive reaction to the picture. That
was critical. When you make a film like this,
whether it’s Modena in 1957 or the American
frontier in 1757 and you embrace Iroquois
culture” – referencing his 1992 film The Last
of the Mohicans – “it’s kind of the same thing.”
His final word on his audience is also
revealing. “We do quite a bit of testing,” Mann
explains. “The demographic that responds
to the movie the strongest is women over 35,
and then men over 35. I think that’s to do with
people who have lived life: had children,
perhaps had a marriage that didn’t work.
Hence the strong connection to Enzo and
Laura.” But it’s not just the movie’s human
emotional pull that resonates. “It’s interesting.
The favourite component for women is racing
as well as the story. If you look at who is
watching racing now in the wake of Drive to
Survive, the interest from women is soaring.”
Like it or not, his film will be labelled
a racing movie. But perhaps where it breaks
the most important new ground is who might
enjoy watching it the most – while training a
welcome spotlight on the women who
influenced, and had to live with, motor
racing’s greatest, most enigmatic and plain
difficult figure. It’s about time.
Ferrari is on general release now.

Below: Mann, left, filming
The Last of the Mohicans.
Lower: it’s curtains for the
No6 Ferrari in 1971 film
Le Mans. Bottom: costs
were high on the film but
the results are worth it

Howard’s Rush. In other words, not a patch
on the realism of Le Mans, which remains
the benchmark in this regard. “I did some
amateur racing,” Mann explains. “As a
director or actor if you have a fraction of an
experience you know how to project or
extrapolate it. It was enough to say ‘I get it’.
“Racing lends itself to beautiful shots, and
pushes the audience into the role of observer.
I didn’t want that. I wanted to subjectify them
to the internal experience of driving. The
last thing you are conscious of when you are
driving is what’s happening to you in that
moment. You are conscious of what you are
doing next. When it’s working it’s what Jean
Behra called ‘ridiculous ecstasy’.”
Such a film is always going to be aimed
at a wide audience, but as a genuine car
enthusiast you sense he can’t help but care
about how it will be received by true racers.
“The most critical audience for me was
when I screened it in Modena for about 200
76

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

EROS HOAGLAND, GETTY IMAGES

“I wanted to subjectify people to
the internal experience of driving”

M KLEMANTASKI COLLECTION ONDADORI VIA GETTY IMAGES

Eventual winner of the
1957 Mille Miglia Piero
Taruffi accelerates away
from Rome in his Ferrari.
This is a period shot by
Louis Klemantaski

The Ferrari team received notification of
only the first three positions at the
Ravenna control, so that they did not
realise that their only rivals were already
out. The reactions to this monopoly were
interesting, for Wolfgang von Trips eased
up, Peter Collins was shaken to have the
German leading at the first control, so
went much faster, and Piero Taruffi, as
always, really got into his stride down the
fast leg of the Adriatic coast. Olivier
Gendebien could know nothing of what
was going on behind him, and just drove
as hard as the car could stand. By the time
Pescara was reached Collins and Taruffi
had overtaken von Trips, and before they
turned inland they realised the Maserati
menace existed no longer, for Ferraris
were still in the first five places.
By Aquila the order was unchanged
and the Ferraris were conducting a clean
sweep in the order Collins, Taruffi, von
Trips and Alfonso de Portago, with the
Gran Turismo car of Gendebien ever in
fifth place. Through Rome there was no
change in the order and Collins seemed
certain of victory. The average to Rome
was 172.965kph, so that it did not seem as
though the leader was easing up at all.
On the fast winding stretches to Siena
Collins continued to increase his lead and
by Florence he was nearly nine minutes
ahead of Taruffi. However, over the Futa
and Raticosa mountain passes the leading
Ferrari began to make ominous noises
from the back axle, and already Taruffi’s
car was showing similar symptoms, the

F R O M : M OTO R S P O RT, J U N E 1 9 5 7
1957 MILLE MIGLIA

Ferrari sweep
the board again
I TA LY, M AY 1 1 - 1 2 1 9 5 7

Taruffi is congratulated by wife Isabella. Days
later the Italian government banned road racing

extra power of the 4.1-litre engine being
too much for the transmission.
Away from the Bologna control went
Collins and Louis Klemantaski, both
keeping their fingers crossed for the
grinding from the back end was getting
worse, and though they drove light-footed
along the stretch to Piacenza they never
made that city, for at Parma the grinding
became too much and they came to rest
with a broken rear axle.
When Taruffi went through Cremona
with von Trips in close company it was

obvious that they were touring in to win,
both hoping that they would not suffer the
same fate as Collins, while de Portago was
now a long way back. Gendebien was first
home of the works cars and an easy
winner of the Gran Turismo class, but he
had to wait until the others arrived to
know his position overall. Taruffi and von
Trips arrived back at Brescia running
almost side by side, so that after being in
the lead at some point or another almost
every year in the past, but never finishing,
Taruffi had at last finished a Mille Miglia,
as the outright winner.
After de Portago had gone through
Cremona it was clear that he could not
improve on Gendebien’s time, so the Gran
Turismo car was third overall, and it was
just a matter of getting to the finish, to be
fourth. Alas, he never managed it for while
travelling at 170mph a tyre was said to
have burst and the car was hurled into a
ditch, to rebound across the road and into
the opposite ditch, both driver and
passenger being killed. This lamentable
accident was a sad blow and caused the
Mille Miglia to end on an unhappy note.
De Portago had been a truly sporting
motorist; one with enormous courage, an
ample share of skill and ability; while his
friend and navigator Edmond Nelson was
a truly amateur sporting type who went in
these events for the sheer fun of the thing
and a love of danger and excitement. DSJ
This is an abridged version of Denis
Jenkinson’s 1957 report. The full version
is available for free on our website
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

To the Max
A record-breaking number of races and a
record-breaking driver. Mark Hughes
explains how it all happened in 2023

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

GETTY IMAGES

FORMULA 1 SEASON REVIEW

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

FORMULA 1 SEASON REVIEW

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen
came into the Abu Dhabi
Grand Prix 276 points ahead
of the second-placed driver –
team-mate Sergio Pérez
80

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

GETTY IMAGES

Verstappen – the best driver
with the best car – had been
world champion for two months
when the last race arrived

iven that the championship
had been wrapped up almost
two months earlier, there was
little tension around the Abu
Dhabi season finale. But there
was a second place in the
constructors’ championship to be decided
between Mercedes and Ferrari. They arrived
here separated by four points, with a potential
44 up for grabs. But those 44 points (26 for a
win and fastest lap, 18 for second) were very
much in the reaches of fantasy for either team,
given the seasonal dominance of Red Bull and
Max Verstappen. The combined totals of the
points scored by Mercedes and Ferrari were
less than half those scored by the champion
team. Verstappen’s score alone was over 150
points ahead of either of the rival constructors.
This contest was always likely to be
decided by the placings behind Verstappen at
Abu Dhabi – and so it proved. There’d been a
brief shaky moment in the Red Bull camp
when in Saturday practice Verstappen was
only sixth-fastest and complaining of bouncing,
jumping and no grip. It was Verstappen’s first
real opportunity at finding this, as one of the
two Friday sessions had been devoted to
the obligatory running of junior drivers and
most of the others had been lost to two long
red flag periods. But the hope elsewhere that
Red Bull had encountered a Singapore-like
set of difficulties proved ill-founded and
Verstappen took a relatively comfortable pole,
his 13th of the season.
“We tried something which ended up
disconnecting the car between high and lowspeed,” explained Christian Horner of the FP3
problem, “and so just reverted back to a more
normal set up for qualifying.”

Lando Norris had been vying for pole until
a sideways moment exiting the Turn 13 lefthander after the hotel lost him a chunk of time
in the McLaren and left him only fifth on the
grid, with Charles Leclerc putting his Ferrari
on the front row ahead of George Russell’s
Mercedes and Oscar Piastri’s McLaren. Lewis
Hamilton had failed to get his Mercedes out
of Q2. Carlos Sainz – who crashed heavily on
Friday as the Ferrari bottomed out over a
bump which was subsequently machineground flat – didn’t get out of Q1. So in the
constructors’ fight between the two teams,
Leclerc and Russell were very much the focus.
The opening lap saw a great dice between
Verstappen and Leclerc, but with the Red Bull
driver always in control. By the time DRS had
been enabled on the third lap, he was already
out of the Ferrari’s reach. Russell had dropped
places to both McLarens at the start, with
Norris soon going by team-mate Piastri to run
third. Russell later put a pass on Piastri and a
later pitlane delay for Norris promoted Russell
further. So with Leclerc and Russell now
running a respective second (worth 18

“Verstappen
took a relatively
comfortable
pole, his 13th
of the season”
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

FORMULA 1 SEASON REVIEW
Another smoking
performance for
Verstappen – Abu
Dhabi was his
seventh straight win

From top: Abu Dhabi was one of
George Russell’s better races in
2023; Lando Norris can be
satisfied with his season;
Charles Leclerc – second at the
Yas Marina Circuit

points) and third (worth 15), that alone wasn’t
going to be enough for Ferrari to overcome its
four-point deficit. Furthermore, Hamilton was
running 10th (worth one point) while Sainz
was outside the points-paying positions.
Leclerc was by the time of the first stops
absolutely no threat to Verstappen and so
regardless of whether Russell could do
anything about Leclerc – and he did briefly get
to within around 1.5sec of him after the second
stops – Mercedes was looking secure.
But then came a complication – in the
shape of Red Bull’s Sergio Pérez. He’d started
ninth and had made steady progress from
there, running long to the second stops which
got him onto faster tyres than the cars around
him in the last stint. This enabled him to begin
picking off positions but one of those passes
– that on Norris for fourth – had been clumsy
and they’d banged wheels, forcing Norris offtrack. Although Pérez made the pass stick
without contact on the following lap, the
stewards awarded him a 5sec penalty for
forcing another driver off the track.
Pérez subsequently overtook Russell four
laps from the end but all the Mercedes driver
had to do to retain the official position was
stay within less than 5sec of the Red Bull.
Understanding this situation well as he
82

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

watched his mirrors, Leclerc deliberately
allowed Pérez to pass him for second on the
road with two laps to go. He was hoping to
allow Pérez to pull more than 5sec on Russell
but less than 5sec on him. Had he succeeded
in this, Leclerc’s official second to Russell’s
official fourth would have been enough to

“Only
Singapore was
missing from
the RB19’s list
of conquests”
secure Ferrari the runner-up position in the
constructors’ (so long as Hamilton didn’t
improve on his eighth place).
What actually happened was that Pérez
couldn’t quite pull out those 5sec on Russell
and after his penalty was an official fourth. So
by the margin of 1.1sec on the final lap of the

season, Mercedes secured that multi-million
dollar placing. Not that it mattered in the end,
but Hamilton did briefly get ahead of Yuki
Tsunoda’s AlphaTauri on the last lap for
seventh, but with brake problems ran wide
on the exit and lost the place again.
The fireworks lit up the night sky, the boats
in the marina sounded their horns and
Verstappen wreathed the Red Bull RB19 in tyre
smoke with some celebratory donuts after
one of the most dominant campaigns the
championship has ever witnessed.
hat Abu Dhabi finale summed
up the season all on its own:
Verstappen’s comfortable
victory, the very distant
squabbling over the crumbs
from his table.
After winning 17 races in 2022, Red Bull
had managed to create a car with an even
bigger margin of superiority over the
opposition into the second year of the ‘ground
effect’ regulations. This time it won 21 of the
22 races, with only Singapore missing from its
list of conquests. Sergio Pérez finished a very
distant runner-up to Verstappen, with two
early season victories, to give the team a 1-2 in
the drivers’ championship for the first time.

Top 10 drivers of the year
1. MAX VERSTAPPEN

6. ALEX ALBON

2. CHARLES LECLERC

7. GEORGE RUSSELL

3. LANDO NORRIS

8. CARLOS SAINZ

4. FERNANDO ALONSO

9. OSCAR PIASTRI

5. LEWIS HAMILTON

10. PIERRE GASLY

He had the fastest car but there were times when its
reluctance to generate instant front tyre temperature made
qualifying it tricky. He invariably found a way, and that was
fundamental to his domination of the season.

Over one qualifying lap he is arguably faster than anyone.
There were a few errors as he tried to use that ability to
push to bridge the gap formed by the Ferrari’s limitations.
But it’s part and parcel of the same thing.

The McLaren remained a problem. It didn’t like slow corners,
had to be tricked into good speed of rotation on corner
entry, yet Norris masked those traits while exploiting its fast
corner performance. Just waiting for the right car now.

All the old qualities are still there in full. The amazing
racecraft – his moves on lap 1 in Zandvoort or his
mugging of Pérez in Brazil – and the relentless push
was much in evidence.

FERRARI, DPPI, NURPHOTO/FORMULA 1 VIA GETTY IMAGES

With its slow corner instability and lack of high-speed
grip, the W14 hardly ever gave Hamilton something
to work with. When it did – in Hungary and Austin –
he was the Hamilton of old.

The general pre-season expectation – even
at Red Bull – was that the gap behind them
would narrow, not widen, into year two of the
regulations, and the RB19 looked at a casual
glance much like its predecessor. But that was
deceptive. The RB18 had merely set out
the fundamentals – of layout and the
interconnection between the aerodynamic
and suspension platforms – to build upon.
The RB19 – still Honda-powered – built upon
them and more fully stretched the potential
of that foundation.
In addition to that, Mercedes and Ferrari
– the teams which in theory should have been
closing that gap – had stuck with concepts very
different from that of the Red Bull despite
disappointing 2022 seasons. Concepts which
were ultimately limited in their potential. In
combination with the performance Red Bull
had found over the winter – in order of 1sec
per lap despite the regulation raised rear floor
edge which cost an estimated 0.5sec – that’s
how that historic level of dominance was born.
The source of those Red Bull gains were
rooted in a deeper chassis, an improved DRS
effectiveness and continued development of
the underfloor/sidepod combination in the
wind tunnel. The deeper chassis – facilitated
by a more pronounced central V in section –

Albon has developed into a leader, Williams taking its cues
from him in just the way it would an Alonso or Verstappen.
He has moulded it around him and some of his defensive
drives after over-qualifying the car were things of wonder.

Every bit as quick as Hamilton over the season, he
didn’t put his races together in as consistent a way.
There were some scrappy errors in what was an
untypical season for him.

Good enough to push Leclerc hard, better than Leclerc at
pulling a result out of the car when it was bad, good enough
to set two consecutive poles and a win when it briefly had a
balance he liked. Smart and combative.

The peaks of this rookie were sensational – front row at
Suzuka, win from pole in the sprint at Qatar. The troughs of
empty data banks – mainly to do with understanding the
Pirellis – are all that has him this far down. A future champ.

Arriving in a new team after a tough apprenticeship,
being placed along a strong incumbent team-mate,
he eventually grinded himself ahead as more often the
quicker driver in the latter part of the year.

created additional space behind the front wing
(working it harder and allowing the car to be
balanced around the increased rear grip it was
generating) and more volume within the
tunnels (which was creating the greater rear
grip). The deeper sidepod fronts defined by
the new chassis produced a more powerful
vortex as the air spilled down the undercut,

Some of Red Bull’s secrets spilled after Sergio
Pérez’s crash at the 2022 Monaco Grand Prix

which in turn further energised the airflow
along the floor edges, making the underfloor
yet more powerful.
It was the basic rightness of the previous
year’s car – its bodywork geometry, the
fantastically intricate underfloor design,
suspension which combined super-tight

platform control with the suppleness needed
to combat bouncing at low ride heights – which
allowed those upgrades of the RB19 to be so
devastatingly effective. Adrian Newey was
instrumental in defining that concept and
actually designed the suspension of the ’22
car himself. The big potential of the concept
was baked in to the RB19.
By contrast, in trying to fix a flawed
concept, Mercedes simply introduced a
different range of problems to the year before.
From a 2022 car which had a lot of unusable
downforce because of a propensity to bounce,
Mercedes took the same basic layout,
introduced a new rear suspension and
concentrated its aero map around the high
ride heights seen in slow speed corners. It
turned out to be far too conservative an
approach, the W14 lacking rear grip in highspeed corners yet still with an unpleasantly
unstable characteristic into slow corners.
There was a small window of medium-speed
corners where it worked quite well – such as
those of the Hungaroring where Lewis
Hamilton set pole – but otherwise it was an
average of 0.3sec off the pace in qualifying
and much more than that in the race. It was
the first season in which Mercedes failed to
win at least one race since 2011.
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

An incendiary display by Leclerc
in qualifying at Singapore but
the weekend belonged to Ferrari
team-mate Carlos Sainz

Final
constructor
standings

Driver standings
POS
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22

NAME
MAX VERSTAPPEN
SERGIO PÉREZ
LEWIS HAMILTON
FERNANDO ALONSO
CHARLES LECLERC
LANDO NORRIS
CARLOS SAINZ
GEORGE RUSSELL
OSCAR PIASTRI
LANCE STROLL
PIERRE GASLY
ESTEBAN OCON
ALEXANDER ALBON
YUKI TSUNODA
VALTTERI BOTTAS
NICO HÜLKENBERG
DANIEL RICCIARDO
ZHOU GUANYU
KEVIN MAGNUSSEN
LIAM LAWSON
LOGAN SARGEANT
NYCK DE VRIES

TEAM
POINTS
RED BULL
575
RED BULL
285
MERCEDES
234
ASTON MARTIN
206
FERRARI
206
McLAREN
205
FERRARI
200
MERCEDES
175
McLAREN
97
ASTON MARTIN
74
ALPINE
62
ALPINE
58
WILLIAMS
27
ALPHATAURI
17
ALFA ROMEO
10
HAAS
9
ALPHATAURI
6
ALFA ROMEO
6
HAAS
3
ALPHATAURI
2
WILLIAMS
1
ALPHATAURI
0

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

Oscar Piastri tastes
victory in the Qatar
sprint. Above: a first
winless season for
Mercedes since 2011

POS TEAM

PTS

RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT

860

MERCEDES

409

FERRARI

406

MCLAREN MERCEDES

302

ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES 280

ALPINE RENAULT

WILLIAMS MERCEDES

ALPHATAURI HONDA RBPT

ALFA ROMEO FERRARI

HAAS FERRARI

120

FORMULA 1 SEASON REVIEW

GRAN PRIX PHOTO, GETTY IMAGES, DPPI

Norris was off to a flyer in the
British Grand Prix, leading for the
first four laps before a DRSassisted pass by Verstappen

A new floor design for Austin gave
Hamilton hope and he chased Verstappen in
the race and might have won but for a strategy
miscall. But he was later disqualified (along
with Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari) for excessive
underbody plank wear. Hamilton took third
in the championship with an extra 30% of the
points of team-mate George Russell, who
although comparably quick, had a somewhat
scrappy season with some key errors.
Ferrari stayed with its distinctive ‘outwash’
bodywork, with big bluff sidepod fronts
directing the airflow out away from the car (to
be pulled in further back by the low-pressure
area between the rear wheels) and providing
a high-pressure area in front with which to
control the front wheel wake. That was the
theory and it had worked reasonably well in
’22. But there came a point where further
development stalled. There simply wasn’t
enough airflow to keep both the underbody
and floor edges fed at high speed – and the car
had a nasty habit of suddenly losing downforce
at the rear in high-speed corners. Even Charles
Leclerc, a driver very comfortable with
oversteer, found it more than he could handle,
pointing out that the grip loss was so sudden
at such high speeds that it was difficult to drive
it with full confidence. New tyre grip could
usually mask the trait over a qualifying lap and
the car remained extremely agile in slow
corners. This in combination with the renewed
vigour of its power unit – the ERS-H reliability
problem of last year had been fixed – was
enough to allow Leclerc to set four poles and
Carlos Sainz two. But in the races it often gave
its tyres a harder time than the Mercedes, and
a far harder time than the Red Bull.
Into the second half of the season a Sainzsuggested set-up engineered-in a false
understeer and both drivers found it gave them

more confidence. With the car like this Sainz
set consecutive poles at Monza and Singapore
and won the latter, the only non-Red Bull
victory of the season. A new floor one race
later at Suzuka gave the car more benign aero
traits, making the false understeer unnecessary
and in this form Leclerc re-assumed his small
edge over Sainz for the balance of the season.
Only an unfortunately timed safety car cost
Leclerc victory in the new Las Vegas Grand
Prix, the penultimate race of the season.
Both Mercedes and Ferrari have confirmed
they are abandoning these concepts for their

