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1937 Auto Union Type-C V16

‘Replica’ is too often considered a dirty word, but it isn’t when it comes to the beautifully engineered masterpieces created by Dick Crosthwaite and John Gardiner. Ecclestone’s Auto Union is an example, evoking the fabled era of the Nazi-supported Silver Arrows grand prix behemoths of the 1930s. Uncomfortable as it might seem when you step back and think about it, the sinister connection to the most devastating 20th century manifestation of humanity’s worst traits hasn’t dimmed our fascination in these awe-inspiring technical wonders. The sturm und drang sensual barrage – sight, sound, smell – on the rare occasions when collections of 1930s Mercedes and Auto Unions have run together at Goodwood transcend the awkward associations of what, in isolation from what the horrors they ultimately represented, was an astonishing era for motor racing – as our edited period account of the their first visit to Donington Park in 1937 attests.

The Germans’ Grand Prix at Donington

Bernd Rosemeyer wins for Auto-Union at 82.86mph; Mercedes-Benz fill second and third places, Lang and Seaman retire

History was made at Donington on October 2nd. A record crowd, which looked like part of that on Epsom Downs for Derby Day, which the first reports give as 38,000 to 40,000 strong, lined the course to watch the Mercedes-Benz and Auto Union teams battle for the first time in this country – and battle they most certainly did, amid a continuous high-pitched howl of sound and the pungent smell of ‘boot-polish’ dope.

Definitely these German teams race each other, fight every inch of the way, the drivers taking heavy medicine. To suggest that they have got their ears to such a pitch of efficiency that racing becomes a mere pageant, a demonstration, is fallacious. Finality is never reached in motor racing and despite the remarkable thoroughness of German preparation each new race brings its own problems. The Donington Grand Prix found weaknesses in the suspension of Lang’s Mercedes and sorely tried the tyres.

Donington in 1937, Auto Union’s Bernd Rosemeyer

Crowds flocked to Donington in 1937 to witness the likes of Auto Union’s Bernd Rosemeyer.

Getty Images

As the mist lifted and gave way to brilliant sunshine we saw a moving sight at our premier road-racing circuit. Cars filled every park until finally they were left in the roads outside while their occupants hurried to the course. Programmes sold out and still the crowds poured in. The Auto Unions came round to the pits early, Hasse doing a few preliminary laps. Then the Mercedes team arrived in formation, led by a Lagonda, whose driver gave a Hitler salute before withdrawing.

Quickly the morning passed and at last we had the rather ‘throaty’ spectacle of the two crack German teams drawn up to do battle on British soil. Crowds swarmed, cameras clicked incessantly and the onlookers outside pressed forward to catch every move of the cars and their attendants.

Early laps

The leading cars were setting the astonishing lap speed of approximately 84mph, reaching 170 or so down to Melbourne Corner and leaping into the air at the crest of the sharp rise before the pits. Braking was commenced before the bump on the slope down to Melbourne. Muller, in particular, was driving sensationally in his Auto Union and as Rosemeyer braked hard for Red Gate the whole car juddered furiously, steering column and wheel shaking, and the engine side panels flexing like so much aeroplane fabric! After five laps Lang led at 82.6mph, 7.2sec ahead of Brauchitsch, who was 8.4sec in front of Rosemeyer’s Auto Union, the rear-engined car having passed Caracciola on the previous lap. At Red Gate the German cars would slide very slightly, hesitate as the spinning rear wheels got a grip, then accelerate with smoking tyres and a shattering howl and crash of sound into the wood. Down Holly Wood Hill they slid furiously, cutting the very verges of the grass back from the road-surface.

The finish

The British crowd actually cheered Rosemeyer as he was flagged, but the German National Anthem was not played as is the usual custom, and they clapped the next five finishers. Rosemeyer limped badly, was very sore, and his overalls, soaked in perspiration from head to foot, had to be taped up at the seat before he could meet Mrs Shields and get his bouquet. According to the dailies, he had to toast his victory in lemonade, as the champagne was lost – though many spectators would gladly have handed him their all.

A very disquieting noise was heard as Muller’s Auto Union passed away from the pit. It was only the undershield which had been hit by a stone, and eventually had to be cut away with shears. He and Brauchitsch shook hands smilingly for the press cameras and the winning Auto Union was driven away by a mechanic. It had been a proud day for Auto Union; and for Mr Shields, owner of Donington, and for [circuit founder] Fred Craner. May the latter stage an equally international race in 1938. The crowd invaded the course rather badly towards the end, in spite of the appeals of FLM Harris over the very efficient loud-speakers. Then remained only the vast trek back home, the road as far as Ashby-de-la-Zouch blocked for hours with a slowly moving stream of cars.

Long after it was all over the Mercedes publicity man and an assistant typed reports in the open in the Press enclosure – our last glimpse of German thoroughness. A very great day in British motor sport. WB

Taken from Motor Sport, October 1937

Auto Union Type-C V16

Years 1936-37
Designer Ferdinand Porsche
Races (European Championship) 9
Wins 4
Non-championship wins 8

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Revealed: Why 2024 Mercedes sapped Lewis Hamilton's pace

Lewis Hamilton’s last race for Mercedes after 84 grand prix victories and six world titles was a neat summation of his desultory last three seasons there. Quick in the practices at Abu Dhabi, he failed to get past the Q1 hurdle of qualifying after a bollard dislodged by a car in front of him became trapped under his car. He then staged a strong recovery to fourth in the race.

There have been tantalising glimpses of vintage Hamilton – none more so than in his record-busting ninth British Grand Prix victory – but his season cannot be considered as anything other than deeply disappointing. At times he has clearly been bewildered at his qualifying pace deficit to team-mate George Russell. Hamilton himself added to speculation in Qatar with his mischievous statement of, “I’m definitely no longer fast.”

Given that this is the same driver who was supremely fast at Silverstone and Spa and how talent doesn’t just switch off like that, a fuller explanation is required.

It’s about this generation of ground-effect cars. Running tiny ride heights front and rear, they do not pitch and dive anything like as much as previous generations of cars. This is really bad news for any driver who relies on pitch to help rotate the car into slow corners. Which, together with his braking, has always been Hamilton’s core skill. He would use the weight transfer of late heavy braking to load up the front tyres, begin the turn-in early, then as he released the brakes into the turn the front would respond super-positively, with the rear coming round just enough to give him a neutral balance early in the corner.

As ground-effect cars have evolved – with suspensions featuring ever-more anti-dive in their geometry and ever-lower ride heights – it has become increasingly difficult to make Hamilton’s technique work. In the first two seasons of the regulations – 2022 and ’23 – he was able to at least make a fair fist of it. Relative to Russell, who has a much less extreme style on corner entry, Hamilton’s qualifying was within the normal ‘noise’ of variability, an average of 0.015sec faster in ’22, 0.017sec slower in ’23. Tiny margins.

“Running ever lower moves the car further away from Lewis’s instincts

As the teams have all got a better understanding of how to limit the amplitude of the bouncing as the underfloor nears stall point at high speeds, so they have been able to run the cars ever-lower. Into ’23, the Mercedes benefited from this, just like most of the others – so moving the car even further away from Hamilton’s natural instincts and muscle memory of how he has always driven karts and racing cars in the previous three decades. But there was then a step-change development part-way through the season: an aero-elastic front wing. This was fitted to Hamilton’s car from Montreal. While this greatly improved the Mercedes, it disadvantaged Hamilton relative to Russell. Up until Canada, Hamilton’s average qualifying deficit to Russell was 0.076sec, bigger than before but still tiny. Post-Canada to the end of the season the gap ballooned to 0.314sec.

The reason an aero-elastic front wing is now such a powerful tool is that it gets you around the most stubborn limitation of these cars – which is their exaggerated difference in balance between low-speed understeer and high-speed oversteer. A front wing which will bend back its flaps at high speeds and thus de-power its effect allows you to set a more aggressive flap angle to combat the low-speed understeer without introducing high-speed oversteer. McLaren and Mercedes have led the way on this technology, McLaren on its updated car at Miami, with Mercedes following at Monaco/Canada. The performance boost was immediate on both cars.

Generally, the closer the floors are run to the ground and the greater the resultant downforce, so the more the balance moves towards understeer. The choke point of the venturi tunnels, where the underbody downforce is at its greatest, are a long way back in the car. So the flexi wing allows you to have your cake and eat it – by allowing you to lower the car even further without suffering the full adverse balance effects of doing so.

A lower rear ride height than ever before means even less dive under braking and into the slow corners. Which hurts Hamilton relative to Russell; it destroys his feeling for the car. All the previous cues to which he was unconsciously reacting as he made his inputs were now almost entirely gone. Furthermore, as he tried then to get the rotation by using the throttle, he was overheating his rear tyres.

The two races in which Hamilton was genuinely quick – Silverstone and Spa – were fast corner tracks, where there is virtually no variation in technique, as there is way less weight transfer involved.

That, in a nutshell, has been the root of Hamilton’s struggles. There has been a false ceiling put upon the value of one of his previous areas of advantage. It’s up to the driver to adapt but that doesn’t alter the fact that the cars have evolved in a way which has neutralised the value of a technique which used to buy him lap time. If there is any component of age in the deterioration of his form, perhaps it’s how our ability to adapt can diminish.

A key question heading into ’25 and Hamilton’s new chapter as a Ferrari driver is whether the Scuderia can give him a car which will allow him to express his natural way of driving. Or whether this year’s not been so much about a Mercedes trait as a current generation F1 car trait.

Paddock talk

“They [FIA] are not doing themselves any favours. They are literally running out of people to do those jobs”

Tim Mayer, FIA race steward for 15 years, voices his concerns after being fired from his position

 

 

“I’ve lost all respect…He’s always polite in front of the cameras, but in person he is completely different. I don’t want anything to do with him”

Max Verstappen on George Russell after receiving a one-place grid penalty at the Qatar Grand Prix

 

 

“It has been probably the longest year of my life, knowing from the beginning I was leaving”

After Abu Dhabi, Lewis Hamilton reflects on his heart-wrenching final season with Mercedes

 

 

“To Zak, Andrea and the men and women at McLaren, congratulations”

Christian Horner at Abu Dhabi proving that good sportsmanship is not as dead as some would believe

 

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In tribute to Gordon Cruickshank

Gordon Cruickshank: 16 July 1955 – 9 December 2024

When asked to write an appreciation of someone’s life, the trick is to look for and hope to find enough in their character and achievements to make them stand out as someone special, a cut above. It’s what you do. Except when the subject is Gordon Cruickshank. For him no looking was ever going to be required; because the fact he was one of most extraordinary people you could ever have the dumb luck to meet was nose-on-face obvious to literally everyone who got to know him.