“Oscar Piastri’s
performance as
a rookie was
occasionally
sensational”
2024 cars, each accepting that their initial
responses to the challenge of the ground effect
regulations was incorrect.
Even before the season began McLaren
believed it had understood at least part of the
previous year’s Red Bull concept. But too late
to be incorporated into the car with which it
began the season. The update to a more Red
Bull-like underfloor and sidepod form came
in two parts – at Baku in April and Austria in
July – and thereafter the turnaround in the
car’s performance was spectacular. Between
there and the Japan/Austin upgrades for

Ferrari and Mercedes, the McLaren was the
second-fastest car after Red Bull. It could even
occasionally push Verstappen for pole,
although the Red Bull’s superior tyre usage
invariably made race day beyond doubt.
Lando Norris got the Silverstone crowd on its
feet by leading the first few laps there and he
delivered several fantastic performances in
the latter half of the season, providing the most
consistent – though ultimately thwarted –
threat to Verstappen’s dominance.
Oscar Piastri’s performance as a rookie in
the McLaren was occasionally sensational,
never more than in qualifying on the front row
on his first visit to Suzuka. He followed that
up with victory from pole in the Qatar sprint
race, having led the Spa sprint for a few laps
some weeks earlier. But his adaptation to
Pirelli-style racing was incomplete and he’d
usually struggle to match Norris’s race pace
as a consequence. The potential, however,
looks off the scale and McLaren was quick to
extend his contract for many years.
If there was a bigger sensation than the
rookie Piastri or the scale of Verstappen’s
dominance, then it was the early season form
of Aston Martin and Fernando Alonso. For a
few races at the beginning of the season they
were best of the rest behind Verstappen and
leaving the identically powered works
Mercedes far behind. The Aston AMR23 –
which was very Red Bull-like in its geometry
and a step-change from its predecessor –
allowed 42-year-old-Alonso to demonstrate he
had lost nothing since his glory days. He was
on the podium in four of the first five races,
started from the front row in both Jeddah and
Miami and he ensured Verstappen needed to
drive to the extreme limit to deprive him of
pole at Monaco. He was in victory contention
on race day there and also delivered
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

FORMULA 1 SEASON REVIEW
stunning performances in Montreal, Zandvoort
and Interlagos. But the car lost its early season
competitiveness after Barcelona. The stepchange was big and sudden.
There were suggestions – denied – that it
had suffered from a clampdown by the FIA on
front wing flexibility. Whatever the reason, it
went from being better than Ferrari and
Mercedes to around 0.25sec-0.3sec behind
them. The exception was Alonso’s second in
Montreal but that was on an unconventional
track on a damp weekend. Generally, with its
Montreal upgrade for the next few races, it
was around the Q2/Q3 cut-off. Another new
floor for Zandvoort reversed some of the
changes made in Montreal and coincided with
another great Alonso performance. But it
didn’t hold good at subsequent tracks. A third
major upgrade for Austin showed some
promise, but not to the extent of returning the
team to its early season form.
Lance Stroll began the season quite
impressively, considering he’d broken his wrist
a week before it began. But he could not get
on with the car at all in its post-Spain form and
only started regaining some form with the
introduction of the Austin upgrade.
At Alpine the gap between what the race
team management had promised to Renault
management and what was actually delivered
– sixth in the constructors’ – led to something
of a bloodbath. Team CEO Laurent Rossi, team
principal Otmar Szafnauer, sporting director
Alan Permane and engineering chief Pat Fry
were all either moved, dismissed or chose to
leave. The termination of Szafnauer’s and
Permane’s employment was announced in the
middle of the Belgian Grand Prix weekend.
Luca de Meo, CEO of parent group Renault,
was the one wielding the axe and he put Bruno

Despite Red Bull’s stranglehold
on the standings, F1 remains
a sport on the up with large
crowds everywhere – including
here in Spain. Top: Daniel
Ricciardo returned for seven GPs

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

“Daniel
Ricciardo was
usually slightly
slower than
Yuki Tsunoda”
Famin – previously heading up the power unit
group in Viry – in charge of the combined
Enstone/Viry operation.
Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly scored a
podium each and were usually to be found at
the Q2/Q3 cut-off part of the grid. The chassis
was reckoned about 0.5sec off the pace, the
power unit around the same – and the team’s
request to the FIA for a ‘holiday’ from the
engine freeze was turned down.
The bottom four in the constructors
championship – Williams, AlphaTauri, Alfa
Romeo and Haas – were very closely matched

in performance but with cars of quite different
traits. Within this group Alex Albon was the
stand-out performer in a Williams that was
light on downforce but with good straight-line
speed and balance. He delivered top-drawer
racing and buttoned-down any opportunity
for good points. Under new team principal
James Vowles, and the committed backing of
Dorilton, the team looks to be making progress.
AlphaTauri began the season with the
slowest car, but ended it with the fifth-fastest.
Rookie Nyck de Vries didn’t meet the exacting
standards of Helmut Marko, paving the way
for the return of Daniel Ricciardo who starred
in qualifying at Mexico but was usually slightly
slower than Yuki Tsunoda. After Ricciardo
broke his hand at Zandvoort he was replaced
for a few races by the impressive rookie Liam
Lawson, who is now Red Bull’s official reserve.
In its final year with Alfa Romeo badging,
Sauber endured a place-holder season as Audi
gears up for its ’26 F1 debut with the team. In
a re-run of 2019, Haas had a car which was
occasionally quick in qualifying.
F1 in the Liberty era marches onwards and
its popularity has remained high despite
the lack of variation on-track. The Vegas
experiment – whereby F1 itself was the
promoter and land owner for the facilities –
worked well, with a spectacular race. The
return of China beckons. South Korea wants
back in, as does South Africa. The teams are
making enough money to be either turning
big profits or investing heavily (Aston Martin,
Williams) – and want to keep out any
late-comers to the party, such as Andretti.
Meanwhile the relationship between Liberty
and the FIA remains an uneasy one.
The F1 speed virus continues to mutate at
an impressive rate.

XXXXXXXX

JOHNNY
HERBERT

JONATHAN BUSHELL, FORMULA 1 VIA GETTY IMAGES

“In a car that was 2sec
faster than the rest,
Mansell still gave it
everything – it was
the same with Max”
know some people, myself included,
would say the season was boring and
predictable. But you have to give Red
Bull credit, and the way Max Verstappen
went about his season was something
very special. Every time he gets in the
car he’s on it, like all the great drivers. His
domination has been compared to Michael
Schumacher’s at Ferrari, but it reminded me
of Nigel Mansell in 1992. In a Williams that was
sometimes two seconds faster than the rest.
Mansell still gave it everything, every single
time – and that was the same with Max. He
always drove right on the edge because that’s
in his DNA. Yes, he had a dominant car but
he was mighty. And he’s only getting stronger.
Let’s hope he gets more of a challenge next
time. He’ll enjoy that too.
Sergio Pérez started strongly, but middle
to the end it wasn’t enough. He needs to up
his game if he wants any chance of winning a
championship – which doesn’t look likely.
Second doesn’t sound like a
disaster, does it? But if you look at
Mercedes’ year that’s what it was.
Did its position just show how
weak everyone else was?
Probably. Mercedes is in a right
predicament. In 2022 it said it
knew what the fix was, but clearly
didn’t. Even the change of concept
after last season began showed only an
inconsistent improvement. I’m not convinced
the team has the magic touch any more.
Ferrari was stronger towards the end of
the season and it was great to see Carlos Sainz
get that win in Singapore. Charles Leclerc then

showed his leadership qualities. Combined
with Frédéric Vasseur’s increasing influence,
I have a good feeling for Ferrari in 2024.
If you look at the top four, McLaren was
the most improved across the season. The team
had to up its game having started so poorly,
but my, how well it did so. It was great to see
Oscar Piastri win that sprint race in Qatar, but
also the performances of Lando Norris as well.
A really strong pairing for the future and I hope
McLaren can keep up its momentum.
Fernando Alonso, inset, remains an
incredible force, as we saw in Brazil in his
battle with Pérez. That racing skill doesn’t
disappear with age. He’s so exciting. Aston
Martin even managed to mix it with Red Bull
early on before the team lost its way. Now it’s
down to the team to understand why the
upgrades it brought to the car didn’t work.
Aston should have been second or third given
how it started, but only one driver seemed to
be able to get the points for the team.
Lance Stroll must up his game.
The management upheaval at
Alpine didn’t help its cause at all.
I had a lot of expectations at the
beginning of the season, but it just
didn’t happen for this troubled
team. A lot of the older, experienced
people such as Alan Permane and Pat
Fry have gone, so what’s next? I worry
for Alpine. I like Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon,
but it was a mixed season for both of them. Like
the Mercedes drivers, I don’t think they knew
what they were going to get every time they
went out on to the track. That’s a theme for this
generation of cars, actually.

In contrast, Williams was a good news
story in 2023. Alex Albon has confidence to
show his speed, especially on Saturdays,
Logan Sargeant got stronger towards the end
of the year and James Vowles made a big
difference as team principal. As I said in this
column, I was sceptical when he came
in, but he has a very calm, methodical
understanding of what he experienced at
Mercedes and has taken that to Williams. The
team put a smile on my face.
AlphaTauri had a nice performance jump
in the latter stages to rise to eighth, didn’t
it? That’s a cause of controversy given its
relationship with Red Bull, but it’s hardly
something new. Yuki Tsunoda actually shone,
particularly in qualifying. Daniel Ricciardo did
a good job when he came back, but he wasn’t
spectacular. Mexico was great, but that was
it. But what Liam Lawson did against Tsunoda
was spectacular, I’d say.
As I said last month, Sauber appears to
be treading water, making up the numbers
until Audi comes in. As for Haas, how the car
chewed through its tyres left Kevin Magnussen
and Nico Hülkenberg severely limited.
So was this a poor season? It was
predictable, which isn’t good. But the racing
behind Red Bull was good, mixed up and
close. The potential is there, with a great
bunch of drivers who are maturing and getting
better. Red Bull is dominant – but can the team
keep it going? There are no guarantees.
Johnny Herbert was a Formula 1 driver from
1989-2000 and a Le Mans winner in 1991
Follow Johnny on Twitter @johnnyherbertf1

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

The birth of
Motor Sport
In 1924 the story of our magazine began. To mark the start of our
centenary year Gordon Cruickshank, who has worked at Motor
Sport for 40 of those 100 years, looks back at our earliest days
88

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

THE EARLY YEARS
In our October 1924
issue we featured
the Junior Car Club
200 Mile Race at
Brooklands – and
it was “marvellous”

HERITAGE IMAGES/GETTY IMAGES, BENTLEY

he Organ of Motor and Motor
Cycle Sport. That was this
magazine’s subtitle at its
inception, when it began life a
century ago in July 1924. Above
that phrase the actual
masthead said The Brooklands Gazette. At
the time virtually all high-profile motor sport
in Britain took place at the Surrey autodrome,
that Colosseum of speed which had been so
advanced in 1907 but which was gradually
fossilising. The magazine, though, soon
looked further afield.
Who started it, and why? We don’t know.
No record has survived of any backers, or
what Oscar Seyd, the first editor, hoped to
achieve. In any case he was soon replaced
by Richard Twelvetrees, an enthusiast who
both wrote and raced and had a broader
outlook. As well as the trials, sprints and
hillclimbs which took place around this
country, he brought in reports of Land Speed
Records abroad and of grands prix, already
seen as the peak of motor racing but due to
the ban on open-road competition in the UK,
taking place only on the continent.
We weren’t alone. The Autocar had
always included racing news, and there was
The Light Car & Cyclecar for those of an
economical turn of mind, but by changing
our title to Motor Sport in August 1925
Twelvetrees confirmed our focus. “Everyone
realises that the original title did not
adequately cover the field of our activities,”
he wrote when announcing the new name.
The same issue contained How I won the

Editor Richard Twelvetrees
testing a new Salmson in 1926

Grand Prix d’Europe by Antonio Ascari, and
Dudley Benjafield’s own report on contesting
the Le Mans 24 Hours in a works Bentley.
Motor Sport’s policy of getting the inside
story from the people who counted was
already firmly established. Sadly, that issue
also contained Antonio Ascari’s obituary.
The ultimate price that must sometimes be
paid within motor sport was always at hand.
And we spoke to the nation. When 2LO,
the fledgling BBC radio service, decided to
broadcast on motoring it was to Motor Sport
it turned, Richard Twelvetrees duly taking
a seat in front of the huge and intimidating
Alexandra Palace microphone.
In 1949, for our 25th anniversary issue,
Twelvetrees wrote, “When one realises that
Britain’s only periodical devoted entirely to
the interests of the sporting motorist began
as an unofficial record of racing at
Brooklands, the achievement of its present
status in motor journalism can only be
described as phenomenal.”
It wasn’t only racing. Our very first issue
contained a road test (by ‘Open Throttle’ – pen
names were the style of the time) of the new
3-litre Bentley, which just weeks before had
scored the first of the marque’s victories at
Le Mans. Bentley was also our cover car. Many
long-vanished names – Schneider, Sénéchal,
Amilcar, Bean – were put to the test around
the magazine’s informal road route, and
sometimes on the track at Brooklands; some
would have a more lasting story. In that
earliest decade we tested Aston Martins, Alfa
Romeos, Rolls-Royces, Fiats, Renaults and
Morgans, all badges we see around us today.
Among the office relics is an extremely
battered record book dating from the 1930s,
its handwritten, dog-eared pages listing the
huge variety of tests we published. It was still
being added to in the 1980s.
Not that all readers approved. One early
editor grumbled in his editorial that some
readers were complaining about our
inclusion of road tests, that these were “mere
advertisements” but he firmly put these
carpers right, pointing out that advertisers

From top: Malcolm Campbell wrote
for this organ in the ’20s; Antonio
Ascari’s 1925 article; “top notch”
two-wheeled riding with CF Temple,
Issue No1; JD Benjafield made his
deadline for the August 1925 issue
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Left: as this 1932 cover shows,
Motor Sport covered cars,
motorcycles, aircraft and
boats. Below: in August 1930
you could catch up with aerial
tittle-tattle in our Gliding
Gossip and News. Right:
August 1930, price: sixpence

GETTY IMAGES

Left: Items of Interest
includes a car compass;
Right: Campbell was big
news in 1925. Below:
‘Bentley Boy’ Woolf
Barnato, centre, was
a reader favourite in the
late ’20s. Below left: as
was Sir Henry Segrave

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

THE EARLY YEARS
could say whatever they wanted in their
advertisements (long before the days of the
Trades Descriptions Act) and that we were
going to exercise the same freedom,
complimentary or critical. It confirmed the
independent, free-speaking and sometimes
opinionated attitude Motor Sport has
maintained ever since.
Our scope was very wide in the early
days, and not just ranging from those
glamorous grands prix on exotic foreign
shores to muddy trials, seafront sprints and
stately endurance runs at home. Taking the
phrase ‘motor sport’ to mean anything with
an engine, we investigated the latest in
motorbike design, reviewed the small
aircraft that looked as if they might become
popular personal transport, and took to the
river in boats for a series of outboard motor
tests. There was even a period when we ran
with the subhead Land, Air, Water.
The enthusiasts putting the magazine
together knew that whether you followed
racing or enjoyed stretching your AC to its
maximum on the open road you would also
want to read about gadgets and accessories,
car models and the latest in non-skid tyres.
It all went into the mix.

Very quickly the magazine began
interviewing and profiling the major names
in the sport such as Malcolm Campbell,
Woolf Barnato and Henry Segrave, while also
describing technological innovations in
engines and running gear, debating racing
formula changes and visiting the major

motor shows to discover the latest machinery
on offer – and badger the firms’ managers
for road-test opportunities.
From the beginning the magazine made
its own voice known, with uncompromising
editorials debating rules changes or
fulminating about the way British racing
progress was being outstripped by
continental racing teams able to develop
their technology on true road circuits. And
there was that eternal bogey, The Law. Even
in those distant 1920s successive editors
complained about petty harassments and
absurd restrictions, even though at the time
there was no maximum speed limit on the
open road. And sometimes they had a point
– one poor man was prosecuted for
competing on a Sunday, under a law dating
back to Charles I... Outspoken opinion,
too, is a tradition Motor Sport has firmly
maintained ever since.
These last hundred years have seen
staggering changes in the world of cars and
racing, changes that would amaze Oscar
Seyd. He would probably be astonished
to know that the periodical he steered
through its first tentative months is still here,
10 decades on.