He worked on this title for 42 years, right up until just days before his death on December 9, aged 69. Alongside Bill Boddy and Denis Jenkinson he’s among the most consequential people ever to work for Motor Sport. In that time editors came and went – even I was one of them for a few years – but Gordon remained the one true constant of the world’s oldest motor sport title, through is 1980s heyday and the dark days of its 1990s decline, to its revival during the 2000s and on to the present day.

And yet it is tempting to focus on how much more even than that he might have gone on to achieve but for one dark day in 1989 when the Mercedes in which he was a passenger left the road, overturned and left him a tetraplegic. But the problem here is that Gordon would hate to dwell upon this not just because he absolutely refused to be defined by his accident, but also because it would risk painting a picture of a man quite understandably inclined to wonder ‘if only’ or, worse, a person prone to self-pity. If that was even an instinct he possessed few, if any, saw it. Just once in the 28 years he was my friend did I get a glimpse, a moment of frustration about how utterly avoidable and unnecessary had been the accident that changed his life. And even that manifested as pure anger, and if you knew Gordon, the very idea of him getting angry might seem somewhat implausible.

He woke up in Stoke Mandeville, looked straight in the eye an existence few of us could even contemplate, and simply got on with it. By strapping a pencil to his hand (his fingers no longer worked) he was able to stab away at a keyboard and thereby keep a diary. A diary that was turned into a Sony Award-winning BBC Radio 4 play starring Peter Capaldi as Gordon, which might give some idea of the calibre of writer we’re dealing with here.

Bored and determined to make as much of his future as his disability would allow, he borrowed an anatomy book from his doctors and turned his engineering brain to discovering how hands were designed. It took him no time at all to realise it was all just mechanical components, some of which still worked, most of which did not. It took him rather longer to design his own operation to recover as much function as humanly possible before pitching it to the surgeons who, suitably agog, realised their patient might just be on to something. I believe it became standard NHS procedure for patients with Gordon’s level of spinal injury shortly thereafter.

Gordon Cruickshank, in ’58 Corvette

Gordon Cruickshank, in his element, behind the wheel of a ’58 Corvette.

Crucially the surgery gave him the ability to flex his hands and afforded some mobility in his thumb. It may not seem like much to you or me, but to Gordon it was everything: he could hold a knife and fork, lift a glass so long as it had a thin stem and thereby feed and water himself. Although he would need access to care 24 hours per day for the rest of his life, it returned a transformative degree of independence and dignity. And one more thing: because he could now hold a handle on a steering wheel, it meant he could drive.

I don’t know how many tetraplegics in the UK hold driving licences and how many of them do regularity rallies in classic cars but now Gordon has passed on, I expect the answer is none. I was driven by him on innumerable occasions and he drove just as he did (I am told) before the accident: fast, smooth, decisive with his brain always yards ahead of the vehicle. I never felt safer in a car.

He adored cars in general, Alfas in particular and drove a 164, Jaguar XF and a Giulia, with his 3.4-litre Mk2 Jaguar kept for competition use and his BMW 635CSI for recreation. Often he’d come to see us for lunch, a 270-mile round-trip from his home in Wimbledon Village and usually without a carer, which absolutely terrified us. If he’d broken down somewhere with no mobile signal he’d not even be able to get out of the car, let alone call for help. Gordon, by contrast, was entirely sanguine about it and would never dream of letting such a merely potential inconvenience spoil his fun.

But Gordon was so much more than simply the most courageous man I’ll ever get to call my friend. His writing was all journalism should be: simple, flawless and endlessly entertaining. Editing his copy was very little different to sitting down with a really good book; you’d just read his story, maybe put a headline and sub-head on it, then pass it for press. The thought it might be grammatically incorrect or factually inaccurate was laughable.

He was also incredibly funny, a gift I fear seen only by his closest friends or those who worked with him day in, day out. His stories were always told deadpan, as if he were the only person in the room who didn’t see the humour in them.

He told tales of the old days of Motor Sport in the late 1980s and early 1990s where the news desk was only allowed to make telephone calls at times that coincided with the cheap-rate tariff; and how the stationery lady would only issue reporters with a fresh Bic biro once evidence of its spent predecessor had been produced. He kept in his desk a list of all the fictional names he’d read which had really amused him, never more so than when I was able to reveal to him that one such name – Sappho Clissitt – was not only a real person, but a literary agent and a friend of mine.

And for all the scientific precision of his brain, his love was for the arts, be it literature, paintings or music. Every summer he’d hold a garden party where the great and the good would gather: I remember one year finding common cause with art critic Brian Sewell as we both fulminated about freelance journalist word rates. He also loved having people over, loved going to the cinema and theatre with them, loved travelling, loved talking to my children and most of all loved life despite the dreadful blow it had dealt him. And, as previously mentioned, he never, ever complained.