“One man was prosecuted for competing on a
Sunday, under a law dating back to Charles I”

The 1929 JCC Double 12 (two 12-hour
races) at Brooklands had a strong
line-up – and today’s Motor Sport
subscribers can read the report in our
June 1929 issue at our online archive
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Knocked for Six

Over the next months we’ll present cars from each of Motor
Sport’s 10 decades which have a claim to being the greatest
of the greatest. First, from our founding decade, is Bentley’s
Le Mans-winning beast. Gordon Cruickshank states its case

1920s
BENTLEY
SPEED SIX

Race car of the

CENTURY
1924-2 024

I N A S S O C I AT I O N W I T H
00

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

RACE CAR of the CENTURY
I N

A S S O C I A T I O N

BENTLEY

ven the name is mighty – Speed Six.
Perhaps it’s the glamour of those
wild-living, free-spending ‘Bentley
Boys’ who raced them, or maybe our
devotion to Le Mans that gives a 1920s
Bentley such resonance on these shores.
After all, on the continent at that time
there was true road racing, with Delage,
Fiat and Alfa Romeo forging a path towards
the pure grand prix car. Britain, though,
hampered by a ban on road racing, was
focused on the artificiality of Brooklands’
speed bowl, by now a racing cul-de-sac
fostering thundering monsters at the
expense of agility.
Yet there was one area where Britain
would develop a perfect fit for the niche,
high-performance touring car. A car with
steam-engine toughness and the muscles

1929: Woolf Barnato heads for Le Mans
24 Hours victory in Speed Six Old No1

to heave a six-seater body around – or to
beat all rivals in the 24-hour marathon at
Le Mans, the new endurance benchmark.
On no fewer than five occasions between
1924 and 1930 dark green Bentleys of
increasing size and power would take the
Union Jack to victory, and the final

W I T H

development with two glorious successive
triumphs under its towering, vent-slashed
bonnet was the rumbling Speed Six.
The man behind the badge was Walter
Owen Bentley – ‘WO’ to insiders. Revealed
in 1919, his 3-litre design promised a new
standard of performance motoring; when
it finally reached production it made an
immediate impact. Drawing on both the
1914 grand prix and 1912 racing Peugeot
as well as his aero engine expertise, WO’s
engine featured four valves per cylinder
– very sophisticated for the time – as well
as twin ignition, single overhead camshaft
and major aluminium components. All of
this would carry through to the Speed Six.
Immediately the Bentley’s sturdy build
and silent power drew plaudits. WO
himself believed in racing for publicity

PHOTOGRAPHY: JONATHAN BUSHELL

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

RACE CAR of the CENTURY
I N

A S S O C I A T I O N

W I T H

BONNET

New radiator and bulkhead shape
marked out Speed Six. Just 182
cars were built, qualifying as a
production model for Le Mans.
Team cars’ P100 lamps were
powerful – but often cut out

ENGINE

and in 1921 a prototype, EXP 2, triumphed
at Brooklands, first of many victories, often
in the hands of enthusiast owners. Bentleys
took home the team prize in the 1922 Tourist
Trophy and the factory even sent a shortchassis boat-tailed car to contest that year’s
Indianapolis 500. A year on, it was one of
those keen private owners who took his
3 Litre to the first running of a new endurance
race near a little French town called Le Mans.
Bentley thought it a daft idea but went along
anyway, to see his machine claim fourth
place. Twenty-four arduous hours of racing
turned out to be the ideal place to
demonstrate the robustness of his machines
against the best Europe could field.
Racing was the perfect billboard, yet
these were designed as road cars. While
wealthy and aristocratic clients – future Kings
94

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

Edward VIII and George VI were just two
customers – were lining up to buy a costly
Bentley chassis to be clothed by a
coachbuilder in their choice of bodywork,
it was soon clear that a 3 Litre made a lively
two-seater but struggled with a heavy
limousine body. Step forward the new
6½ Litre, a six-cylinder with longer, sturdier
Barnato and Tim Birkin share the
Mans
triumphant Speed Six at the ’29 Le

legs and combining advanced technicalities
of the smaller engine with a super-silent
triple-throw crank camshaft drive, mounted
in a beefier chassis. Although aimed more
at carrying passengers in silent comfort than
pelting day and night around a racetrack,
this sporting tourer would be the springboard
for the Speed Six.
Meanwhile, Bentley had developed the
four-cylinder car to 4 ½ Litre, fitting the new
engine into a 3 Litre chassis to try for a 1927
success at La Sarthe after a couple of dry
years there. This prototype was backed up
by two of the faithful 3 Litres, one of them
the car which if not for a tired driver error
would have finished runner-up the previous
year. Driven by racing doctor Dudley
Benjafield and journalist Sammy Davis it
achieved the first of what would be four

ALAMY

Iron block with integral head was
hefty but tough. Team cars had up
to 6:1 compression and revved to
3500rpm, with 200bhp available

CHASSIS

BODYWORK

Speed Sixes were offered in
three chassis lengths, team
cars employing the shortest,
plus axles with built-in
jacking pads for quick wheel
changes at pitstops

Le Mans rules dictated
a four-seater tourer body with
functional hood. Vanden Plas
built the super-light coachwork,
with slam passenger door
handles for faster Le Mans starts

FASCIA

Crammed team car dash dominated by
chronometric rev counter, plus magneto
switches and manual lap counter. Wheel
rope-bound for grip; fold-down mesh
screen leaves twin aeroscreens

victories in a row, but only by the skin of its
gear teeth. Bruised and battered from the
famous multi-car crash at White House
corner involving all three Bentleys, it was
nursed to the pits, lashed up and sent back
out with a bent chassis and a single
headlamp. Overstretched by this last-gasp
challenge, the leading Aries collapsed,
handing Bentley a memorable success. The
same car won again in ’28 with Bentley
director Woolf ‘Babe’ Barnato and Bernard
Rubin aboard. How could they follow that?
Answer: the Speed Six. With its pair of
SU carbs, redesigned inlet ports, higher
compression and sparkier camshaft it now
pushed 180hp to those tall tyres, with a new
radiator shape to distinguish it from the
Standard Six. At Cricklewood Bentley’s racing
department fitted the features it had
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

Quick-release filler to
fuel tank, left, and stone
guards for glass and
radiator were vital
Twin SU carbs feed
the high-compression
six-cylinder

Thurston billiards
scorer adapted for
lap counter

SPECIFICATION
ENGINE
CAPACITY
VALVE GEAR
INTAKE
POWER
SPEED
TRANSMISSION
BRAKES
SUSPENSION

Inline 6
6957cc
SOHC, four valves per cylinder
Two SU carburettors
180bhp, 200bhp in race spec
125mph in race spec
Rear-wheel drive, four-speed gearbox
Rod-operated drums F and R
Leaf springs, rigid axles F and R

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

RACE CAR of the CENTURY

ALAMY

I N

absorbed from long-distance racing: light
pistons, stronger axles with jacking pads,
double-action shock absorbers, stone
guards for lamps, screen and radiator
(Le Mans wasn’t yet surfaced) and above
all a vast 45-gallon fuel tank with quickaction filler, all fitted to a short chassis
clothed in a very light Vanden Plas body.
Now the works Sixes produced 200bhp
and could reach a fearsome 125mph.
Despite two of the new cars not
finishing in Brooklands’ Double 12, in 1929
a Speed Six sailed past all-comers to take
first ahead of three 4½ litre Bentleys in
the French classic. That season the same
car triumphed in the Brooklands Six Hours
race and placed second in two other major
events. One of those was the Irish Grand
Prix. No wonder this adaptable device was
WO’s favourite Bentley.

A S S O C I A T I O N

The following year, the last for the
works team, the ‘Big Sixes’ continued their
domination in endurance events, a 1-2 in
the Double 12 just a taster for France, where
again first and second fell to the great green
machines. The tired pair at the wheel of
the winner were Glen Kidston and Barnato,
Babe’s third victory in three entries – and
he now controlled the company. But
Old No1 had more success until a
1932 crash killed driver Clive Dunfee

W I T H

despite his vast diamond fortune which had
propped up the company for some years
the firm failed commercially, to be bought
secretly and ignominiously by arch rival
Rolls-Royce. It was a sad yet glory-garlanded
closure for a marque which had upheld
British prestige in one of the toughest
international challenges racing could offer.
The Bentley name would resurface
with a new ethos to achieve a fresh
reputation, but the impact of those endless
hours pounding round a never-ending
track behind feeble lamps would leave
indelible memories. Grands prix? Pah.
Leave that to the Continentals. Ettore
Bugatti may have called Bentleys “lorries”,
but even he conceded they were the fastest
ones in the world.
MS VERDICT: Union Jack-waver supreme
fired Brits’ love for the French classic.

Don’t miss next month’s issue
when we will reveal our picks
for the 1930s, 1940s and
1950s. And remember, you
can be part of Motor Sport’s
centenary celebration by
voting for the Race Car of the
Century. Voting will be open
on our website from April 2

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

HONG KONG WORLD RX

MICHAEL JURTIN/RED BULL CONTENT POOL

A fire at Lydden Hill
last July jeopardised
the entire World
Rallycross season.
James Elson travels
to the Far East to see
the series rise like
a phoenix in an
all-new urban setting
ooking out towards Hong Kong’s
famous Victoria Bay, a cloud
suddenly appears. Is it mist coming
in off the water, a depression
bringing in one of the peninsula’s
well-known volatile weather
fronts? Ah no, it’s just dust off the aggregate. It
is November and we’re in the eye of a World
Rallycross storm as workers frenetically try to
get the series’ first street race ready on time.
The event sees WRX literally break new
ground as it hits Hong Kong – a stunning new
location for its season finale. With the backdrop
looking like something out of Harrison Ford’s
Blade Runner, the half-a-mile circuit – a mix of
gravel and asphalt – will see cars slide, jump
and battle door-to door in front of a vertigoinducing skyline on the edge of the water.
What makes the weekend even more
crucial is that the championship is looking to
recover from a devastating battery fire suffered
by Sébastien Loeb’s Special One Racing team
earlier this year. The outfit lost both its newfor-2023 electric RX1e cars and all its
equipment, the knock-on impact looking at
one point like it might derail the entire season
for all the other teams too.
The world championship was paused for
several rounds as a result before the title chase
was restarted with double-headers in both
South Africa and Hong Kong to round out the
year. The only catch being that the top class
cars have been parked while investigations by
battery manufacturer Kreisel continue, with
drivers using the second-tier also-electric RX2e
machines instead, with the wick turned up to
400bhp from 370.
It is a less than ideal solution, but hopes
are high that a bumper contest in the
spectacular setting of Hong Kong can
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

HONG KONG WORLD RX

Niclas Gronholm shows
he’s a chip off the old
block, taking second in
Hong Kong’s opening race.
Marcus, are you watching?

provide the series with a much-needed goodnews story. But even before a wheel is turned,
the organisers have found themselves in a race
against time to get the circuit set up.
When Motor Sport arrives on the Friday of
the weekend, cranes swing freight containers
overhead, lorries noisily reverse and the sound
of hammering rings out across the paddock.
The track and temporary facilities aren’t
finished, and the event starts tomorrow.
“No toilets, no internet, no track!” says
one mechanic, but with Formula 1 and WRX
track designer Apex working up until the last
minute in a monumental effort which started
10 days ago, the gravel is finally laid, advertising
hoardings spirit-levelled in place and VIP
fridges are stocked. The PR disaster of an
incomplete track is averted – now we just need
some car racing.
When it gets going on the Saturday, the
action will decide whether WRX strongman
Johan Kristoffersson can win a record sixth
title or young fellow Swede Kevin Hansen
achieve the almost unthinkable by snatching
the crown from under his nose.
With the former enjoying a 36-point lead
over Hansen and 46 available across the
double-header weekend, the odds are in
Kristoffersson’s favour – but he has to negotiate
100

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

“You need to build up speed and
make friends with the walls”
what looks already like one of the most
formidable circuits on the calendar.
“You need to build up speed and make
friends with the walls to be confident,” says
Kristoffersson. “This weekend will be different
for me because it will mostly be about not
chasing ultimate speed [but securing points
for the title], trying to manage the risks a bit
more: it’s narrow, very unforgiving and
mistakes could damage the car – the track will
bite back very hard. I won’t be on the limit as
much as I like.”
For his part Hansen, 25, is revelling in his
best ever season. “I’m trying to focus on my
own thing,” he says. “Johan is very far ahead
and will 99.9% win the title – that’s fair play to
him. He and his team have been great. I think
this has been my best year so far. It’s a really
nice feeling coming to the end of ’23.”
This is unfamiliar territory in every sense
of the phrase for the championship. The glitzy
track setting surrounded by skyscrapers is a

long way from mud-splattered venues such as
the UK’s Lydden Hill or Hell in Norway. It is
part of WRX’s plan to expand by taking its
product to the people through street races –
and doing this in markets it has never gone to
before such as South East Asia.
The idea has been tried before: the nowdefunct Global Rallycross series ran street
races of a sort at Florida’s Fort Lauderdale and
Belle Isle in Detroit, and the X Games organised
a race on streets in LA in 2012. WRX last ran
on public roads when it encompassed a few
suburban streets at 2019’s Trois Rivières.
None of these were quite as full-blooded as
WRX’s push into Hong Kong. The event is seen
as a toe in the water with potential future street
races mooted, as the championship looks to
recreate the recent F1 model of complementing
classic venues with city locations like Miami
and the following weekend’s Las Vegas GP.
However, despite the ambitions, a dark
cloud still hangs over proceedings in Victoria

An inferno at Lydden Hill
destroyed Special One
Racing’s Lancia Deltas

How to build
a rallycross
track in 10 days
Circuit designer Apex was
drafted in to work miracles

JOERG MITTER/MICHAEL JURTIN/RED BULL CONTENT POOL, EMILS GRINTALS

Kevin Hansen’s delighted with his
race-winning trophy. Below: the
track was ready in time... just

Harbour due to recent events earlier in the
season at what was supposed to be a glorious
homecoming at one of the spiritual centres of
rallycross, Lydden Hill.
A battery on the Special One Racing Lancia
tribute car of Sébastien Loeb caught fire on
the Friday of the weekend. A huge blaze
ensued, destroying his team’s equipment. The
WRC legend described the fire as “brutal”.
Powertrain manufacturer Kreisel hasn’t yet
announced what the root cause of the issue
was or a solution for next season.
Asked whether he was confident about the
future of the series in light of the information
vacuum, Kristoffersson replies with a succinct
“No”, and Special One Racing, unhappy with
the lack of findings since the event, declined
an invitation to participate in Hong Kong with
cars provided for it.
But there are positive noises elsewhere in
the paddock. Hansen – ever the upbeat
spokesperson for the series – feels a solution
will be found.
“I’m optimistic,” he says. “Everybody
wants to race our own cars again. We’ll come
to a good conclusion and future for rallycross.
[It was] the first time for a fire like that, in a
new era of motor sport. Things will change.
I think it’s just an exciting time.”

From left: Patrick O’Donovan,
WRX title winner Johan
Kristoffersson and Ole Veiby

Lydden Hill is the spiritual
home of UK rallycross. Below:
Mikaela Åhlin-Kottulinsky

The World Rallycross Championship put
in a herculean effort to get its seasonfinale Hong Kong street circuit completed
in barely more than a week.
For their part, WRX drivers delivered
a show in the Far East, but they weren’t
the only ones going flat-out – the circuit
was made start-to-finish in an astounding
10 days, with the final touches added
just eight minutes before the first wheel
was turned in anger.
The breakneck transformation is the
latest work of Apex, the company behind
the Miami Grand Prix circuit.
The WRX round was based at the
Central Harbourfront exhibition space on
Hong Kong Island, overlooking Victoria
Bay, which the track designers say
offered a unique build opportunity.
“With an event area like this, it gave
the time needed to make an off-road
section with the combination of a
street section,” says Simon
Gardini, a track consultant
working with Apex.
Key components
were stuck on a ship in
the South China Sea,
meaning the build went
down to the wire, with
final FIA approval given just
minutes before the first session:
“We normally get two months to build a
street track,” Gardini adds, “not 10 days!”
Now the ‘prototype’ event has run,
they are confident of a more composed
construction process next year, while a
positive impact on Hong Kong is also
emphasised by Apex MD Dafydd Broom:
“Having 2000m3 of locally sourced
gravel, above, is essential – sustainability
stretches to helping the local economic
environment over the weekend.”
And it is very much just a weekend
– Apex and co have to get all their
equipment removed over the 48 hours
following the racing before preparations
begin for a concert by the Hong Kong
Symphony Orchestra.

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

101

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WORLD RX HONG KONG
Series CEO Arne Dirks echoes the
sentiment, while acknowledging how tough
this recent period has been for the sport.
“It hasn’t been an easy moment for all of
us,” Dirks says. “But I think how we moved
on, this is typical rallycross. Working even
closer together, you see all the passion from
the teams in finding a way to continue.
“From our understanding we are ready to
race with the RX1e cars in 2024, but this is the
responsibility of the FIA and Kreisel. We’re
confident of being back on track.”
After deciding to press on in 2023 the
championship has now confirmed it will use
electric cars and ICE machines (running on
‘sustainable’ fuel) in the same top class in 2024.
Delegations from other potential new venues
were present in Hong Kong – a few more exotic
locations could be on the calendar.
As for new manufacturers, Hansen’s father
and team boss, 14-time champion Kenneth,
says: “There are nearly 150 car makers in China
alone – surely some of them must be interested.”
The potential of the Hong Kong round is
something emphasised by his son Kevin too.
“I think this is maybe the biggest break
that we’ve had since becoming a world
championship,” he says. “It is really an
astonishing location – it’s the first time that we
have pulled off something like this, something
people have dreamt of for such a long time.

Formula 1, Formula E and touring cars have
city centre races – it’s different when it’s
rallycross because it’s such an arena sport and
you get it [here] so compact and extreme.
“You can spread a message around the
town which doesn’t disturb them, but people
are really able to come in, have a look and
experience it in a great way. I think for the
future we’ll see more city centre races on this
side of the world but also in Europe.
“It’s perfect for the sport and perfect for
manufacturers – we need to come to the fans
in a completely different way rather than just
going to faraway races like Höljes in Sweden
and Lohéac in France.”
There are others betting on more rallycross
action in this part of the world too. Yan Zhang,
a former Chinese TV anchor who in the mid2000s became one of the region’s first female
single-seater racers, now has her own racing
team, track and school in Beijing. She’s keen
to promote the motor sport discipline in
this part of the region, as well as supporting
women in racing.
“Especially in China, when I started a lot
of men would remark, ‘Women? Bad drivers!’”
she says. “But we’re now becoming more
involved and rallycross can help in that it’s a
big party. It shows how racing can be fun.”
In 2022 WRX full-timer Klara Andersson –
another Swede – became the first woman to

score a podium finish in the world championship
era and Mikaela Åhlin-Kottulinsky stepped up
to the top class in Hong Kong after finishing
third this year in a second division which has
a 40% female grid. It’s clearly a good platform
for women in motor sport.
Back on track, the atmosphere kicks up a
gear as a bumper crowd turns out to watch
the cars battle in balmy conditions on day two.
Kristoffersson – 2023 king after Day 1 went
his way – scores a solid 1-2 with team-mate Ole
Veiby, but the real star of the show is the man
who comes in third: Patrick O’Donovan. The
19-year-old is already a double British
Rallycross champion and appears to be turning
into the sport’s chirpy answer to Lando Norris.
Wisecracking and grinning his way
through every interview, the young off-roader
is just as charismatic behind the wheel, sliding
and drifting his way onto the podium. The
driver is mobbed on his way to the prizegiving, the crowd then screaming in delight
as he dances for joy on the rostrum at third
place in his debut WRX weekend.
In comparison to its ’80s thrill-a-minute
heyday, rallycross has felt like a neglected
discipline in recent years. However, as the
weekend in Hong Kong showed, it has all the
ingredients to be one of the most exciting
motor sports around. But can it get the
message out there?

JOERG MITTER/RED BULL CONTENT POOL

“It really is an astonishing location – it’s the
first time we’ve pulled off something like this”

Taking the sport to the
people: expect to see more
pop-up city WRX races in
the coming seasons
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

103

2023 IN PICTURES

FERRARI

The 2023 season brought action and
drama at virtually every turn across
a multitude of categories. Here we’ve
compiled the photographic highlights
of a world of motor racing competition

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2023 IN PICTURES

Josef Newgarden takes glory
in the Indy 500, which was
one of the few events not
dominated by eventual
champion Alex Palou, below

Having lifted a breakthrough IndyCar title
during his first full season back in 2021,
how much better could Alex Palou get?
A lot, so it turned out, as the 26-year-old
Spaniard rampaged his way to a second
championship this season aboard his
Honda-powered Chip Ganassi Racing car.
Despite the weight of contractual rows
with McLaren away from the circuits,
Palou showed no effects of that pressure
on the track. An early podium in Texas
was followed by a first win of the year on
the Indy road course. That kick-started
the Palou steamroller, and a mid-season
hat-trick of wins (Detroit, Road America
and Mid-Ohio) put him in the box seat.
Only Scott Dixon could keep pace, but
even he was powerless to prevent
Palou’s coronation with a round to spare
after a fifth victory of the campaign in
Portland. Penske’s Josef Newgarden did
deny him Indy 500 glory though.
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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

INDYCAR, JAKOB EBREY

IndyCar

Ash Sutton is already a BTCC
great after securing title
number four. Below:
team-mate Sam Osborne gets
some Scottish air at Knockhill

BTCC
The tweet (or X?) was a telling one: “You
displayed a combination of tenacity, style
& skill, but most of all sheer controlled
brilliance that is rarely witnessed. This is
just the beginning.” The author was BTCC
legend Jason Plato, and addressed to
now four-time champion Ash Sutton.
It represented something of a passing of
the torch. This year’s BTCC season was far
from a classic, with the hybrid systems still
finding their feet, but that should take
nothing away from Sutton’s crushing
performance. With 12 wins from the 30
races (including an impressive four
consecutive victories across Brands
Hatch-Snetterton) he was in a league of his
own aboard his NAPA Racing Ford Focus.

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

107

2023 IN PICTURES

Project One’s ‘Rexy’ Porsche takes a bite at
Corvette’s GTE Am champion C8.R that was
shared by Nicky Catsburg, Ben Keating
and Nicolás Varrone. This was the final year
of the GTE rules set before GT3 takes over

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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

World Endurance
Championship

STEFFEN HEISE/PORSCHE, GETTY IMAGES, GRIMFOTO/FERRARI

Forza! Ferrari’s first Le Mans
winners since 1965 celebrate back
in Maranello. Below: Hypercar era
exploded as customer teams such
as Jota shared Porsche’s limelight

On paper it’s the same old story. In reality,
it’s so much more. Toyota Gazoo Racing
secured yet another 1-2 in the FIA World
Endurance Championship points, but
that’s not even half the story of a stunning
season of change for top-flight
endurance racing. Sébastien Buemi,
Brendon Hartley and Ryo Hirakawa
celebrated two wins and four second
places on their way to another title for the
Japanese brand, but Toyota missed the
big one, with Ferrari’s new 499P taking
the biggest laurels of the year when
James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi and
Alessandro Pier Guidi won the Le Mans
24 Hours in emphatic fashion. The
Hypercar class is proving a hit too, with 13
cars competing in the top class this year,
and a host more to come for 2024. The
arrivals of Alpine, BMW, Isotta Fraschini
and Lamborghini lift the expected total to
a superb 19 Hypercar entries.

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2023 IN PICTURES
Formula E
Ladies and gentlemen, a new star is born.
Well, two actually, as both Jake Dennis and
the new Gen3 cars from Spark Racing
Technologies caught the headlines during a
big year for Formula E. Like it or loathe it,
this season was a cracker, with Dennis, Nick
Cassidy and Mitch Evans playing out a
superb three-way title fight amid all of the
unknowns that come with a fleet of brand
new cars beneath them. Dennis stamped
his mark early with an opening weekend
win in Mexico, and by mid-year was a
regular on the podium in his Porschepowered Andretti car. He secured the world
title on home turf at the London finale when
Cassidy retired from race one. “It was a
crazy year, mostly because you never
actually believed you were going to win a
race until you crossed the finish line... we
were having that many issues with the cars,”
explained Dennis. “Next year things are
likely to get even closer as the teams and
drivers understand the new tech better.”

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Sardinia hosted two events
when other plans fell over.
Below: Scotland was added to
the schedule for the first time

Extreme E

COLIN McMASTER/ALASTAIR STALEY/EXTREME E, GETTY IMAGES

Safe to say Extreme E experienced
some growing pains in 2023. The third
season of the all-electric off-road
championship had grand plans to make
its debut in the Amazon, crack America
and visit Argentina... but none of them
happened. Instead a trip to Saudi
Arabia, Scotland, Chile and a curious
double-header in Sardinia formed the
slightly truncated calendar. When racing
did get underway we were treated to a

three-way Swedish title battle as
Johan Kristoffersson and Mikaela
Åhlin-Kottulinsky eventually sealed the
title for Nico Rosberg’s Rosberg X
Racing concern. Carlos Sainz Sr’s team
was second with Mattias Ekström/Laia
Sanz, with Kevin Hansen/Molly Taylor
third for Veloce. Lewis Hamilton’s X44
squad had to settle for fourth, but
drivers Cristina Gutiérrez/ Fraser
McConnell did win twice.

Formula E’s new era began in
Mexico, with much faster, if still
raw, Gen3 cars proving a hit.
Above from left: Dennis is
crowned in London; and
celebrates with a burnout
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111

Kalle Rovanperä put in another
masterclass, despite his young
age, to become a two-time
champion for Toyota. Below: the
sport was rocked by the tragic loss
of Craig Breen, who was killed in a
testing accident in Croatia in April

WRC

Age is just a number. Regardless, it’s hard to
believe that Kalle Rovanperä is still only 23
when he’s already a two-time World Rally
champion and masters a Rally1 machine in
the manner he does. The Finnish sensation
made it back-to-back titles for Toyota with a
superbly consistent season, with just a
single retirement from the 13 rounds. Of the
others, he won three and never finished
lower than fourth to wrap up the crown.
Briton Elfyn Evans gave Rovanperä a run
for his money though, his three wins helping
him to second in the points, securing yet
another 1-2 for Toyota in the process. And
that bodes well for British rallying ahead of
next year, when Rovanperä has made the
shock call to only compete part-time. Could
it be Evans’ time to go one better than his
hat-trick of runner-up spots? We also
must pause for a moment to reflect on the
tragic loss of Craig Breen, the Irish star
who was killed while testing his Hyundai
ahead of Rally Croatia.
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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

JAANUS REE/RED BULL CONTENT POOL, GETTY IMAGES, TOYOTA/McKLEIN

2023 IN PICTURES

Islands in the stream,
that is what we are... Adrien
Fourmaux’s Ford and Dani
Sordo’s Hyundai cross
swords after separate offs
during Rally Japan
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2023 IN PICTURES

IMSA

Hypercar didn’t just star in Europe, it also
cracked America at the very first
opportunity, even if there was a much more
home-grown feel about the result during
IMSA’s first season with the new category.
Having ditched the ageing DPi class after
years of service, the new GTP category
came in designed to accommodate the
same LMH and LMDh cars seen in the WEC,
not that we actually saw any LMH cars enter
IMSA this term, but give it time... Domestic
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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

brands Cadillac and Acura (Honda’s North
American arm) had the upper hand over
new European arrivals Porsche and BMW in
the end. Alexander Sims/Pipo Derani only
scored a single win, but their consistency
was enough to just see off the Wayne Taylor
Racing Acura of Filipe Albuquerque/Ricky
Taylor, and the similar Meyer Shank
Racing-run Acura of Tom Blomqvist/Colin
Braun, which somehow won three times
the number of races, yet finished third.

Ryan Blaney celebrates his first
Sprint Cup title in Arizona.
Below: Ryan Preece’s terrifying
accident at Daytona where his
Ford flipped a dozen times. He
emerged without major injury

NASCAR

This title was extra sweet for Ryan Blaney,
and for more than one reason. The 2023
campaign brought the Penske Ford
Mustang driver his first NASCAR Sprint Cup
crown, a year on from the season in which
he marked himself out as a future
champion. In 2022 Blaney was the fastest
man during the season finale at Phoenix,
but moved aside to allow title-chasing
Penske team-mate Joey Logano the win
that would secure him the championship.

This time the tables were turned, with
Blaney streets ahead of Logano, celebrating
three wins to Logano’s one. And, while
Blaney was second once again in the
Phoenix finale, this time it was enough to
give him the crown by a single point ahead
of Kyle Larson and William Byron, with
Blaney leading his rivals over the finish line.
Just two points covered the top three in the
standings after the mammoth 36-race
schedule. Phew.

ICON SPORTSWIRE VIA GETTY IMAGES, NASCAR ON FOX

The new GTP (well, Hypercar)
era dawns at Daytona.
Cadillac would just edge
Acura, but both Porsche and
BMW also enjoyed race wins

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

115

CORBIS/ULLSTEIN BILD VIA GETTY IMAGES

With a steely resolve and a
helmet that wouldn’t have
looked out of place in a
1990s Pet Shop Boys video,
British motorcycle
record-chaser Eric
Crudgington Fernihough
locked horns with the
pre-war sportswashers

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R A C I N G

T H E
In the 1930s Eric Crudgington Fernihough
was obsessed with becoming the fastest
motorcyclist on Earth on his supercharged
Brough Superior. But he had some strong
competition in the Nazi Germany-backed
BMW. Mat Oxley tells a tale of British
ingenuity, determination and pluck

R E I C H
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

117

at in a dusty cupboard in the bowels
of the Royal Automobile Club,
leafing through ancient volumes of
The Motor Cycle and Motor Cycling,
the name jumped right out at me.
How could it not? Mr Eric
Crudgington Fernihough Esq. And the faded
photos on yellowing, brittle paper, almost a
century old, did full justice to the name: cravat,
plus-fours, neatly trimmed moustache and a
supercharged Brough Superior.
If I had made this discovery half a century
earlier, the actor Terry-Thomas would’ve been
a casting director’s dream for Ferni the movie.
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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

Fernihough had been long forgotten,
which didn’t seem right. His story was more
than worth telling, so I set about researching
and writing a book about the man and his
adventures. And what adventures!
Fernihough was an orphan, adopted by a
wealthy lady, who ended up at Cambridge
University in the early 1920s, from where he
graduated in chemistry and engineering. Or
brewing fuels and making motorcycles, as he
preferred to call his studies. The motorcycle
bug bit ‘Ferni’ early.
“A quarter of a century ago, a very small
boy, rummaging in the family wastepaper

basket, found a catalogue of motorcycles and
their accessories,” he wrote in 1936, at the age
of 31. “He kept it, studied it, and from it learned
to name the component parts of the machines
he saw. It was dearer than any storybook to
him, because from it sprang a deep-rooted
interest in motorcycles that filled his life.
“Years afterwards the boy used to break
bounds from his boarding school and tramp
miles to an important road, where, for a brief
half hour, he could sit and watch various
makes ascending a certain hill and compare
their performances. Often he was late back
for roll-call, but that, to one who was as

ERIC CRUDGINGTON FERNIHOUGH
Streamlining on the
Brough Superior was pure
garden-shed engineering.
Eric is showing off his
handiwork at Brooklands

DAVID SAVILL/GETTY IMAGES

“Terry-Thomas would have been a
casting director’s dream for Ferni”
obsessed with motorcycles as he was, did not
seem important. For, while he was sitting in
detention, his thoughts were free to fly away
to some future time when he himself should
own a machine, should tune it, and perhaps,
if the gods were very kind, win races on it.
That small boy was I…”

The gods were kind to Fernihough. He
rode his first race in 1923, at Brooklands, while
at university. In those days inter-varsity Oxford
vs Cambridge bike races were still a thing.
In 1927 he contested his first Isle of Man
TT but never returned to the island, after
friend Archie Birkin died during practice after

swerving to avoid an oncoming van. (In those
days the roads weren’t closed to traffic during
TT practice sessions.) Birkin’s brother was Sir
Henry Birkin, a member of the Bentley Boys,
a band of wealthy British car racers.
Four years later Fernihough won the
European 175cc championship, riding a JAPpowered Excelsior. JAP engines – manufactured
by John Alfred Prestwich in a north London
factory that employed more than 5000
workers – played a major role in the challenge
that defined Fernihough’s career.
In 1934 Ferni set his sights – despite failing
eyesight, which required him to wear
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119

ERIC CRUDGINGTON FERNIHOUGH
prescription goggles – on breaking the twowheel land speed record to become the fastest
motorcyclist on Earth.
The interwar years were the golden age of
land speed-record breaking, on four wheels
as well as two. Records were often bettered
several times each year, as engine and
aerodynamics performance climbed a steep
upwards development curve.
Of course, it wasn’t only about getting your
name in the record books. Fernihough was
chasing cash bonuses offered by tyre, fuel and
lubricant companies. He also earned a few
extra quid by tuning engines in the workshop
situated adjacent to his house, near the
gates of Brooklands.

Ferni faced this new challenge almost
alone. The only person that offered any real
support was George Brough, founder of
Brough Superior, the so-called Rolls-Royce of
motorcycles, much loved by TE Lawrence, aka
Lawrence of Arabia.
Ferni was given two Brough Superior
SS100s, built from new and not-quite-new
parts. And step by step he prepared for his
attempt on the world record.
In 1936 he fitted a supercharger to the
Brough and reached 159mph in the Brighton
Speed Trials, the fastest a motorcycle had
travelled in Britain.
“Ferni got away like lightning and man and
machine roared bullet-fashion into the gloom,

the war-song of the big twin punctuated by an
occasional misfire,” wrote one observer. “This
augurs well for his forthcoming attempt on
the world’s speed record.”
However, there was a problem: Adolf
Hitler. When the Nazis came to power in
1933 they set about establishing a motor
sportswashing programme of racing and
record breaking by funding Auto Union and
Mercedes. Meanwhile BMW was already busy
breaking motorcycle records.
BMW’s number-one speed merchant was
Ernst Henne, also an orphan, who described
himself as “a bit of a wild thing”. He once spent
nine days in a coma after falling off a road bike.
By the time he came around, one newspaper

“When the Nazis came to power, they set about
establishing a sportswashing programme”

BROOKLANDS, ULLSTEIN BILD VIA GETTY IMAGES

‘Ferni’, second from left,
lived near Brooklands and
frequently raced there

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Fernihough’s greatest
rival for the motorcycle
speed record crown was
Ernst Henne, here
shaking hands with
Adolf Hitler

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121

BMW streamlining. Above:
Henne was a darling of the
Nazi regime. Right: Ferni at
Brooklands before his
record attempts

Henne’s talents
were wide, including
racing BMW
motorcycles off-road

This was Eric’s first
streamliner; it was
soon adapted

Henne first broke the
record in 1929, reaching
134.68mph outside Munich

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

ERIC CRUDGINGTON FERNIHOUGH

With the world record in
the bag, Eric was invited to
give an exhibition run here
at the 1937 Dutch TT

STILLTIME, GETTY IMAGES, BROOKLANDS, BMW, ALAMY

“He spent the winter learning panel beating and
aluminium welding to fabricate his streamliner”
had already published his obituary. Henne
broke the motorcycle record for the first time
in 1929, riding a 734cc supercharged boxer
twin to 134.68mph on a road near BMW’s
Munich HQ. By the time Fernihough was ready,
Henne had raised the bar to 159.09mph.
Ferni’s first attempt was far from
auspicious. In October 1936 he attended
Germany’s first Reich Records week, a new
event run by the NSKK (National Socialist
Motor Corps), established by Hitler to
mobilise and mechanise German youth.
When he arrived on the Frankfurt
autobahn, guarded by NSKK troops and
decorated with Nazi flags, he wasn’t greeted
with open arms. This event was designed to
showcase German engineering and heroics,
not British derring-do.
The NSKK needn’t have worried, though.
Ferni’s supercharged 996cc Brough looked
positively medieval next to BMW’s latest
creation: a supercharged 492cc flat twin
wrapped in an aluminium streamliner. A twowheeled Silver Arrow.

BMW developed this fighter plane without
wings in a wind tunnel that was later used to
test Messerschmitt and Heinkel warplanes.
And yet Henne had a horrible time with
the streamliner. The 492cc engine was all new
and a big step forward from its ageing 734cc
predecessor. But each time Henne attacked
his own record the motorcycle broke into a
terrifying wobble. Nevertheless, by the end of
the day he had raised the record to 169.05mph.
Meanwhile Fernihough got nowhere, beset
by oil leaks, ignition misfires and a burnt-out
clutch. Many would have given up there and
then, but if Ferni was a brave and talented
rider and a brilliant engine tuner, his greatest
power was superhuman obsession.
He had the Brough’s magnetos rewired and
set off for Hungary, where part of the Londonto-Istanbul Transcontinental Highway had
been constructed near Budapest, to fit the
specifications required for record attempts:
dead straight and flat.
The Brough ran perfectly on the Gyon
road. Ferni broke Henne’s record one way,

but his ageing Sturmey-Archer gearbox
stripped a pinion on the second run, denying
him the mean figure needed for official records.
At least he knew Henne wasn’t out of his reach.
And thus began a remarkable few weeks,
during which Ferni criss-crossed Europe in
his Fordson van, driving 5000 miles, loping
along dusty, bumpy single carriageway roads
at perhaps 35mph and completing more than
30 tiresome border crossings.
Back home again he rebuilt his engine,
replaced the gearbox, loaded up the van and
retraced the 1100 miles back to Gyon. This
time he reached 167.8mph, which a few weeks
earlier would have given him the record but
was now too slow.
Then home again, where he spent the
winter learning panel beating and aluminium
welding to fabricate his own streamliner. Ferni
knew nothing of aerodynamics and it showed.
Nevertheless in April 1937 he set off for Gyon
once again, with mechanic Eric Rowland and
a young helper by his side. Their first days
back at Gyon were spoiled by mechanical
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123

The Italians used fighter-plane
streamlining on their Gilera.
Piero Taruffi, who later won an
F1 GP for Ferrari, stole the
record from our Eric

issues and bad weather. By day five Fernihough
was running out of cash – closing the
road was not cheap – and he had to wait until
late afternoon before conditions were good
enough for a decent run.
“Not a miss! Not a stutter!” reported Motor
Cycling. “Up went the revs in a howling
cadence to peak. Through the approach curve
Ferni laid the blown Brough way over in a steep
bank; then she was sliding, sliding… Would
he, could he, hold that slide? Yes, up she came
and down the straightaway like an artillery
shell! ‘This is it,’ Rowland kept repeating under
his breath. ‘This is it.’ And it was it. Hastiest
in the world!”
Fernihough had recorded a mean of
169.8mph, just 0.73mph better than Henne,
and was the fastest motorcyclist on Earth. Not
for long, though.
A new player had entered the recordbreaking game: Italian marque Gilera, with
brilliant rider, driver and engineer Piero
Taruffi, who had started racing motorcycles
in the 1920s. In 1931 Taruffi was signed by
Enzo Ferrari to race both motorcycles and
cars. The following year he beat Ferrari’s
favourite bike racer Giordano Aldrighetti in
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MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

“Thousands of German troops
were descending on Austria”
the Coppa del Mare motorcycle race, so the
Old Man sacked him.
Taruffi moved to Rome, where he joined
the nascent motorcycle and aerospace brand
CNA (Compagnia Nazionale Aeronautica),
owned by Count Giovanni Bonmartini, a
committed Blackshirt and friend of Italian
dictator Benito Mussolini.
Bonmartini was building the world’s first
transverse inline-four motorcycle, the
template for today’s superbikes. His plan was
to sell a “two-wheeled Bugatti… a bike which
is not suitable for everybody… destined for a
few exceptional sportsmen.”
He christened his motorcycle Rondine
(Italian for swallow), after the plane he had
flown accompanying the 1922 March on Rome
which brought Mussolini to power.
However, Bonmartini fell out with another
Mussolini henchman, Italo Balbo, chief of the

Italian air force. Therefore his hopes of
winning lucrative military aircraft orders were
finished, so he sold CNA.
The CNA motorcycle project was bought
by Giuseppe Gilera, who hired Taruffi to
continue developing the supercharged 500cc
four. Gilera and Taruffi made their first attempt
on the record in the spring of 1937, using
the Bergamo-Brescia autostrada, closed to the
public by Blackshirt general Ugo Leonardi.
They were unsuccessful. By October 1937
Taruffi was ready for another go, the Gilera
also wearing fighter plane-style streamlining,
developed by Caproni, another military
aircraft manufacturer. Taruffi was a genius
at getting the most out of any vehicle. His
memories of his next attempt show why.
“The air inside my bubble was calm.
I gripped the tank tightly with my knees and
pressed my elbows down on them, so that all

ERIC CRUDGINGTON FERNIHOUGH

Fernihough broke the record in
Hungary, 1937; he’d die trying to
re-take his crown in ’38. Below:
Hungarian record holder, 1936