There is so much I’ll miss now Gordon is no longer with us. His knowledge, wit and warmth; his gentleness, kindness and consideration for others. But there is something to which his passing will make no difference at all, and that is what, thanks to Gordon, I have learned. He taught me to be more patient, and have more grace about matters beyond my control. Most of all he showed me the true meaning of fortitude. With many others, I will miss him more than I can say. Andrew Frankel

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McLaren F1 car that kickstarted Lewis Hamilton’s career sells for £2m

2006 McLaren MP4-21

Sold by RM Sotheby’s, £2m
As Lewis Hamilton settles in with Ferrari, it’s not unrealistic to imagine that confirmed relics relating to his ground-breaking F1 debut with McLaren might one day be valued at multiples of what they are worth today. So, while £2m isn’t an insignificant sum this MP4-21 could prove to have been a bargain having been unquestionably one of the first McLaren grand prix cars tested by Hamilton as a 21-year-old. It was subsequently campaigned by Juan Pablo Montoya in the first three races of the 2006 season. Fully restored by McLaren Racing Heritage in ’19, it is once again ready for the track.

1972 Ginetta G15

1972 Ginetta G15

Sold by Bonhams Cars Online, £10,948
Unused since the vendor acquired it in 2024, this race car had previously been in the same hands for 40 years during which it racked up multiple victories in the HSCC’s Historic Road Sports series.

1994 Porsche 911 Reimagined by Singer

1994 Porsche 911 Reimagined by Singer

Sold by RM Sotheby’s, £975,000
Regarded by many as the ultimate restomods, Singer’s superbly upgraded 964 model 911s have attracted a worldwide following and a lengthy waiting list. This had 2103 miles on the clock.

2021 Ariel Atom 4

2021 Ariel Atom 4

Sold by Collecting Cars, £53,000
A quarter-century after launch, the Ariel Atom remains one of the quickest cars on the planet. This generation four version had covered just 40 miles and featured Honda’s 350bhp 2-litre engine.

2022 Audi RS6 Avant Vorsprung

2022 Audi RS6 Avant Vorsprung

Sold by Historics, £91,520
Subtracting £91,520 from the £121,900 paid for this 190mph wagon when new reveals that every one of the 804 miles covered by the owner cost £38. It was loaded with extras.

1908 Renault VS Vanderbilt Cup replica

1908 Renault VS Vanderbilt Cup replica

Sold by Bonhams, £69,000
The 10 original Vanderbilt Cup racing cars built for US tycoon William Kissem Vanderbilt Jr featured 7.4-litre lorry engines. This painstakingly built replica made do with a mere 4.5 litres.

1987 Bentley Eight

1987 Bentley Eight

Sold by SwvA, £1815
Ultimate rat rod? This Bentley’s glory days had been and gone but, for £1800, it was surely worth picking up where the previous owner left off. It was running, driving and had a tidy interior, too.

1955 Jaguar XK140

1955 Jaguar XK140

Sold by Historics, £23,452
As Frank Sinatra said, “Regrets, I have a few…” – the latest of which is not keeping an eye on the final Historics sale of 2024, which yielded this delightfully honest XK140 that sold for a fraction of what it would have made five years ago.

Forthcoming sale highlights

  • Bonhams Online, Milton Keynes, January 17-27
    Looking to snag an out-of-season two-wheeled snip? Our guess is that this Bonhams sale will be the place to find one. Offerings with the potential for easy improvement before the spring include a 1979 Honda CBX1000 estimated to fetch £3,500-£5,500, a 1998 Ducati 900SS at around £1000 and a slew of small-capacity British classics valued at £500 or less.
  • RM Sotheby’s, Phoenix, Arizona, January 24
    RM Sotheby’s returns to its traditional Biltmore Hotel venue for this year’s foray at Arizona Car Week, where it will offer an eclectic range of classics from the headlining 1958 Ferrari 250 GT LWB Berlinetta ‘Tour de France’ at £2.8m-£3.6m to a 1959 £16,000 Vespa microcar. You could also bid for a table made from a Ferrari 458 engine.
  • Bonhams, Scottsdale, Arizona, January 24
    One of the more interesting lots on offer at Bonhams’ first live car sale of 2025 is a Land Rover Series II originally owned by myopic playwright Arthur Miller, Marilyn Monroe’s third and final husband. Also up for grabs will be a brace of 1980s Nissan Skyline race cars, and a Lamborghini Miura that’s a dead ringer for the famed The Italian Job example.
  • SWVA, Poole, January 30
    If you’re prepared to face the gloom of a British winter and head to the possibly wind-whipped coast, this inaugural SWVA sale of 2025 could yield some bargains. A tidy 1961 Austin-Healey ‘Frogeye’ Sprite, for example, comes from a consignor who has moved abroad, and a very rare 1965 Ford Zodiac Farnham estate is being relinquished after 23 years in the same ownership.
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Fire-breathing Shelby Cobra with bootful of trophies

Described as “the winningest Cobra of them all”, this famed Shelby Cobra spearheaded Ford’s attack on both the SCCA A and B production series and the US Road Racing Championship.

The project was backed by industrial wire manufacturer Essex Wire through president Paul O’Malley and chairman Walter Probst, who saw marketing gold in sponsoring Ford’s racing endeavours.