DE GIER, MORTONS, BROOKLANDS, ALAMY, MUTSCHLER

With Europe spinning
towards war, Fernihough
worked round the clock to
uprate his JAP engine

my limbs were firmly locked, ready to react
to the first sign of a wobble…
“Now the finish was coming up. The
handlebars started to shake. I braced my
knees, lest the slightest movement here
should impart larger, uncontrollable tremors
to the whole mass of the machine. The forces
against me were tremendous. No sooner had
I mastered the swerve in one direction than
the bike would head off in another; but I must
not, on any account, let up. And I didn’t.”
Taruffi, Gilera and Italy were the new
record holders, at 170.27mph.
This news didn’t go down particularly well
in the NSKK headquarters in Berlin, which
demanded an immediate counterattack. But
Henne was unable to better Taruffi in the 1937
Reich Records event, because BMW’s
streamliner was impossible to control at such
speeds. Enter Hitler’s favourite engineer,
Ferdinand Porsche, who advised an
aerodynamics overhaul.
Porsche’s input worked wonders. On
November 28, just five weeks after Taruffi’s
170mph breakthrough, Henne reached
173.67mph on the Frankfurt autobahn. Ferni
spent the winter eking more power from his

JAP engine. “I get up at 7am and I’m in bed at
2.30am; I merely work and eat.” He knew his
Brough was already pretty much obsolete,
so if he wanted to recapture the record he
must act quickly.
By March he was ready. But global events
were moving ahead of him. His progress
towards Hungary was slowed by tens of
thousands of German troops descending on
Austria to annexe the country.
At Gyon the weather was abysmal, so
after several days he drove home again. Two
weeks later he was once more bound for Gyon.
Talk about obsessed…

The 995cc JAP engine could propel the bike to
180mph – and along the way was very noisy

The Brough now sounded louder and
madder than ever. “If it didn’t scare you stiff,
it wouldn’t be right!” said Fernihough.
On the morning of April 23, Ferni was
doing 180mph – according to Rowland’s highly
attuned ears – when he lost control; he died
in the ensuing crash.
The hearse containing Fernihough’s body
(packed in ice) was given a hero’s send-off
by the Hungarians. A procession of cars
accompanied the vehicle from Budapest on
the first leg of its sad journey home. Later,
BMW representatives escorted the cortège
through Munich. Meanwhile Rowland drove
home, with the tangled remains of the Brough.
“At every frontier their utter sorrow
touched me deeply,” he wrote. “As I left each
frontier post the officers lined up and, standing
to attention, gave a salute of honour. The
sympathy I was shown in Hungary, Austria,
Germany and Belgium all went to prove just
how much dear old Ferni was loved.”
The full incredible story is
told in Racing Hitler by Mat
Oxley, £27.99, available at
matoxley.bigcartel.com
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

125

THE

BUYING, SELLING, AUCTIONS, MEMORABILIA
and
r
Chassis 005 was the only V8
Vantage GT2 to make it to
Japan, racing with A Speed
for three seasons from 2010

DEALER STAR CAR

Orient express

HIDENORI SUZUKI

This V8 Vantage GT2 originally earnt its keep in the Far East. In
retirement it’s showing no signs of slowing, says Simon de Burton
shan’t forget the first time I clapped eyes
on Aston Martin’s V8 Vantage in its
2005 launch year. It was at the Gaydon
HQ and I was admiring one of the first
production cars in the entrance atrium
while awaiting the arrival of Aston’s
eccentric but effective CEO, Dr Ulrich Bez.
But when he burst onto the scene, it wasn’t
the car he wanted to talk about – but cake.
Royal wedding cake, to be precise, as dished

out at the recent nuptials of Charles and
Camilla. “This, money cannot buy,” said Bez
with wild-eyed enthusiasm. “It is priceless,”
he opined, prodding it with the arm of his
lime-green spectacles.
But while Bez was still basking in the
glow of having been a royal wedding guest
(the King’s an Aston Martin fan, don’t forget)
he was simultaneously gearing-up to return
the marque to serious competition with the

creation of Aston Martin Racing by launching
track versions of the freshly minted Vantage .
The announcement came at the following
year’s British International Motor Show, where
Bez revealed that he, development engineer
Chris Porritt, development driver Wolfgang
Schuhbauer and a German journalist would
race in the forthcoming Nürburgring 24 Hours.
The N24 car, which was close to stock,
achieved an impressive fourth in class – and

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

127

THE SHOWROOM Dealer

It’s back in its eyecatching A Speed livery
but also in period raced in
all-white, inset, when
sponsored by Dunhill

was (legally) driven home afterwards. Aston
Martin’s renaissance was properly ‘back on
track’ and a slew of proper race variants of the
Vantage followed, including GT2, GT3 and GT4
versions and a Rally GT model developed by
Prodrive for the 2006 Race of Champions.
The 2010 car on offer with the Ascott
Collection in northern France is chassis 005
of the nine GT2s built and remains as it was in
2010, making it eligible (among numerous
other events) for the Endurance Racing
Legends series and Le Mans Classic.
The GT2 specification combines
the aluminium VH architecture of the road
car with the addition of carbon fibre body
panels (the roof remains aluminium) and

an FIA rollcage. Brembo racing brakes and
two-piece discs take care of stopping, with
aerodynamics being improved by a front
splitter, rear spoiler and rear diffuser.
A relatively modest output of 475bhp keeps
the V8 reliable, and it drives through a sixspeed, sequential flat-shift transmission.
The car was delivered new to Yuichiro
Seguchi’s A Speed team which became the
first in Japan to enter an Aston Martin in
the GT300 class, dressing it in the same white
and orange livery as worn by the team’s
popular grid girls.
In 2014 the car took two class wins in
the Challenge Cup Japan and won the Aston
Challenge Japan under the sponsorship of

Dunhill, the historic maker of Motorities
driving accessories. Chassis 005’s finest hour
came, however, when it finished third in class
at the AMR Le Mans Festival in 2015
The car was subsequently bought by a
French enthusiast and has again been
campaigned in earnest since 2022, notably
taking a class win at that year’s Mugello Classic.
It is to be sold with a comprehensive spares
kit – and the buyer should celebrate with a
slice of gateaux.

2010 ASTON MARTIN V8
VANTAGE GT2

On sale with Ascott Collection, Gazeran, France.
Asking: £696,000. ascottcollection.com

DEALER NEWS

● A rare beast even in its
heyday, the SUNBEAM
HARRINGTON LE MANS
was a high-end Alpine
whose name capitalised on
an Alpine Harrington that
had scooped the Index of
Thermal Efficiency at 1961’s
Le Mans. This 1962 model,
right, took part in the RAC
in ’62 and had a rough time
of it: DNF. Gloucester’s
COUNTY CLASSICS said
the car is in “very good
condition”. Price: £39,999.

● Stockport’s stock is
rising. Further evidence of
this can be gleaned by
HR OWEN LAMBORGHINI
MANCHESTER being
awarded LAMBORGHINI
GLOBAL DEALER OF THE
YEAR – just over a year

since the refurbished
showroom opened. And
runner-up? HR Owen’s
Lamborghini HATFIELD.
● A few M6 junctions south
from Stocky, LOOKERS’
revamped BMW CREWE
has opened after a
one-year, £5.8m upgrade.
It adheres to BMW’s Retail
Next concept – a Grand
Designs-esque space with
plenty of glass, natural light
and lounge-like seating.

IF YOU HAVE ANY INDUSTRY NEWS OR TIPS CONTACT LEE.GALE@MOTORSPORTMAGAZINE.COM

128

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

● With lamps behind its
grille and cycle wings, the
HEALEY SILVERSTONE
E-TYPE, inset right, looked
fast and was – 110mph;
0-60 in 7secs. This 1950
example is hen’s-teeth
territory: 105 Silverstones
were made and of those,
51 were D-Types and 54
the more desirable and
spacious E-. It’s on sale for
£129,995 at CAMBERLEY
MARINE AND SPORTS
CARS in Fleet, Hampshire.

● POPEMOBILEs have
come in all shapes and
sizes – for his visit to the UK
in 1982 Pope John Paul II
cruised around in a Leyland
Constructor. Now for his
Vatican City car pool,
POPE FRANCIS is going
all-out EV with 40 leased
VOLKSWAGEN ID.3s, 4s
and 5s. Of late, the Pontiff
has been using a fuss-free,
standard Ford Focus. LG

COUNTY CLASSICS, CAMBERLEY MARINE AND SPORTS CARS, HIDENORI SUZUKI

In celebration of thermal efficiency

Our passion is classic competition cars

1990 Porsche 962 Brun Motorsport – P.O.A.

1959 Lotus 15 – P.O.A.

2007 Porsche 997 GT3 RSR – P.O.A.

1965 ex-Autodelta Alfa Romeo 1600 GTA – P.O.A.

1974 Surtees TS16/02 - P.O.A.

1972 ex-Schnitzer BMW 3.5 CSL Group 2 – P.O.A.

We have a wider variety of great cars for sale. Please call or visit our web-site for more information.
www.rmd.be – salesinfo@rmd.be – +32 (0) 475 422 790 – Schoten, Belgium

THE SHOWROOM Auctions

AUCTION PICKS

The fleetest
of folk devils
Simon de Burton on the Carlton they
wanted to ban and global sale-room fancies

1993 PORSCHE 911 RSR
SOLD BY BONHAMS, £1.7M
People with a passion for perfect Porsches might
be tempted to shy away from this grubby-looking
example – but its appearance belied the fact that in
30 years it had travelled just six miles.

130

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

1974 DUCATI 750 SUPER SPORT
SOLD BY GOODING & COMPANY, £126,760
Just 401 of these ‘Green Frames’ were built to
commemorate Paul Smart and Bruno Spaggiari’s
1-2 victory at Imola in 1972. This one belonged to
fabled rock photographer Guy Webster.

1991 VAUXHALL LOTUS CARLTON
SOLD BY HISTORICS, £111,524
If prices for fast Fords can hit six-figures, why
shouldn’t it be the same for (very) fast Vauxhalls?
This well-preserved Lotus Carlton shows that some
collectors will pay whatever it takes to own the
best of anything, and the completely original,
177mph Q-ship with a mere 17,823 miles on the
clock was probably the finest example of its type.
Just 950 were built, with 3.6-litre straight six
engines. All were finished in Imperial Green and, as
well as holding the title of ‘world’s fastest four-door
saloon’, the Lotus Carlton also had the distinction of
being the subject of a Daily Mail campaign to ban it.

1968 KELLISON SANDPIPER
SOLD BY RM SOTHEBY’S, £66,700
This buggy looked out of place among more than
50 white Porsches in the single-owner White
Collection. Although the owner hadn’t lost the plot
– this was restored by 356 guru Tim Goodrich.

1975 MERCEDES-BENZ 350SL ELECTRIC
SOLD BY ICONIC AUCTIONEERS, £45,000
Converting classics to battery power is not cheap
– restoring this ‘Sportline Zero’ SL and substituting
its 3.5-litre engine for electric motors allegedly cost
close to £200,000.

1949 SPEEDWAY RACE VEST
SOLD BY BONHAMS, £1536
Automobilia doesn’t come much more niche than
vintage speedway race bibs. This one was once
worn by West Ham Hammers star Reg ‘Fearless’
Fearman, who celebrated his 90th birthday in April.

1984 AUDI QUATTRO WR
SOLD BY ICONIC AUCTIONEERS, £21,375
Anyone who has put a car away ‘just for a while’ will
know how quickly time can pass. This Quattro had
been in the same family ownership from new; 28
years later it came out looking like this…

FORTHCOMING SALE HIGHLIGHTS
● MECUM, KISSIMMEE,
FLORIDA, JANUARY 2-14

BONHAMS, HISTORICS, ICONIC, GOODING & COMPANY, DARIN SCHNABEL/RM SOTHEBY’S

This sale marks 25 years of
Mecum auctions, and will
include the so-called Apex
Collection of what the house
describes as “insanely rare
cars”. The rarest of the lot
will be one of only 30 original
Ford GT40 road cars ever
built. With just 13,442
miles recorded, it was
comprehensively restored
by RUF Automobiles and
probably represents a
once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

● BONHAMS, PARIS, FEBRUARY 1

Bonhams returns to the
spectacular Grand Palais
venue for its latest sale
designed to take advantage of
the captive audience of classic
car enthusiasts attending the
ever-growing Rétromobile
show. Fresh from raising £1.2m
for the wreckage of the
Lamborghini Countach
featured in The Wolf of Wall
Street, the house will offer an
immaculate 1981 LP400S
Series 2 with an estimate of
£500,000-£600,000.

● ICONIC, STONELEIGH PARK,
WARWICKSHIRE, FEBRUARY 24

● RM SOTHEBY’S, MIAMI,
FEBRUARY 29-MARCH 3

This annual one-stop shop for
anyone looking for a turnkey
competition car had already
attracted some interesting
entries as this issue goes to
press. Stars include a 1971 JRT
Ford Escort RS1600 Group 2
car dubbed ‘Lairy Canary’
(£100,000-£120,000) and the
Ford Sierra RS500 (£240,000£280,000) built by Andy Rouse
and driven by Guy Edwards
during the 1988 British Touring
Car Championship.

No, RM Sotheby’s hasn’t
decided to follow US rivals
such as Mecum and BarrettJackson by staging multi-day
sales – this four-day
MODAMIAMI event is set to be
a “celebration of automobiles
and luxury culture”. Being
held at the vast and lavish
Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables,
it will combine a display of
ultra high-end classics with
multiple opportunities to buy
expensive stuff.

2006 McLAREN-MERCEDES MP4/21
SOLD BY BONHAMS, £2.2M
The astronomical £15.1m achieved for Lewis
Hamilton’s first F1 winning McLaren-Mercedes at
RM Sotheby’s made the mere couple of mill paid
for this one in which Kimi Räikkönen scored
podium places in Bahrain (third) and Australia
(second) seem like a bargain.

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

131

THE SHOWROOM

Motor Sport collection
ALL PRODUCTS AVAILABLE AT MOTORSPORTMAGAZINE.COM/SHOP

Editor’s choice

A new star of
Formula 1 art
Fans of motor racing art, artefacts and ephemera will
find a huge range, including these collectibles, at the
Motor Sport shop – motorsportmagazine.com/shop

132

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

JAMES STEVENS ART

He may be one of the newer names on the motor sport art scene, but James
Stevens’ star is on the rise. Since switching his focus away from a career in
aviation and turning his considerable artistic talent to Formula 1 imagery
in 2021, Stevens’ work has gone on to garner critical acclaim. He started out
creating pitstop scenes, earning the nickname the ‘Pit Stop Painter’. It was
a clever approach, and he’s since branched out into action paintings. We’re
fortunate enough to have a selection of his works available, from embellished
canvases showing pit scenes for the likes of McLaren, Red Bull and Jackie
Stewart at BRM, to a true one-off original depicting Michael Schumacher’s
Ferrari F2004. An investment piece.
Clockwise from top left: Michael Schumacher painting, £1650; Max
Verstappen embellished canvas, £800; Fernando Alonso painting, £1650;
Jackie Stewart embellished canvas, £800

THE
EXPERT
VIEW

SUIXTIL RIO POLO SHIRT

Bring in the new year in style with this slick
Rio polo shirt from Suixtil. The brand
became a big thing in Argentina during the
1940s and ’50s thanks to its involvement
with motor racing. Its sponsorship of the
national racing team even led to its
re-branding as Escuderia Suixtil for a while.
This design features mother of pearl
buttons and red logo and is made from
100% slub yarn cotton, which is a far nicer
material than it sounds. £95

When is a toy not a toy?

AVRO VULCAN CUFFLINKS
MOTOR SPORT
100 YEARS CALENDAR

It’s not too late to secure your copy
of our stunning 100th anniversary
Motor Sport 2024 calendar. Celebrate
a centenary of your favourite
motoring monthly all year, with
each image depicting an epic scene
from Formula 1’s rich history, from
rumbling BRMs and Vanwalls, to
turbo monsters, screaming DFVs and
modern-day heroes. It’s also massive,
at A2 size. £32.99

Love something with a story behind it? Look no
further than these cufflinks, made from recycled
fuselage material from the Avro Vulcan XH558
bomber – the last Vulcan to fly. Designed in 1952,
the Vulcan was revolutionary with cutting-edge
technology and Rolls-Royce Olympus turbojet
engines (derivatives of which would go on to power
the mighty Concorde). The aircraft now resides
at the former RAF Finningley in Doncaster. £19

ABOUT THE MOTOR SPORT SHOP
With hundreds of special and unique
racing-themed products, and many new items
regularly added, the Motor Sport shop is
aimed at both serious and casual collectors
with a wide range of prices to suit your budget.
Visit motorsportmagazine.com/shop

MOTOR SPORT WATER BOTTLE

The start of a new year brings the return of plenty
of motoring events, so having something handy
to keep your chosen tipple hot or cold is a real
bonus when on the banks. Try our new insulated
500ml drinks bottle, guaranteed to keep your
brew piping hot for hours in the winter, and your
squash ice cold in the summer. Plus, it has the
Motor Sport logo on it! £32.99

visit to the Toy Collectors’ Fair at
Sandown Park got me thinking:
when does a model stop becoming
a toy, and instead become a collectible?
This thought was sparked by a
discovery from German company Schuco,
which has been around since 1912. While
at Sandown I found a lovely die-cast model
kit in 1:18-scale of Stirling Moss’s Mercedes
W196 from Monaco 1955. It was a lovely
thing, but it was wind-up, so you built it,
gave it a crank and it would run around
the floor. Great, but is it a collectible?
The general rule in the collecting
world is, no, because by that point you’ve
opened the box, built the item and
enjoyed it. But that does mean it’s unlikely
to have any future increase in value. And
frankly who cares if you’ve bought the
thing to enjoy in the first place? But it is
an important distinction. Take Dinky or
Corgi toys. These were always made with
play in mind, yet classic ones still in their
box fetch huge amounts over ones that
have clearly had a less-preserved life.
The modern variant would be Hot
Wheels. There is a huge variety of models
out there, all in seductive packaging. The
rule here is, they become toys when
opened. Hot Wheels knows this and has
started to release boxed sets of cars with
transporters or sets of related cars, such
as rally heroes or endurance legends in
its Premium ranges. These are a response
to more mature customers who love a little
collectible for a good price.
Bburago for years made cheap model
cars, ‘toys’ intended to be removed from
their display packaging and enjoyed. But
a few years ago they got the Ferrari
licence, and if you’re now in the market
for a fine F1 model under £150 then you’ll
struggle to find better. Even modern
offerings – such as Charles Leclerc’s official
2019 Ferrari – are already growing in
value, with some even doubling in price
as soon as they stop being made.
In future, don’t let a name like
Bburago put you off investing. As always,
investing in the future is fine, but if you
buy something to enjoy it, that’s all the
value you’ll need.
Andrew Francis is director at The Signature
Store, thesignaturestore.co.uk
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

133

FAMILY BUSINESS ESTABLISHED 1981
Our ofﬁce/showroom is at: 62B HIGH STREET, SHEPPERTON, TW17 9AU

VIEWING BY APPOINTMENT PLEASE

The Original MGF & TF Specialist.
Church Square Autos has been in
Business for 41 years since 1981 and
have been supplying low mileage
high spec MGFs & TFs for over
20 years from the ﬁrst to last made,
Quality not Quantity for us
MGF VVC, +Hardtop, Just 12,573 miles, Immaculate. £9,750

MGB Roadster, large photo album of full restoration £12,995
1978 Feb export model. Just 32,400 miles. As seen in July
2023 MG Enthusiast Magazine. Exported to California in
1978 and Re-imported back to the UK in 1990 converted back
to right hand drive. Full and total nut and bolt restoration.
Also supplied with paperwork including every old Mot dating
from its ﬁrst in 1990 to last one @31638 miles. Runs on Lead
free fuel. Finished in unmarked Flame Red coachwork, with
excellent Black leather seats with red pipping also has a
Walnut dash, Black soft top, full tonneau cover.