1965-‘Essex-Wire’-Sheby-Cobra-427.-On-sale-with-Mecum

1. The car was rebuilt to exact original specification by top Cobra restorer Mike McCluskey 2. Scored 497 out of 500 at the 2013 Shelby American Automobile Club convention – the best ever for a Competition Cobra restoration 3. Essex Wire livery includes Wimbledon White paintwork with Raven Black stripe bordered in orange 4. Firestone tyres are genuine ‘new, old stock’ items dated 1966 5. Ultra-rare original parts include a magnesium intake manifold and aluminium cylinder heads 6. 427ci ‘big block’ V8 can produce up to 670bhp

‘Essex man’ Fred Krammer was put in charge, recruiting Cobra racer Robert ‘Skip’ Scott who leased chassis CSX3009 before signing sports car star Dr Dick Thompson and midget racing specialist Ed Lowther as team-mates.

Built in January 1965 to ‘competition roadster’ specification, the Wimbledon White Cobra’s high-compression 427ci V8 drove through a Ford top-loader transmission and limited-slip differential.

Black and orange bonnet stripes and ‘Essex Wire’ prominently displayed on each door left no doubt as to the car’s sponsor and, when Scott and Thompson debuted it at the Pensacola USRRC 200 in April 1965, it finished fourth overall. It soon picked up the nickname ‘Ollie the Dragon’ due to its knack of belching fire every time the driver let off the throttle.

1965 Shelby 427 competition Cobra 427 interior

Painstakingly restored

Mecum

CSX3009’s finest hours came after Lowther bought it to contest the SCCA’s A production series, achieving multiple chequered flags to win the 1966 national championship and to clinch second place the following year.

German GT and Le Mans racer André Ahrlé acquired the car around 20 years ago, returning it to its original Essex Wire spec.

A multiple concours grabber, it will be offered with a comprehensive spares package, plus Lowther’s helmet, race suit and gloves from 1966 – the halcyon year that CSK3009 secured its first championship on the way to becoming the “winningest” one.

1965 Shelby 427 competition Cobra 427 ‘Essex Wire’

On sale with Mecum, Kissimmee, Florida, January 18. Estimate: £POA. mecum.com

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Trans-Am looks, V8 power and ULEZ exempt: Pontiac Firebird is unlikely commuting hero

No muscle car aficionado would be fooled by it, but many a fan of the cult 1977 caper Smokey and the Bandit might do a double-take if they spotted this black and gold Pontiac Firebird rumbling down the street.

The four high-performance Trans Am models used (and subsequently trashed) in the making of the Burt Reynolds classic were T-tops from the previous model year and while their destruction might have been a shame, the success of the film – it was the second-highest grossing movie in the US in 1977, behind Star Wars – saw annual production of the Firebird range jump from 110,000 in 1976 to 187,000 in 1978.

Pontiac Firebirds rear

Full Trans Am body kit

Richard Harrison

The Firebird coupé pictured here was built in 1979 and began life as a luxury Esprit version but was soon upgraded by the early addition of a genuine Trans Am body kit and all important ‘spread eagle’ (or ‘screaming chicken’) gold bonnet graphic and other associated metallic decals .

With a documented 30,000 miles on the clock, the car has been registered in the UK from new and is believed to have been garaged for all 45 years of its life – hence its spotless “glass-like” paint finish and astonishingly tidy, unmarked interior.

Pontiac Firebirds back lights

Fitted with the correct Firebird markings

Richard Harrison

But while it left the Pontiac factory in Van Nuys, California with General Motor’s modest 231ci/3.8-litre six-cylinder engine (as confirmed by the original build sheets in the car’s bulging history file), current owner Richard Harrison had it upgraded with a more Bandit-worthy 350 V8 shortly after taking possession around six years ago.

The engine was fully rebuilt before installation and can ‘breathe’ properly thanks to the addition of a £1500 bespoke exhaust system that gives the car a suitably effective V8 growl.

It retains, however, all of the many optional extras with which it was fitted prior to being delivered to notable Pontiac dealer John Gimma in New Orleans – additions that ranged from power brakes and a high-ratio rear axle to sports mirrors, dual horns and a full custom interior with bucket seats (plus an ashtray lamp to maximise those Smokey and the Bandit moments).

Pontiac Firebirds wheesl

“For the money, for the glory, and for the fun”

Richard Harrison

Barrister Harrison has decided to offload the Firebird as part of a drive to consolidate an extensive vehicle collection – but says he will miss the amusement he derives from driving it to work at his legal chambers in the City of London.

“It’s probably an unexpected car for a lawyer to own, but it’s great fun on the road,” Harrison says. “The engine is super smooth and has proved 100 per cent reliable for me – even while sitting in the numerous summer traffic jams I’ve often faced on the way around the M25.

“And,” adds Harrison, “I love the fact that, despite the fact that it can drink fuel at the rate of something like 10mpg, it’s exempt from the ULEZ charge.”

Pontiac Firebirds interior

Offset the 10mpg fuel consumption with the fact that it’s ULEZ exempt

Richard Harrison

This is hardly the sort of thing the Bandit would have cared about… but it’s certainly another reason to justify ownership along with the fact that, in the UK at least, it is also MOT and road tax exempt due to being more than 40 years old.

1979 Pontiac Firebird

On sale with Richard Harrison, London. Asking: £20,000. Tel: 07545 562475.