MGF TROPHY ‘SE’ 160vvc, Just 22,000miles £9,495
2001. service history including every mot, we have just
serviced/Mot’d, new headgasket/cambelt/water, pump/
stainless water pipes. Previously owned by me back in Jan
2012 when we where showing the car at events and got
second prize in MGCC Pride of Ownership. Finished in
Rare Anthecite (one of just 106 UK cars made in Anthercite)
a totally original Trophy spec plus with ABS braking, wind
deﬂector, headlight covers which have been on car since a
few months old. Immaculate outstanding condition.

1996(N). As seen in MG Enthusiast magazine Dec ‘22.
Showcar with a very, very low mileage repeat in outstanding
original condition. Fully documented service history ﬁle
including original purchase bill of sale. Purchased by me
from its ﬁrst owner then sold to and re-purchased from its
second owner then registered to me. Finished in Flame
Red with Red fusion half leather seats and Black soft top.
Extras include black removable hardtop, Front fog lights,
passengers airbag, mudﬂaps, all these being ﬁtted from new.

MG TF 135 Facelift model, just 14,893miles. Immaculate. £7,695

MG TF 135 Spark’SE’, just 39,000 miles with FSH. £6,495

2005(55) Facelift model. Finished in Sonic Blue with
Full Black leather a glass heated rear screen and soft ride
suspension plus rear mudﬂaps. Dry stored by a Private
collector for many years, now been re-commissioned by us
eg, Serviced, ﬁtted with a new water pump/cambelt and a
new Mot. Glass heated rear screen, soft ride suspension,
engine water level sensor, front fog lights and Facelift alloy
wheels. 40th from last made by MG/Rover group and is in
Totally Immaculate Condition, as shown in our photos.

MG TF 135 Spark’SE’, just 42,000 miles with FSH. £5,795

2006 Special edition in outstanding condition. Previously
used by me as a showcar in 2012 before selling in 2013 to its
last owner, new discs & pads, new heater resistor, serviced
and just mot’d. Finished in Sonic Blue with Black leather
seats with Grey inserts plus MG logo, Silver interior pack,
16” 11 spoke alloys with ABS and 4 pot Red brake calipers,
Engine water level sensor, front fog lights, chrome packs,
wind deﬂector, MG Matts etc. Immaculate outstanding
example of these very sort after. Ulez compliant.

MGF VVC, Very low mileage just 16,864 miles. £5,695

2005 05’ in Sonic blue, full service history including
headgasket/cambelt/water pump stainless water pipes
and old Mot’s etc. Black leather seats with grey inserts
with MG Logo, silver interior pack, chrome packs, wind
deﬂector, front fog lights, engine water level senser,
Stainless steel rear exhaust box. New 16” 11 spoke alloys
wheels and new Falken tyres. The last Ltd edition ever
made by MG/Rover group and this TF was Registered
the very last day of MG/Rover on the 31/05 /2005.

MGF TROPHY ‘SE’160vvc, just 62,000 miles. £4,995

2001(Y) MGF vvc. Supplied by us back in 2013 with
11,970 miles to its second owner then at 13,300 miles to its
last owner, having covered now just 16,864 miles by him.
Full service history (17 services) including HG/WP/CB
and most MOTs. Silver with Black half leather sport seats,
as new unmarked 16” alloys, ABS braking, wind deﬂector,
Silver interior trim. Supplied New by our then local MG
dealer Kingsbury & Son Hampton. The second owner had
this MGF Under body protected/wax oiled in 2013.

MGF VVC, 1 owner just 33,000 miles. £4,895

2001(Y) in Trophy blue with trophy interior, having covered
with documented history. Fitted with a Stainless Supersport
rear exhaust box, ungraded Kmaps ECU (ﬁtted by us),
replacement Mohair Black hood, cambelt/water pump,
wax oiled, reconditioned displacers, new calipers 4 new
wheel bearing etc. Supplied serviced and with a new mot
to 5/12/2024. Has an insurance marker against it from way
back in 2004, since when it was also fully repaired. A very
well looked after Trophy, last owner since 2017 38,000miles.

MGF Freestyle vvc Ltd Edition, just 57,000 miles. £4,895

2000(W) MGF vvc one Lady owner from new,
having covered just 33,000 miles with documented
history. Fitted with unmarked Red/Black leather
seats plus a two tone Red steeering wheel a
passengers airbag, abs braking, 16” alloys, Silver
interior trim.We have just serviced and ﬁtted a new
headgasket/water pump/cambelt etc 02/11/2023,
Repeat this One Lady Owner low mileage MGF vvc
is in immaculate condition.

MG TF 135 High spec, just 50,000 miles. £3,895

2001 (51), in outstanding condition. Previously supplied by us
and known to us since 2012. High spec Freestyle model ﬁtted
with MGOC Suplex H054 uprated suspension kit (a £1500
conversion) with adjustable shockers,. Full Black leather
sport seats, silver interior trim, ‘SE’ 16”alloys, ABS Braking,
Blue hood, front and rear Trophy spoilers. Documented
service history. Supplied serviced and ﬁtted with a new
headgasket/cambelt/water pump (29/07/2023), Stainless
Supersport rear box and Stainless Cat/Lambda sensors.

2003(03), a very good high spec TF, ﬁnished in Anthercite
and ﬁtted with Black leather seats/armrest, new 16”11
spoke Graphite grey alloys with new falken tyres plus
soft ride suspension. Boot spoiler, wind deﬂector,
front fog lights, having covered just 50,000miles with
documented history incuding a replacement headgasket/
water pump/cambelt, stainless water pipes, just had new
lower suspension arms, front & rear brake discs and pads,
rear exhaust box and cat plus ﬂexi pipe.

Rover 25 IMPRESSION S 3 1.4, Ulez Compliant. £2,495
Ideal ﬁrst car / or for traveling into the Ulez Zone.
Rover 1.4 5 door, just 2 owners including us.
Documented history, Air conditioning etc, cheaper
insurance and road tax, low mileage and in excellent
condition.

MGF/TF PARTS FOR SALE
We are NOT in the ULEZ ZONE......Hardtops including a Racing Hardtop, Soft tops, selection of Alloy wheels new and secondhand eg New Rare 85th Twisted pepper alloys,
New 16” 11 spoke alloys Silver, 16” 6 spoke, 16” Hairpin alloys. Accessories, Seats & Interior items, centre consoles eg: Walnut/gloss Black(LE500),
Boot spoilers, MGF/TF Xpower Roll hoops with Torneau covers. Front Bumpers...... Also NEW TT

THIS IS JUST A SMALL SELECTION FROM OUR STOCK

07836 281493 or 01932 241843

sales@churchsquareautos.com | www.churchsquareautos.com
SALES & PARTS FOR YOUR MGF/TF

DEALER GALLERY
To advertise, please call Paula Trainor on 020 7349 8479
or email paula.trainor@motorsportmagazine.com

The largest classic car showrooms in central London
A selection from 65 cars available

1965 Mercedes-Benz 230SL ONLY 127 miles since full restoration

1964 Austin Mini Cooper S Matching numbers & fully restored

1963 Aston Martin DB4 Series V R.S. Williams 4.7litre engine upgrade

1972 Bristol 411 Series III Lovely order with new interior

2002 Aston Martin DB7 Vantage Volante
- ONLY 21,330 miles from new

2010 Aston Martin DB9 ONLY 26,500 miles from new

www.graemehunt.com
+44 (0)20 7937 8487 • mail@graemehunt.com

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

137

2008 ASTON MARTIN V8 VANTAGE GT2
Ex-Le Mans car, 1 of 8 Factory-Speciﬁcation GT2’s ever built. Rare and highly eligible entry into the great
Endurance Racing Legends Series, including Le Mans Classic.

2004 COURAGE-AER C65 LMP2
Ex-works car with double Le Mans history, including a podium in 2005. Silverstone and Monza 1000km winner.
Fresh bare-tub Moto Historics restoration, including zero mile engine and gearbox. A potential outright winner
in Endurance Racing Legends and Le Mans Classic.

Carrera GT

356 Speedster

911 Carrera RS (964)

911 Turbo (991.2)

Basalt Black • Black Leather GT Seats
19/20” Centre Lock Magnesium Wheels
Porsche Ceramic Composite Brakes
Original Luggage Set • No. 1,121 of
1,270 Cars Built • Previously Sold by
Paragon • 2,885 miles • 2006 (06)

Signal Red • Black Leather Sports
Seats • 15” Steel Wheels with Chrome
Hub Caps • Chassis No. 83032
Certificate of Authenticity • Tool Kit
& Jack • Previously Sold & Serviced
by Paragon • 1957

Guards Red • Triple-Tone Leather
Bucket Seats • 17” Magnesium Cup
Wheels • Power Steering & Anti Lock
Brakes • One of just 104 RHD Cars
Blaupunkt Bremen DAB Radio
42,594 miles • 1992 (J)

GT Silver • Bordeaux Red/Black
Dual-Tone Leather • PDK Gearbox
20” Turbo III Wheels • Sport Chrono
Glass Electric Sunroof • Previously
Sold & Serviced by Paragon
18,583 miles • 2016 (66)

£1,649,995

£314,995

£274,995

£99,995

911 Turbo (991)

911 GT3 (996)

911 Carrera 4 S Targa (991)

911 Turbo (997.2)

Basalt Black • Black Leather Sports
Seats • PDK Gearbox • 20” Turbo
Centre Lock Wheels • Touchscreen
Satellite Navigation • Sport Chrono
Carbon Interior Pack • 16,012 miles
2015 (15)

Arctic Silver • Black Leather Bucket
Seats • 18” GT3 Split Rim Wheels
Stainless Steel Rear Roll Cage
Air Conditioning • Previously Sold &
Serviced by Paragon • 55,191 miles
2000 (V)

Night Blue Metallic • Black Leather
Sports Seats • 20” Carrera Classic
Wheels • Touchscreen Satellite
Navigation • Switchable Sports
Exhaust • Previously Sold & Serviced
by Paragon • 15,664 miles • 2015 (15)

Meteor Grey • Black Leather Adaptive
Sports Seats • PDK Gearbox
Porsche Ceramic Composite Brakes
19” Turbo II Wheels • Touchscreen
Satellite Navigation • Sport Chrono
33,619 miles • 2010 (60)

£89,995

£84,995

£79,995

911 Carrera 2 (993)

911 Carrera 2 GTS (997)

911 Carrera 4 S (991)

911 Carrera 2 S (991)

Viola Metallic • Marble Grey Leather
Seats • Tiptronic S Gearbox • 17” Cup
Wheels • Air Conditioning • Porsche
Classic Radio • Previously Sold &
Serviced by Paragon • 48,880 miles
1996 (N)

Basalt Black • Black Leather Sports
Seats • PDK Gearbox • 19” GTS Centre
Lock Wheels • Touchscreen Satellite
Navigation • Sport Chrono • Bose
Sound System • Switchable Sports
Exhaust • 28,423 miles • 2011 (61)

Guards Red • Black Leather Sports
Seats • PDK Gearbox • 20” Carrera S
Wheels • Switchable Sports Exhaust
Touchscreen Satellite Navigation
Bose Sound System • 22,782 miles
2014 (64)

Basalt Black • Black Leather Sports
Seats • PDK Gearbox • 20” Carrera
Classic Wheels • Touchscreen
Satellite Navigation • Switchable
Sports Exhaust • Sport Chrono
39,561 miles • 2013 (63)

£74,995

£69,995

£65,995

£59,995

01825 830424

sales@paragongb.com

www.paragongb.com

We have superb in-house workshop and preparation facilities. Each car is supplied fully serviced with a new MOT and our
12-month/unlimited mileage comprehensive parts and labour warranty. See more of our current stock at paragongb.com
PARAGON GB LT D

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EAST S US S EX

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the world’s number one classic ferrari dealer

1963 Ferrari 250 GT ‘Nembo’

Unique RHD ‘Nembo style’ 250 GT Spyder, based on ex Alain Delon Ferrari 250 GTE. One of the most beautiful Ferrari Spyders

other classic ferraris FOR SALE

1971 FERRARI DAYTONA SPYDER
Expert conversion in period. Fantastic condition.

1984 Ferrari 288 GTO

Outstanding example. Low mileage.

1969 FERRARI 365 GTC

A very rare and desirable Ferrari V12 GT.

W W W. TA L A C R E S T. C O M
+ 44 (0) 1344 308178 | + 44 ( 0) 7860 589855 | j o h n @ t a l a c re s t . c o m

CHARLES RAMSEY
THE CLASSIC CONNECTION
www.classicconnection.co.uk

Jaguar E Type Roadster, 1961 Outside Bonnet Lock. Gunmetal Grey
with Blue Mohair hood and matching tonneau cover. Blue leather interior
with blue carpets. Beautifully restored some years ago with very little use
since. Chassis number 875135 is still in superb condition throughout and
wonderful to drive. Very rare matching numbers car in its original highly
sought after colour, although the interior trim was red according to the
heritage certificate. £159,995

1961Series
Jaguar
E Type Roadster
Outsidelock.
Bonnet
LHDnumbers car was
1961 Jaguar E-Type
I Roadster
outside bonnet
This Lock
matching
supplied
new toGunmetal
the USA Grey
. Number
385 cars
builtand
in left
hand drive.
The car
wasBlue
subject
to a
2000 Miles.
with 339
BlueofMohair
hood
matching
tonneau
cover.
leather
complete
‘ground-up’
rebuild
and
restoration
which
was
completed
in
2012.
It was
imported
to
interior with blue carpets. Beautifully restored some years ago with very little
usethen
since.
Chassis
the UK in875135
Octoberis 2013
247 condition
miles on the
odometer.and
Colour
was changed
Carmen
the
number
still inwith
superb
throughout
wonderful
to drive.toVery
rare Red,
matching
interior
retrimmed
with
black
leather
and
it
was
fitted
with
a
black
soft
top.
This
excellent
and
rare
numbers car in its original highly sought after colour, although the interior trim was red according
E-Type is supplied with a UK V5C registration
document. Superb condition throughout. Heritage
to the heritage certificate.
certificate included£174,995
in the history file. £149,995

Porsche 911
Carrera
registration.
1961 3.2
Jaguar
E-Type Coupe
Roadster 1988
OutsideFBonnet
Lock LHDBlack with
full black
leather
interior.
looking
80’s
icon
has
Matching
numbers
car supplied
newThis
to thestunning
USA . Number
339 of 385
cars
built also
in left hand
the
sought
G50after
five
speed
from new.
drive.
Rescuedafter
in 2008/9
being
storedgearbox.
in a barn for 98,000
over thirtymiles
years. Subject
to a
Will
be
supplied
with
a
full
service
and
new
mot.
Fuchs
alloys,
complete ‘ground-up’ restoration completed in 2012. When the car was restored in the USA
sunroof, whale tail. Lovely condition throughout, the paintwork is
the colour was stunning
changed to Carmen
Red, the interior
retrimmed with£62,995
black leather and it was
and unmarked
throughout.
fitted with a black soft top. Superb condition throughout.

Porsche 993 Turbo with Ruf Turbo R conversion (LHD). 1995
with 993 number plate included. Black with black interior. Lovely
condition throughout, has to be seen, heard, and driven to truly
appreciate just how special this car is. Comes with huge folder
of history detailing everything it has had done throughout its life.
£129,995

1969 Porsche 911T Targa1995
2.2 litre.
White993
withRuf
blackTurbo
interior.
82,000 miles. This Porsche has been
Porsche
R Conversion
subject
to much recent
expenditure
totalling
overSupplied
fifty thousand
pounds. A fullby
engine
rebuild has also
Black with
black
interior.
the lastto owner
Official Porsche
been48,000
carriedmiles.
out including
all new
pistons
etc, engine
baytodetailed
concours standard
and a new
Centre
South
East
Germany
in
2004.
The
conversion
by a Porsche
full exhaust system. The paintwork on this 911 is unmarked andwas
lookscarried
amazingoutthroughout.
Comes
specialist
5,000 miles.
Lovely condition
throughout,
has to911.
be Currently
seen, heard,
andregistered
driven to
with
Porscheatcertificate
of authenticity
and is a matching
numbers
Belgian
so can be taken into
EU withoutjust
thehow
usualspecial
charges,this
or car
we can
easily history
register fiinle.the UK. Must be
trulythe
appreciate
is. Huge
one of the prettiest pre 73 911’s we have had to date. £114,995

Ariel Atom 3.5R 2018 18 registration, only 550 miles from new with full Ariel service history. Fully
loaded and extremely rare factory 3.5R with side pods and front and rear factory carbon spoilers.
350bhp. Currently fitted with a new stainless sports exhaust which makes it sound insane (original
exhaust comes with it) This is the pinnacle of the Atom 3 and now very well sought after. Excellent
condition throughout as you would expect. Extras include brake bios adjuster, satellite navigation,
perspex side protectors, drivers foot rest, supercharger, side pods, carbon spoilers, rain light with
specially made matching reverse light, adjustable suspension all around. £69,995

Mini Cooper S Mk3 1971 K registration.
Showing 43,000
miles, comprehensive history file.
Ariel
Gleaming solid black paintwork 2018
with black
interiorAtom
and red3.5R
carpets. Having been built in October
550but
miles
from
newuntil
with
full 1971
Arielit isservice
history.
and
1970
then not
registered
August
believed that
this car Fully
was theloaded
Geneva Motor
extremely
350bhp.
is the
Atom
3 and
Show Car as rare
a Black3.5R.
with Black
interior carThis
was taken
thatpinnacle
year. The carofisthe
matching
numbers
with the
genuine
shell throughout.
The body wascondition
fully restoredthroughout
many years ago as
and you
still
now
very
wellbody
sought
after. Excellent
looks stunning, the interior was re-trimmed
by Newton
Commercial and still looks like new. The
would
expect.
mechanicals were also completely gone through and the car drives perfectly. It has been my own car
for around six years and is a very reluctant sale. £44,995

BMW 2002 1974 N1988
registration.
Chamonix
White
withCarrera
dark blue interior.
Three years ago over
Porsche
911
3.2
Coupe
£42,000
was spent
on restoration
worksfull
including the leather
following: Full
body and chassis
restoration,
98,000
Miles.
Black
interior.
stunning
under-body
restoration
and seal,with
wings andblack
inner wings, sills and
inner sills,This
full interior
re-trim,
has all
the
sought
after G50
five and
speed
newlooking
glass and80’s
seals, icon
new chrome
round,
new bumpers,
new wheels
tyres. gearbox.
Supplied with
Lovelyservice
condition
throughout,
the
itsFuchs
original alloys,
blue walletsunroof,
containing itswhale
manuals,tail.
Handbooks,
records etc.
and lots of history
including over 20 previouspaintwork
MOTs, invoices,
its Certificate of Authenticity and its
is correspondence,
absolutely stunning.
original keys. This has to be one of the best 2002’s I have seen, also it really is fantastic to drive.
57,000 Miles believed to be original. £29,995

Volkswagen Type 2 23 Window Samba
1963BMW
A registration.
1974
2002 Cream over dark red with matching
beautifully
interior. This
very with
rare bus
is ablue
genuine
German
built 23UK
windows,
which was
57,000re-trimmed
Miles. Chamonix
White
dark
interior.
Original
Car. Recent
supplied new to the German Embassy in Mexico City as their Minibus, they sold it in 1969. There
£42,000
body and
chassis
restoration
fullhas
interior
re-trim,
glass and
is a birthfull
certificate
to show
its authenticity.
Theplus
interior
been kitted
out new
by a cabinet
makernew
in
chrome.
Huge
history
fi
le
including
a
Certifi
cate
of
Authenticity
and
its
original
keys.
American Walnut and it looks superb. Rock and Roll bed, central table, cooker, USB connectors,
Bluetooth, amplifier, speaker
full sunroof.
Also,seen
it hasand
beendriven.
fitted with a brand new 1600
One of system,
the bestand2002’s
we have
updated engine. A 23 Window Split-Screen Samba really is the quintessential Type 2 and it’s not
often you see one out and about. £67,995

Triumph TR5 PI 1968 G registration.
UK original
car, red S
withMk3
black interior. Very rare Surrey top
1971 Mini
Cooper
with43,000
matchingmiles,
red removable
hard top. Comprehensively
in 2015 usingsolid
a newblack
old stock
comprehensive
history restored
file. Gleaming
body
shell.
The
interior
has
all
been
replaced
and
is
in
superb
condition
throughout,
including the
paintwork with black interior and red carpets. The
car is matching
woodwork.
The paintwork is unmarked and has a lovely finish. All the chrome is lovely, and the alloy
numbers with the genuine body shell throughout. The body was fully
wheels really set it off. The history file contains receipts for ten years of ownership by the last owner
and theforinterior
wasThere
re-trimmed
by Newton
Commercial
andrestored
the parts purchased
the restoration.
is also a heritage
certificate confirming
its origin.
many
years
agoeven
andthough
still Itlooks
It has always been mot’d
since
restoration
doesn’tlike
legallynew.
require one. Must be one of
the best TR5’s on the market especially being a Surrey top UK model. £52,995

Maserati 4200 Spyder 2003 52 registration. Black with full black leather interior. Semi automatic
gearbox with paddle shift. 63,000 miles with full service history by main dealer and specialist.
Owned by the last owner for twelve years and always very well maintained during his ownership.
Comes with a substantial history folder which includes the original book pack and service book. Two
keys, satellite navigation, heated memory seats, air conditioning, electric convertible roof. Looking
stunning in black this 4200 Spyder is in fantastic condition throughout, which is a very rare colour
combination that you don’t often see especially in the Spyder. Sounds wonderful with its Ferrari 430
derived engine. Has just been serviced and had a mot with no advisories. £15,995

MGB V8 Coupe, British racing green with tan leather interior,
1974 N registration. This is a genuine matching numbers factory
built UK supplied car. Electronic ignition, electric fan upgrade,
alloy wheels, headrests, overdrive, sports steering wheel (original
included). The history file contains owners, parts and workshop
manuals, old receipts and a data sheet. This car is in superb
condition throughout and is great fun to drive. £26,995

Classic Connection, sales, service & restoration
Pound Lane, Burley, Hampshire, BH24 4EB
Telephone: 01425 489575 Mobile: 07970 024634 Email: sales@classicconnection.co.uk

1976 TYRRELL P34 - COSWORTH F1 CAR

The Tyrrell P34 was made famous by Jody Scheckter and Patrick Depailler during the 1976 season including finishing 1-2 at the
Swedish GP and 2nd at Monaco. Officially licensed by Tyrrell Promotions Ltd and painstakingly constructed to original drawings,
this car is the only running example of the early and more successful narrow track P34. Completely fresh and ready to race with
new FIA HTP, this is unique opportunity to purchase an iconic car.

SPEEDMASTER SPECIALIST IN HISTORIC AUTOMOBILES
Tel: +44 (0)1937 220 360 or +44 (0)7768 800 773
info@speedmastercars.com www.speedmastercars.com

2023/23 Ferrari 812 GTS - VAT Q
Viola Hong Kong w Blk/Cuoio Int; Daytona Seats Front Lifting Carbon Fibre Int & Ext +++
Passenger Display Apple Carplay 20” Painted Rims **410 mls only ** **One Owner** £409,995

2005 Ford GT 1st Generation 550bhp
Centennial White with Black Interior Full Options - Blue Painted Livery * LW BBS Rims
* Red Calipers * McIntosh Radio ‘Concours Condition throughout’ ** 1,734 mls only **
£439,995

1977 Ferrari 512 BB - RHD - Unrestored
Argento Silver with Red Leather Interior/Carpets Daytona Seats w Blk Inserts & Air Conditioning
Original RHD * Unrestored Condition * 3 Keepers * Nice History File **19,553 mls only **
£299,995

2001 PANOZ LMP07
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COLLECTION

THE SHOWROOM Competitors
Onwards – and upwards: our intrepid
VSCC-ers tackle the slate tracks of
the Lakes. Left: at least Bess has a
roof – and it was needed at the
rainswept Cotswold Trial

HISTORIC RACING

It’s all uphill from here

STEVE SHELLEY

To round out a brilliant year of VSCC trials, Rebecca Smith
managed to cram in two more windswept events before the
winter break, both as a driver and a ‘bouncer’
nd so we approach the tail-end
of the season. Unlike circuit
racing, late autumn still had
two more trials to tackle, even
if they would be the last trials
until the new year. First up was
the Lakeland Trial in Cumbria, which brought
a different kind of challenge for me. Thanks
to a last-minute decision to go I ended up
taking a back seat as a ‘bouncer’ in a Ford
Model A owned by Dougal Cawley (MD of
Longstone Tyres).
The Lakes has to be one of the most
beautiful trials of the year, with the opportunity
to drive and see places you’d never normally
have access to. In true Cawley fashion, we had
a relaxed approach with an obligatory lunch
stop. The biggest accomplishment was (and
always is at the Lakes) reaching the top of the
infamous Drum House at Honister Slate Mine.
A fiercely steep and long hill, it’s all or
nothing as Dougal and I decided never to lift
off. Around tight bends the power of the
mighty Ford kept chugging on. Taking the turn
round the last corner it was touch and go
whether we were going to make it, but thanks
to Dougal’s right foot we crept our way to the
top, to be met with wonderful views.

A full complement of bouncers bouncing on the
Cotswold Trial’s all-new novice Sunday

The end of the Lakes always brings
everyone together at a local pub to share tales
of the day over a pint. We’d had an ace
experience; however we’d missed two hills
(possible due to our important lunch stop),
which popped our chances of an award.
The Cotswold Trial was the following
weekend. Bess would be back out with my
sister Jessica, and two friends who were
completely new to trialling as bouncers.
It was a washout, with rain for several days
before and during. Despite intentions to get
round early, it was disaster after disaster before
we even got to scrutineering at the Bugatti

Owners’ Club – maladies included a leaking
bathroom at home, a forgotten map and then
an exhaust manifold clamp coming loose due
to a lost bolt. Big thanks to Julian Wilton for
fixing the manifold so we could get going.
Our first hill, The Park, was on wet grass
meandering around trees and then up a slight
incline to a stop-restart. Not that we’d see that
as we failed to get round. The second hill,
Parklife, was a struggle to even get to the start
line, which should have been warning enough:
we got zero. Again, sadly not the last time we’d
see a zero on the day.
The Cotswold’s highlight always comes at
the end of the day at Prescott Hill Climb
(Bugatti Owners’ Club) where there are three
hills and many spectators. If you fancy coming
along to see what it’s all about, get it in the
diary for next year. This time a particularly
tricky stop-restart was placed at the bottom
of a steep downhill. Despite our best efforts,
the weight of the Model A and the mud meant
we ploughed past the line and scored 13.
New this year was a Sunday Trial, purely
for novices. With a full entry, it was a fantastic
opportunity for rookies and, possibly,
bouncers from the previous day to get behind
the wheel. A great success.
So, the first half of the trials season is over,
with the next event at Exmoor in February.
I’ll have some time to consider which to do in
2024. Maybe even taking the back seat as my
sister has purchased a Model A
Phaeton and hopes to be out
competing in her own car soon.
Next month: ending the year
at the Bicester Driving Test

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

147

TA L A C R E S T
t he wo rl d’ s numb er o n e c l a s s i c ferra ri dea l er

DEALING IN DREAMS
special Edition

The ﬁrst Edition of Dealing in Dreams, published in 2017,
was a never-before-seen insight into the dealings of Talacrest and a record of the worlds most
sought-after Ferraris and other incredible marques that passed through the Talacrest stable.
The book sold out with incredible feedback and has afforded the opportunity for 10 charities to
receive a share of a total of £175,000 raised by the book and donated by Talacrest.
Talacrest have remained at the forefront of Classic Ferrari dealing with over $1 billion of sales.
This updated and redesigned edition includes an additional 100 pages, never-before-published
photos and the inclusion of an even wider range of road and race Ferraris. In this special
edition, John allows the reader a chance to see his personal collection including
two specially commissioned Ferraris.
The book has a limited print run with all proceeds going to charity.

ORDER YOUR COPY SECURELY ONLINE TODAY!

W W W. TA L A C R E S T. C O M
+44 (0)1344 308178 | +44 (0)7860 589855 | john@talacrest.com

A rare chance to own a fine piece of 1930s Motorsport History

This genuine Riley Ulster Imp has an outstanding history, having
been campaigned successfully over many years. Of the 16
examples built by Riley’s Competition Department, only 9 are
known to exist. These cars do not appear on the open market
frequently, and with the quality in which this example lies, this
opportunity is not to be missed.
The car was first campaigned in Northern Ireland in 1934
before being exported to South Africa in 1936 and acquired by
Buller Meyer. The car subsequently had 5 owners until being
purchased by the current owner and returned to the UK in
2008.
ADU 303, chassis number 6025036, has been driven
competitively both pre-war and post-war.

Now residing in our showroom, the Riley presents in a
remarkable fashion, especially after having been campaigned
continuously since its birth in 1934. The matching numbers
engine was restored in 1985/6 in the same specification as the
car was built in 1934 with all the unique original features such as
the counterbalanced crank, triple plunger oil pump and water
pump, and has the original compression ratio.
With spectacular presence and usability ADU 303 is a piece of
motoring history that is a joy to drive and would stand out in
any environment. This is an opportunity to fast-track your way
through potential entry in so many classic motoring events
throughout the world and is not worth missing out on.
If this motorsport masterpiece looks and sounds like the car for
you, a trip to our showroom is a must.

For more information visit: classicwise.co.uk or telephone 01623 411476

SPECIALIST IN CLASSIC SPORTS CARS
TRADE MEMBER

Specialising in Classic MG’s

8am - 6pm Monday - Friday - Saturday: 8am - 1pm
MG TD – 1950 – Finished in Clipper blue
with Tan interior and weather gear which is
all in very good condition. This is an older
restoration with photographic record and
history file which includes many invoices.
The car is good mechanically and drives
extremely well - Very attractive car. £19,995
MG Midget – 1963 – In Ice Blue with blue
interior. The car comes with a 950cc engine
with disc brakes on the front, wire wheels,
some history and a Heritage certificate, it
has been in the same family since 1987, it
has good bodywork and mechanics. Great
fun car.. .................................................. £7,995
Austin Healy Sprite – 1960 – MK1 Frog-

1960 in Old
English
cherry
MG TD - 1950 - Finished eye,
in Clipper
blue
withwhite
Tanwith
interior
red hood and interior. Original righthand
and weather gear which is drive
all in
very
good
condition.
Thto
is
export which was re-imported back
the UK photographic
in 2016. It is in Superb
condition
is an older restoration with
record
and
with excellent paint work and comes with
history file which includessome
many
invoices. Th
e carcertificate,
is good
history/invoices,
Heritage
Steel bonnet,
Full-Tonneau,
950cc engine
mechanically and drives extremely
well
Very attractive
car
with smooth case gearbox. This car is stun...........................................................................................
£19,995
ning inside and out. .......................... £21,500

Units 9/10 Fifehead Business Park, Manor Farm,
Fifehead Magdalen, near Gillingham, Dorset SP8 5RR
E-mail: mikerolls4mgs@compuserve.com • www.mikerolls.co.uk
Mail Order “Friendly Quality Service”
150

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

1977 MGB Roadster - Dark British Racing Green, Biscuit Tan
trim, o/drive, CB conversion, leather classic high back seats, Moto
Lita wood rim, elm dash, and s/s works boot rack, TSW alloys
with Yokohama s750 tyres, recent new hood. A superb looking
BRG MGB roadster, superb tidy and clean engine bay, TSW alloy
wheels. Has been converted to chrome bumper and lowered to
match, has been restored and retrimmed a few years ago still looks
good with a lovely used patina, nice tan.
£16,995.00

1958 MGA Coupé 1500 - MGA Coupe, black leather trim, restored
a few years ago &amp; still superb looking. Chrome w/wheels,
superb chrome. This 1958 MGA Coupe is an older restoration that
comes with a box of show winner trophies and history in the boot.
Coupes are an increasingly rare and very pretty period MG.
Bodywork wise, the Chariot red paintwork has a lovely depth of
shine. The MG has a perfect set of chrome wires fitted, and the rest
of the bright work on her is also in sensational order. £21,995.00

1974 MGB GT - Very late chrome bumper car, original Citron
yellow, black leather trim. Same family ownership since 1995.
Owned and maintained by engineer owner to a very high
standard, lots of updates and improvements carried out. Minilite
wheels, Leather seats, coach built Webasto roof, leather covered
console, walnut dash, walnut steering wheel. Body in excellent
order, as is the interior and mechanics. Very comprehensive
history file.
£9,995.00

MGB ROADSTER MK1 - Tartan red, red leather trim with white
pipe, last of the 3brg MGBs. Totally restored car with full
photographic record. W/wheels. Fully rebuilt 3brg engine to original
spec, correct detailing on body, trim, engine bay to show standard.
Underside fully painted and suspension, engine bay ancillaries
powder coated. No expense has been spared, would cost in excess
of £45K. All new trim, leather seats, hood, correct instruments, a truly
superb car ready to use and enjoy for pleasure or shows. £29,995.00

1968 MGC Downton Roadster - Introduced in October 1967, the
MGC was the first ‘high performance’ version of the MGB, using a
BMC 6-cylinder engine developed for the MGC. The MGC was not
simply a tuned MGB however, it was a considerably re-engineered
car, with new torsion bar front suspension; uprated braking; new
stronger, all synchromesh gearbox with optional overdrive, and it
rode on 15” wheels, instead of 14” as on the MGB. This grand tourer
was not as popular as the MGB however, and production ceased in
£24,995.00
summer 1969 after just over, 9000 had been built.

1976 MGB V8 Roadster - Black trim, Citron yellow, Carbon fibre dash
and door capping, 15” revolution alloys, 5 speed gearbox, rollover
bar, tuned V8 engine -202HP, uprated suspension genuine MGC alloy
bonnet, high back leather recliners, moto lita steering wheel. Massive
history file and restoration record. This car has been totally restored
and built as a V8 to a very high standard back in the 1990s and is still
superb, just been recommissioned after being stored for a few years.
The modified V8 propels this car at a substantial pace with superb
£26,995.00
handling and attention to comfort.

A NEW NAME FOR MG MECCA CAR SALES

Unit 1, Roudham Trading Estate, Roudham Rd, East Harling, Norwich, Norfolk, NR16 2TW

www.moderngarageclassics.co.uk Tel: 01953 717618

1970 Chevron B16 FVC - £224,950

1984 Renault 5 Turbo 2 - £129,950

1965 Alfa Romeo Spider Veloce - £69,950

A genuine Turbo 2 freshly rebuilt as a spectacular
homage to the Tour de Corse winner

Multiple class-winner with a fresh HTP, recently
beneﬁting from a full professional rebuild

2016 Chevron B19 BDG - £69,950

1961 PBA DKW II Formula Junior - £39,950

1978 Mallock Mk 20/21 Classic Clubmans - £17,950

A Vin Malkie continuation car which has only been used
for a handful of speed events since new

Restored by two-stroke specialist Tim Bishop,
professionally maintained and a regular at Goodwood

Ex-works car, just serviced and set up by the factory.
Big spares package, suitable for CSPA or CSP1

1981 Osella FA1B Historic F1 - £349,950

1963 Lotus 23B - £79,950

1969 McNamara Historic FF - £16,950

Fabulous Cosworth-engined F1, eligible to compete in
Masters Historics and the Monaco Historique

Immaculate and absolutely ready to race, with extensive
history and a huge spares package

A very rare unrestored and authenticated B16 which has
continuous history from new

LD
SO

For further information, please contact:
!"#$%&#'()#$*+%"#,-'*"+.$/0)-1)$2"+'-2'3

Adam Sykes on 07429 600332 or Damon Milnes on 07802 779301
45-,$678)1!"#!$%&'(!)$$**'!"+!9-,"+$:*0+)1!"#!$%,$'!%%(*$-!!

THE WE

LD
SO

A rare and very well presented example. Unused since
comprehensive rebuild and amazing value

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CAR GROUP

25 YEARS EXPERIENCE RETAILING QUALITY USED SPORTS, PRESTIGE AND 4X4 VEHICLES.

FERRARI CALIFORNIA . . £64,999 BENTLEY GT V8 S . . . . . . £64,999 BENTLEY GT V8 . . . . . . . £43,999 BENTLEY BENTAYGA . . £129,999

BENTLEY FLYING SPUR . £27,999 MERCEDES E400 CAB . . £25,999 PORCHE BOXSTER . . . . . £15,999 AUDI TT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . £14,999

To view our extensive stock or book a test drive visit: www.thewelovecargroup.co.uk
or call us on 01372 824787 / 07795 484018 • Email: info@welovecargroup.co.uk
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

151

Melvyn Rutter Limited

International Morgan Sales, Service, Parts and Restoration for Morgan Cars from 1936 to Present Day

AS Motorsport ltd

New

All-New Morgan Plus Six

Finished in Biscay Blue metallic with two-tone grey leather and grey textile seat centres, 19” Frozen
Grey alloy wheels, black grille, black mohair hood, air-con, comfort plus heated seats, premium
Sennheiser audio system, active sports exhausts, luggage rack and a CAT 5S tracker. This is our
brand new, as yet unregistered demonstrator - price does not include OTR costs - £110,625

See websi

ASM hand build bespoke versions of the R1 roadster, inspired by the Aston Martin
race cars that won Le Mans and the world Sportscar championship in 1959.
Contact us for details of commission builds and stock.