Riley flyer that’s part car, part plane

  • Regularly seen at VSCC events, this low-ride-height 1936 Riley 12/4 ‘hardie special’, owes its name to Frank Hardie, an employee at aircraft manufacturer de Havilland. The resourceful Frank used aircraft panels to create his lightweight racing car – it’s a paltry 740kg. In excellent mechanical order, it’s on sale at Ashridge Automobiles, Billington, Leighton Buzzard: £57,000.
    Riley-Hardie-Special
  • Motoring business is clearly brisk at Classic & Sportscar Centre in Malton, North Yorkshire, which has had to set up night shifts to cope with demand. “The catalyst for this was needing to keep up with the sales department,” CEO James Szkiler told us. “Four evening shifts per week really makes the difference in easing the pressure.”
  • This brutish-looking 1999 Aston Martin Vantage Le Mans, left, on sale at Dylan Miles in Tunbridge Wells, was the prototype of 40 limited-edition Vantages built to celebrate 40 years since Aston’s 1959 Le Mans victory. Wing vents were redesigned as a nod to the winning DBR1 while its dashboard was restyled with a large rev counter. Price: £439,995.
    1999 aston martin vantage le mans
  • Production at INEOS is set to re-start in January after the Grenadier maker found a solution to a “critical supply shortage” – thought to be seats. Work on its Land Rover-alikes at its French plant was paused in September.
  • Not all are cock-a-hoop about Jaguar’s re-branding. In a joint press release the Jaguar e-Type Club and International Jaguar XK Club said: “As for the infamous TV ad, it is hilarious – a wonderful way to make Jaguar a laughing stock.” Oof! LG
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F2 through the lens

The best of times. That’s certainly how it’s remembered for the small but happy band who followed the European Formula 2 Championship during its 1967-84 heyday. Now a new book celebrates what was traditionally Formula 1’s official finishing school, largely through the photographs of a woman who fell in love with F2 and travelled the continent to capture it at its peak.

Jutta Fausel initially grew up in East Germany, near Berlin, before her parents organised their escape to the west when she was 11. “My mother and I, using ‘borrowed’ West German passports, managed to cross the border in a truck with just two suitcases and then travelled to the town of Göppingen near Stuttgart to join my father, who had got out earlier and found work,” she says.

The interest in photography was triggered while Jutta was at school in Göppingen, and she subsequently worked in a photography shop while completing a three-year part-time college course. Her father was the spark for her growing fascination with motor sport.

“The first race I went to see was the Solitude Grand Prix in July 1961, held on a circuit on public roads near Stuttgart, not far from our home,” she says. “Run for a mixed field of F1 and F2 cars, it was quite an important event that saw Innes Ireland win for Lotus, with the Porsches of Jo Bonnier and Dan Gurney second and third. Sitting in the grandstand, I took a few photographs of the action using a friend’s Rolleiflex. The cars were fairly small in the frame, but I was hooked. I knew this was what I wanted to do.”

Jutta Fausel with Ronnie Peterson at Hockenheim, 1976

Jutta Fausel with Ronnie Peterson at his final F2 appearance, Hockenheim, 1976

Jutta returned to Solitude in 1962, this time armed with a Leica camera and telephoto lens borrowed from her boss at the photography shop. “Sneaking into an out-of-the-way part of the circuit and staying among the trees, I took as many photos as I could on the Saturday, this time with much better results,” she recalls. “Becoming bolder, on the Sunday I managed to get into the paddock and there I photographed the drivers, crews and cars close-up. It was a fascinating experience. My life’s passion really was confirmed.”

She began shooting at hillclimbs in West Germany, and at one of these events a reporter for Auto Mobil Sport magazine asked to be sent some shots. “I was duly paid five Deutschmarks for each one published,” says Jutta. “It was the true start of my professional photography career.”

The first grand prix she attended was the German GP in 1963, but it was the advent of what was initially known as the European F2 Trophy in 1967 that really caught her imagination. Jutta attended the two German rounds at the Nürburgring and Hockenheim that first year, plus the race at Zolder in Belgium, then began travelling to as many rounds as she could manage.

“F2 was always particularly special to me,” she says. “It was like a big family, racing hard and also enjoying life. We travelled together around Europe. Our band of brothers included veteran world champions (in the earlier years), other F1 drivers, young new talents, enthusiastic privateers, very capable chassis and engine builders, and a lot of super mechanics.

“I never made much money at this, like most of us in those days, but I would never want to change any of it. Many of my fondest memories are of travelling around the world with little or no money in my pocket, and sometimes not being sure how I was going to get home.”

She recalls driving to rounds in a humble Volkswagen Beetle, travelling home through the night to get her films developed and dispatching prints to the magazine she supplied in Stuttgart. Only then would she grab some sleep.

Today, Jutta Fausel-Ward lives in California with her husband John Ward, a race engineer, and still supplies photographs from her archive for use in books, magazines and websites. “As for my first love, F2, I have for many years dreamed of assembling my best work in a book like this, a visual year-by-year record of the series with the essential results included,” she explains. “I wanted it to contain lots of photographs – over 900 in all are in the book – of the characters in the sport and not just the cars. I wanted to also convey the competition and camaraderie, and some sad times, of course, but most of all the pure enjoyment and satisfaction we all shared.”

Now, through Evro Publishing and its editor and old friend Mark Hughes [not to be confused with Motor Sport’s F1 editor], Jutta’s dream is a reality – after an at-times painful eight-year gestation. Other long-time friends and colleagues Bob Constanduros and Ian Phillips pitched in to help with the words, with stats by Motor Sport Database compiler Peter Higham.

It’s a fabulous record of a championship fondly recalled by enthusiasts, partly – or more accurately especially – because it all happened away from the F1 limelight. Here, we’ve selected some of our favourite images from Jutta’s cherished archive.

Formula 2 The Glory Years

Formula 2: The Glory Years, 1967-84

Photographs by
Jutta Fausel
Evro Publishing, £95
ISBN 9781910505199

Zolder, May 21, 1967, Frank Gardner and Jim Clark

Zolder, May 21, 1967

The 1967 season featured Aussie Frank Gardner who made his name in Europe winning the British Saloon Car Championship driving a Ford Falcon for Alan Mann Racing and finishing runner-up in the European F2 Trophy with the Brabham works team. He was still finding his feet in the BT23 here at Zolder, where he finished seventh on aggregate. He’s about to be lapped by Jim Clark, who would probably have won this event overall but for overheating trouble in the second heat.

Zolder, May 21, 1967 pitlane Brabhams 

Zolder, May 21, 1967

Pitlane line-up shows a variety of British privateers. Nearest are three ageing Brabhams – Brian Redman’s BT16 (No16) and the BT14s of Fred Smith (No15) and Ian Raby (No12) – with Allan Taylor’s Alexis Mk10 beyond.

Hannelore Werner Hockenheim, October 11, 1970

Hockenheim, October 11, 1970

Hannelore Werner attracted a lot of attention at Hockenheim after her spectacular second-place finish against respectable opposition in the Nürburgring’s non-championship Preis von Deutschland a couple of months earlier. That proved to have been a flash in the pan, however, for here at Hockenheim she qualified her March 702 19th and retired from the race after six laps.

Patrick Depailler and Francois Cevert Thruxton, April 12, 1971

Thruxton, April 12, 1971

Young French rising stars Patrick Depailler, left, and François Cevert look like they are finding Thruxton a touch on the chilly side during the Easter meeting.

Rudimentary working conditions in the Crystal Palace paddock

Crystal Palace, May 31, 1971

Rudimentary working conditions in the Crystal Palace paddock: Swiss driver Jürg Dubler’s Team Obrist Brabham BT30, nearest, and Canadian John Cannon’s privateer March 712M receive attention. Both retired from their respective heats. Cannon was alone in F2 that year in eschewing Firestone tyres, instead choosing Goodyear.

Ice creams with John Surtees and team at Imola.

Imola, July 9, 1972

Ice creams all round? John Surtees rarely grinned as broadly as this but he’s entitled to enjoy himself post-race at Imola. He has just scored an unexpected victory – the last of his career as it turned out – and lead driver Mike Hailwood is top of the championship table. Hailwood looked on course to win the two-part event until a broken fuel pump belt halted him while leading comfortably.

Race-start-at-Salzburgring,-September-3,-1972-T

Salzburgring, September 3, 1972

Team Surtees only began firing on all cylinders at mid-season but thereafter Mike Hailwood was supreme, winning three races and scoring maximum points in two (for second places behind a grand prix driver) to become champion. Here at the Salzburgring Hailwood (No3) and team-mate Carlos Pace (No14) finished 1-2, with Dave Morgan (No26) third.

Brian Henton at Hockenheim, April 13, 1975

Hockenheim, April 13, 1975

Despite running his works-loaned March 752 on a shoestring, Britain’s Brian Henton drove an exuberant race at Hockenheim to finish third overall.

Joachim Stuck René Arnoux, and Patrick Tambay on the podium

Hockenheim, April 11, 1976

While Hans-Joachim Stuck was in a class of his own at Hockenheim, taking pole position and fastest lap as well as victories in both heats, the Renault V6 engine proved its capabilities by giving Martini men René Arnoux, left, and Patrick Tambay the other podium places.

Maurizio Flammini and Hans Binder’s Osella DNF

Vallelunga, May 9, 1976

Maurizio Flammini (No3) briefly threatened Equipe Elf Switzerland’s supremacy with a late charge that saw him snatch second place from Michel Leclère with three laps to go, only to trip over backmarker Hans Binder’s Osella (No9). Here the local hero – Flammini was from Rome – makes it clear where he thought the blame lay.

Enna-Pergusa, July 25, 1976 track start

Enna-Pergusa, July 25, 1976

The egg-shaped track around the Lago di Pergusa, Sicily’s only natural lake, was so blindingly fast that three chicane-like elements were progressively introduced during the 1970s. The last of these was installed for F2’s 1975 visit and it is visible here, facing the drivers as they roar away at the start. It took the cars on a new section to the left, bypassing the previous right-hand sweeper seen curving away beyond.

Keke Rosberg Nürburgring, April 30, 1978

Nürburgring, April 30, 1978

After Bruno Giacomelli retired with electrical failure and Marc Surer spun at mid-distance, Keke Rosberg, right, and Eddie Cheever took up the challenge, circulating neck and neck with Alex Ribeiro’s March for the last three laps. At the flag, Rosberg’s Chevron was inches behind the Brazilian, with Cheever a few lengths back.