2018 Morgan 3 Wheeler

Dark green with Yarwood Honey leather interior, Heritage V windscreen, polished
roll hoops, polished exhausts and shields, footwell storage box, one owner from
new and just 3,667 miles - £37,995

Virtual
Tour

47 years

WE BUY
INCLUDING
– WEand
COLLECT
Wishing
all MORGAN
of our MorganCARS,
customers
and friends PROJECTS
a Merry Christmas
a Prosperous New Year!
The Morgan Garage, Little Hallingbury, Nr Bishops Stortford, Herts CM22 7RA England
Tel: 01279 725725 www.melvyn-rutter.co.uk Email: mr@melvyn-rutter.net

Poplar Farm, Bressingham, Diss, Norfolk, IP22 2AP

Tel: 01379688356 • Mob: 07909531816
Web: www.asmotorsport.co.uk
Email: info@asmotorsport.co.uk

IVAN DUTTON LTD
Retromobile, Paris 30th January –
4th February 2024, Hall 1 Stand P040
We are exhibiting again at Retromobile in Paris, come along and see some exciting and
unique Bugattis as well as other marques…

1937 Bugatti Type
57S Corsica

Type 44 – Short chassis Le Mans car styled on 1936 race car, HTP’s, DVLA registration.
Finished 7th o/a, 4th in class Classic Le Mans, 2nd Rudge Whitworth Cup Goodwood
Revival, 2nd in class Spa Six Hours.
Type 37 – All original, interesting history, must be one of the last ‘Barn Find’ Bugattis.
Ferrari 250 GT Lusso Scaglietti Prototype – originally the demonstrator for Franco
Britannic Autos (F.B.A.) in Paris.
MG J2 – fitted with Supercharged XPAG engine, patinated & a lot of fun.
Brescia Dog cart – DVLA registered, built up around new major components £175,000

Peacehaven Farm, Worminghall Road, Ickford, Bucks, HP189JE
Tel: 01844 339457 • Fax: 01844 338933 • Ten minutes from M40 Junction 8a • www.duttonbugatti.co.uk
152

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

1974 Alfa Romeo Tipo 33-3/Flat 12: Rare,
fantastic race record, Ickx, Stommelen,
Reutemann, Monza, Nurburgring, Imola.
All orig., fresh rebuild, race ready.

WE WILL BUY AND CONSIGN ALL FERRARI AND ALL VINTAGE SPORTS RACING & GT CARS
PARTIAL TRADES CONSIDERED - FINANCING AVAILABLE

1967 Porsche 910-001: First of 29 910
1963 Alfa Romeo Giulia 1600 Spider:
1951 Ferrari 212 Inter: Vignale / Drogo,
racers built. Full frame-up restoration. Mille Miglia 1952, 1954. Ground up restoExcellent, orig. condition. Rust & acHistorical, FIA and title papers. Driven by
cident free, matching #s, 26k miles, fully
ration. Race and Rally ready.
Niki Lauda, Hans Hermann.
vetted, new shocks, brakes, chrome.

1974 Jaguar XKE V12 Roadster:
One of a kind, uniquely built. Bare metal
repaint, new interior, 5-sp, Webers,
SS headers, Alloy radiator, Two tops.

1965 Porsche 356SC Cabriolet: Match- 1958 MGA Twin Cam: Rare, disc brakes, 1962 Lotus Super 7: 22 year ownership.
1958 AC Aceca: Matching #s, comprehensive, documented frame-up restora- ing #s, 1 of 533. 3-owner, full docs, COA. Dunlop competition wheels, frame-up, Super well developed; quick and easy to
show quality restoration on an iconic
drive. Known for its winning provenance.
67k miles. One repaint. Euro version.
tion, RHD, rally proven, ready for its next
sports car.
Everything has been rebuilt or replaced.
Outstanding original throughout.
event.

WWW.MOTORCLASSICCORP.COM
350 ADAMS STREET, BEDFORD HILLS NEW YORK 10507
914-997-9133 • SALES@MOTORCLASSICCORP.COM

1970 Porsche 917:5 liter, flat 12.
Total comprehensive rebuild by
ex-factory 917 specialist. Driven
by Derek Bell, Vic Elford, Jo Siffert;
used in the making of Steve
McQueen’s movie “Le Mans”.

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

153

CARS FOR SALE / ART & AUTOMOBILIA

CARS FOR SALE
AH Classics
Lancashire’s BEST Classic and British sports car dealership.
Jeffrey mk111
Motorclub 1970. Chassis Rebuilt With MSA Roll Cage. New
Rack, New Rad (Radtec), New Vertical Links, Brakes, Bearings.
Back Axle 4.2 Diff, Mini Fin Drums (Spare Diff 3.9) New Firow
Balanced Prop. AVO Single Adjustable Dampers. Alloy Bodywork.
850cc Engine Rebuilt by Peter Birch, Electrical Waterpump and
Fuel Pump. Gearbox Rebuilt by Klassic Transmissions. 13” Mamba
Wheels Fully Refurbished. Great Little Car £6,995
Westfield Racecar
2.1L Zetec, Piper Cams,Vernier
Pulleys, Jenvey Throttle Bodies
and Dry Sump • Straight Cut
Rocket Box • Quaiffe Diff
Torgue Bias 3.54.1 • Salisbury
Axle • 4 Pot Front Calipers •
Widetrack Front Suspension •
Quick Rack • Redtop Battery
• Water Pump • Full Cage •
Recent Toyo R888 Tyres • Ideal
Race, Trackdays, Hillclimbs &
Sprint £7,500 Road Registered
Q170 ACF

Van Diemen RF89 FF1600
• Chassis no 1461 • Ex Dave Harwood
• Momo wheel • In date belts
• This is the model to have with the LD200 gearbox
• Good overall condition.
£13995

Chevron B1 MK2
Red, Black Trim, Tubular Chassis • All round Independent Suspension, GRP,
Bodywork • Ford 1600cc RoCam Engine • Toyota 5 Speed Gearbox • Built
By Chevron Racing Cars Ltd • Ideal for Someone Who Wants To Be A Bit
Different Or A Chevron Collect • Great Car £12,995 • One of only 2
Built, The Only One Road Registered • Low Mileage

Royale RP2
FF1600 1970
Rare car for restoration, its
been unused and stored for
many years • Direct from one
family ownership • For Sale less
engine and gearbox • Great
project.
Ralt RT30
• For sale less engine & Gearbox, • Very
Succesful Hillclimb car using a BDG & FT200 • Modified engine
frame • RT3 rear suspension • Koni alloy dampers • 9” front 12”
rear tyres • Chassis no RT30 - 529 AM86 13 £7500

£6995

D
L
O

WANTED FF1600 ANYTHING CONSIDERED

Shaw, Oldham, Lancashire • 07761549454
andrewhenson@btinternet.com
www.ah-classic-cars.co.uk

1966 Aston Martin DB6 Vantage,
Body off restoration, Huge history file
£299,950TEL: 01753 644599

1951 FERRARI 212 INTER. Vignale
/ Drogo, Mille Miglia 1952, 1954.
Ground up restoration. Race and
Rally ready. www.motorclassiccorp.
com

Tel: +44 (0)20 8688 4443

1974 ALFA ROMEO TIPO 33-3/
FLAT 12. Rare,fantastic race record,
Ickx, Stommelen,Reutemann,
Monza, Nurburgring, Imola.All orig.,
fresh rebuild, race ready. www.
motorclassiccorp.com

1965 ASTON MARTIN DB6
VANTAGE in Fiesta red with perfect
black hide interior. Long term
ownership and recently fully restored
at enormous expense. A joy to drive.
£315,000 TEL: 01753 644599

154

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

2000 Aston Martin DB7 Vantage, low
mileage with manual transmission,
Beautifully kept, £29,950 TEL: 01753
644599

2007
FERRARI
599
GTB
FORIANO F1 Now available at www.
graemehunt.com. Tel. 0207 937
8487

1964 GORDON KEEBLE GK1 Now
available at www.graemehunt.com.
Tel. 0207 937 8487
1971 Aston Martin DBS V8, Older
restoration but remarkably well kept,
£129,950TEL: 01753 644599

1973 Jaguar E type 5.3 Coupe, Clean
and tidy at a very attractive price.
£49,500 Tel: 01753 644599
1958 Jaguar XK150 FHC, Excellent
restoration by a qualified engineer
£65,950 Tel: 01753 644599

1977 JAGUAR XJ5.3C Now available
at www.graemehunt.com. Tel. 0207
937 8487

1965 Jaguar E type 4.2 Roadster,
Undoubtedly one of the best in
existence £165,000 Tel: 01753
644599

1973
JAGUAR
E-TYPE
V12
ROADSTER Now available at www.
graemehunt.com. Tel. 0207 937
8487

To advertise, please call
Paula Trainor on
020 7349 8479

1964 Jaguar E type 3.8 Roadster,
superbly restored, Nothing further
needed. £135,000 Tel: 01753 644599

CARS FOR SALE

WANTED

Classic Sportscars and Supercars from the
1950’s to 1990’s for discreet purchase
We especially require all genuine original AC Cobra, Aston Martin, Ferrari,
Ford RS Cosworth and RS200, Jaguar, Lamborghini, Mercedes 300SL, Porsche 550, 356 and 911

sales@limebrookclassiccars.com • Telephone: (00 44) 01621 502150
Lotus 22 Formula
Junior
Ex- Jim Russell Car
offered in fantastic
overall condition with its
Original AM 68 Chassis
(straight)
Car completely restored
and only used a hand
full of times.
Comes with FIA
Passport valid until
2028. Presents an
excellent opportunity for
competitive drivers to
buy a race winning car.
Contact Peter Froude
07887 596707
£65,000

T +44(0)1263 768768
F +44(0)1263 768336
bmw@jaymic.com
2002 Thurgarton Road, Aldborough, Norfolk, NR11 7NY, UK

CLASSIC BMW PARTS

See our NEW Online Shop at www.jaymic.com

1962 LOTUS SUPER 7: 22 year
ownership. Everything has been
rebuilt or replaced. www.
motorclassiccorp.com

CLUB
LOTUS

1958 MGA TWIN CAM. Rare,
frame-up,show quality restoration
on an iconic sports car. www.
motorclassiccorp.com

1967 PORSCHE 910-001: First of
29 910 racers built. Full frame-up
restoration.Historical, FIA and title
papers. Driven by Niki Lauda, Hans
Hermann. www.motorclassiccorp.
com

Tel: 01362 691144/
01362 694459
Email:

annemarie@clublotus.co.uk

THE ORIGINAL
& BEST CLUB
FOR ALL LOTUS
OWNERS &
ENTHUSIASTS
• Colour Magazine
• Insurance & Parts
• Discounts
• Free Technical Help
Lotus Regalia & more
for only £3 per year

www.clublotus.co.uk
58 MALTHOUSE COURT
DEREHAM
NORFOLK NR20 4UA

1977 LAND ROVER SERIES 3
RECOVERY VEHICLE. 2 1/4 Diesel
engine. Overdrive. F/W Hubs.
Stainless steel exhaust. Well
maintained. May 2023 MOT. Period
Harvey Frost crane. Used in period by
Royal Mail Workshops at Cardiff &
Newport, then on show at London
Royal Mail Museum. It would be great
for events like Goodwood Revival,
commercial vehicle show and runs.
£10,500. Tel: 07761 549454

2003 Mercedes SL55 finished in
Solent Silver with Charcoal hide
interior. 75,000 from new with
excellent service history. Fabulous
condition throughout. £16,950TEL:
01753 644599

1965 MERCEDES-BENZ 230SL Now
available at www.graemehunt.com.
Tel. 0207 937 8487

MONTESA COTA 310 1990. From
a private collection. Monoshock
suspension. Disc brakes front and
rear. Alloy swinging arm. Running
bike in good condition. £2,200. Tel:
07761 549454

1970 PORSCHE 917:5 liter, flat 12.
Total comprehensive rebuild by
ex-factory 917 specialist. Driven
by Derek Bell, Vic Elford, Jo Siffert;
used in the making of Steve
McQueen’s movie “Le Mans”. www.
motorclassiccorp.com

P OR S C H E
996
TURBO
TIPTRONIC 2002. Silver, dark blue
ruffled leather. Porsche main dealer
and specialist service history.
£34,995. Tel: 07761 549454

TRIUMPH TR6 1973. Magenta
With Black Trim. CR Model.
£6,995. Tel: 07761 549454

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

155

ART & AUTOMOBILIA / BOOKS / GARAGE / PARTS / SPECIALISTS / STORAGE AND TRANSPORT

DIRECTORY
To advertise, please call Paula Trainor on 020 7349 8479
or email paula.trainor@motorsportmagazine.com

Ties • Bow ties • Cravats •
Cummerbunds • Flat Caps
Hand Crafted in the UK

www.dapperjack.co.uk
Unique to Dapper Jack Carbon Fibre Bow Ties

POOKS MOTOR BOOKSHOP

Motoring Brochures, Books, Manuals, Programmes, Magazines
and original posters BOUGHT AND SOLD
pooks.motorbooks@virgin.net • www.pooksmotorbookshop.co.uk
Shop open: Monday–Friday 9.00am – 5.00pm
Fowke Street, Rothley, Leicestershire LE7 7PJ – Tel. 0116 237 6222
or call John’s mobile on 07808 576 837

LOCKHEED & GIRLING

garagefindsuk@gmail.com

Mob: 07756 862188

Tel: 07887 898331

Dapper Jack

BRAKE & CLUTCH HYDRAULIC CYLINDERS
FOR BRITISH VEHICLES 1935-1980. MASTER CYLINDERS, WHEEL CYLINDERS,
CALIPERS, CLUTCH SLAVES, FLEXIBLE HOSES, PADS, KITS ETC.
WORLDWIDE MAIL ORDER
Tel/Fax: 01344 886522

POWERTRACK Ltd

www.powertrackbrakes.co.uk

Elite Auto Storage

Specialists in cherished vehicle storage and transportation
• From priceless classics to family saloons • Maintenance and exercise programs
• UK wide covered transportation • Long and short term storage
• Descreet and secure

Phone: +44 (0)1279 850709
Email: info@autostorage.co.uk • www.autostorage.co.uk
PO Box 85, Great Sampford, Saffron Walden, Essex, CB10 2FX, England

CAN’T FIND PISTONS
FOR YOUR ENGINE?

Fast and reliable delivery on custom forged pistons.
4 stroke pistons made from your sample.
Call us on: (0)1462 684300

sales@cambridgemotorsport.com
www.cambridgemotorsport.com

Unit 5 Lacre Way, Letchworth
Hertfordshire, SG6 1NR

Struggling to
steer?
The answer is
here!

156

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

BOOKS / PARTS

Maserati, the Family Silver
The deﬁnitive history of an iconic marque

By Nigel Trow who, over the course of fourteen years painstaking research,
not only spoke exclusively to key players in the Maserati story but was also,
uniquely, given unfettered access to both company and family archives. It is,
without doubt the masterwork of a master historian.

WINNER:

Guild of Motoring Writers Montagu of Beaulieu Award
‘Buy your copy now…it’s certain to be worth considerably
more in years to come’. Octane Magazine
TIFOSI EDITION - TWO VOLUMES, 872 pages,
presented in a bespoke cloth-bound slip-case: £195
Also available in Collector’s and Archive editions.
Use the QR code to order direct from our website:
www.maseratifamilysilver.com
Also available from Hortons Books: 01672 514 777

PUMPS

FOR

PROFESSIONALS

MADE in the USA

UK Distributor
www.glencoeltd.co.uk

BUY GENUINE PRODUCTS
Quality - Reliability

POSI-FLOW PUMPS

CYLINDRICAL PUMPS

• Efficient
• Quiet Operation
• Corrosion Resistant
• 6,000 hrs Life Cycle

CREST OF

• Solid State Electronics
• Robust Design
• Cleanable Filter

CUBE PUMP
CUBE PUMP KITS

• Fuel Pump
• Fuel Union
• Filter Union
• Soft Mount Kit

✓

Prices exclude VAT @ 20%

• Compact
• Moisture Protection
• 6,000 hrs Life Cycle
• 0.3 m Suction Height

Tel: +44(0) 1748 493 555

CYLINDRICAL PUMPS KITS

• 1 m Suction Height
• 2 Brass 90 Deg. Unions
• 1 Rubber Mounting Kit
• Replacement Filter

Email: sales@glencoeltd.co.uk
FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

157

SPECIALISTS / STORAGE AND TRANSPORT

COVERED VEHICLE TRANSPORT
Offering open and closed secure vehicle transport for single and
multiple vehicles throughout the UK and Europe
•

Classic and vintage covered vehicle transport

•

Single and multi-vehicle covered transport

•

UK and European solutions

•

Fully tracked and insured loads

CLASSIC LANCIA SPECIALISTS
AURELIA • FLAMINIA • FLAVIA • FULVIA • STRATOS
Rapid international mail order parts service. We ship to 70+ countries worldwide
Full or partial restorations undertaken to concours conditions.
Fully equipped bodyshop and mechanical workshops. Race & rally prep undertaken
We also look after an increasing number of British cars for East Anglian based customers.
Chris Loynes is our British car expert and he brings an encyclopaedic knowledge of Triumphs
and MGs in particular.

TRIUMPH, MG, MORRIS & MORE...
Omicron Engineering Ltd., 6 miles south of NORWICH
Tel: (01508) 570351 • Web: www.omicron.uk.com

0800 282 449
www.cmg-org.com
Email: coveredmoves@cmg-org.com

01580 753939
www.jarcarstorage.co.uk

Specialists in high specification car storage, enclosed car transport and our award-winning JAR workshop
2 locations – Tunbridge Wells & recently opened Ashford – a stunning, purpose designed storage facility
JAR Ashford – 2 miles M20 Jct 9 & 10 / 38 mins London St Pancras / 15 mins Eurotunnel
158

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

STORAGE AND TRANSPORT

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

159

MARCH, 1951
MARANELLO, ITALY

A major milestone for Ferrari came in 1951 when
Argentinian racer José Froilán González gave
Maranello a first Formula 1 world championship
victory, at Silverstone, driving a Ferrari 375. Here
is the Scuderia’s workshop two months before the
start of the F1 season, captured by one of motor
racing’s finest photographers, Louis Klemantaski
CORRADO MILLANTA/KLEMANTASKI COLLECTION/GETTY IMAGES

160

MOTOR SPORT FEBRUARY 2024

PARTING SHOT

FEBRUARY 2024 MOTOR SPORT

161

Telephone
01753 644599

Mobile
07836 222111

Sensibly Priced and very desirable Classic Cars

1966 Aston Martin DB6 Vantage, Body off
restoration, Huge history file £299,950

2003 Mercedes SL55 finished in Solent
Silver with Charcoal hide interior. 75,000 from
new with excellent service history. Fabulous
condition throughout. £16,950

1958 Aston Martin DB MkIII, Sold by us 13
years ago, Incredibly well maintained £155,000

1971 Aston Martin DBS V8, Older restoration
but remarkably well kept, £129,950

2000 Aston Martin DB7 Vantage, low mileage
with manual transmission, Beautifully kept,
£29,950

1965 Aston Martin DB6 Vantage, Recent full
restoration, perfect throughout, Too cheap at
£299,950

2007 Aston Martin DB9, Owned by a
successful Concours participant, Superb
£36,750

1973 Jaguar E type 5.3 Coupe, Clean and
tidy at a very attractive price. £49,500

2005 Aston Martin DB9 Volante, 2 owners,
HWM service history, Not expensive at
£32,500

1998 Aston Martin V8 Long wheelbase
Volante, Low mileage and very rare. £149,950

1952 Aston Martin DB2 Le Mans
Lightweight, Perfect for classic events and
Mille-Miglia Eligible, £250,000

1998 Aston Martin V600, Highly collectable,
reduced for quick sale at £259,500

1958 Jaguar XK150 FHC, Excellent
restoration by a qualified engineer £65,950

1965 Jaguar E type 4.2 Roadster,
Undoubtedly one of the best in existence
£165,000

1964 Jaguar E type 3.8 Roadster, superbly
restored, Nothing further needed. £135,000

“OVER 20 ASTONS CURRENTLY IN STOCK”
Email: martin@runnymedemotorcompany.com
www.runnymedemotorcompany.com

RM 35-03 Rafael Nadal
Skeletonised automatic winding calibre
55-hour power reserve (± 10%)
Baseplate and bridges in grade 5 titanium
Function selector
Patented butterfly rotor
Case in Quartz TPT®

A Racing Machine
On The Wrist