Beppe Gabbiani, Divina Galica, Brian Henton, Stefan Johansson, Tiff Needell and Derek Warwick and Eje Elgh

Donington Park, August 19, 1979

The camaraderie of F2. Perched on Donington’s pitwall in 1979 are, from left, Beppe Gabbiani, Divina Galica, Brian Henton, Stefan Johansson, Tiff Needell and Derek Warwick, while Eje Elgh crouches in the foreground.

Ron Dennis and co-director Creighton Brown

Misano, August 10, 1980

Project Four’s Ron Dennis, left, and co-director Creighton Brown keep a look out for their drivers Andrea de Cesaris and Chico Serra. Unbeknown to the outside world, they were now aiming for F1 with an innovative carbon-fibre car designed for them by John Barnard. Over the coming months, an amalgamation with the ailing McLaren team would come to pass and the Project Four car would see light of day as the McLaren MP4.

Pau, May 31, 1982

Pau, May 31, 1982

Early in the race, the top four cars weave through Pau’s tight confines, Thierry Boutsen’s Spirit-Honda just in front and separated from team-mate Stefan Johansson by Philippe Streiff’s fast-starting AGS, while Stefan Bellof’s Maurer is in the foreground. By the end, only Boutsen picked up points, but demoted to second by Johnny Cecotto’s March when hampered by a sticking throttle.

Nürburgring, April 24, 1983Nürburgring, April 24, 1983

With the first three – Beppe Gabbiani, Stefan Bellof and Alessandro Nannini – already out of frame, Philippe Streiff’s AGS (No7) heads the first-lap train, followed by Alain Ferté’s Maurer (No5), Lamberto Leoni’s March (No28), Jonathan Palmer’s Ralt-Honda (No8), Thierry Tassin’s March (No3), Kenneth Acheson’s Maurer (No7), Mike Thackwell’s Ralt-Honda (No9) and Pierre Petit’s Maurer (No6). The end of the fabled Nordschleife for international racing was nigh, for the wall on the left conceals construction work for the ‘new’ Nürburgring.

Mike Thackwell at Enna-Pergusa, July 29, 1984

Enna-Pergusa, July 29, 1984

After knocking on the door for so long, Mike Thackwell drove with extra maturity and application in 1984 to dominate F2’s final season in his Ralt-Honda. No one else, not even team-mate Roberto Moreno, got much of a look in.

Corrado Fabi and Christian Danner resting at Pau, May 31, 1982

Pau, May 31, 1982

There ain’t much in the way of creature comforts as Corrado Fabi and Christian Danner grab some rest in the March team’s transporter.

Issue Contents Archive - Motor Sport Magazine
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The Motor Sport interview: John Barnard

John Barnard is one of motor sport’s most innovative and revolutionary engineers. He designed winning grand prix cars for McLaren, Ferrari and Benetton and brought ground-effects to the Chaparral 2K Indycar with which Johnny Rutherford won the 1980 Indy 500.

Joining McLaren in 1972 he worked with Gordon Coppuck on the championship-winning M23 before moving to America, creating innovative Indycars for Parnelli Jones. He then returned to Formula 1, having attracted the attention of Ron Dennis at Project Four where he began work on the revolutionary MP4 for 1981, the first F1 car to run a carbon-fibre chassis, an innovation that hugely improved rigidity and driver safety. He also designed its Coke-bottle shaped sidepods, an innovation much copied by other teams.

John Barnard and Jackie Oliver at motor sport 100 year

John Barnard, left, was a guest at Motor Sport’s 100th anniversary soiree last summer – as was Jackie Oliver

In 1987 he moved to Ferrari, not at Maranello, but working from his own base in the UK. By ’89, he’d introduced the electronic semi-automatic gearbox, allowing drivers to change gears without taking a hand off the wheel. The designer documents his career in more detail in Nick Skeens’ 2018 biography The Perfect Car – written with Barnard’s co-operation. Ross Brawn has described him as “game-changing in his influence and involvement in F1”.

Motor Sport: Do you regret leaving McLaren in 1986? You surely could have continued to produce race-winning cars for them?

JB: The truth is, yes, I probably do, but what I really regret is selling my shares in the team because the power dynamic changed when Ron still had 40% and I now had none. My decision to leave built up over time. Part of the deal was that I stayed for another two years. John Hogan from Marlboro had said I should be earning more money. I spoke to Ron about it but he never came back to me on that. Then Ferrari started waving big cheques at me, adding noughts all the time. I was the first to re-set the bar, if you like, for what designers or engineers were paid at that time.

I needed time to go away and think. I’d done three years with the MP4 in various guises and I wanted to do something new. I think Ron assumed I’d always be there with him but I decided to make the move and went to Ferrari. Ron was furious with me and he told Enzo Ferrari that if I took people away from McLaren he’d look at taking people from Maranello.

“Lewis isn’t as quick as Leclerc, but he’s still a decent driver”

Incidentally, on the subject of Ferrari, I’m interested to see what happens when Lewis Hamilton goes there. I don’t think he’s as quick as Charles Leclerc, but he’s still a decent racing driver, and he understands how to win championships – not by winning every race but by consistently scoring points. I wonder, too, what happens if the car doesn’t suit him because at Ferrari it doesn’t take long for them to turn on you.

It’s hard to explain but the Italian media puts pressure on the team, week in week out, and that’s tough to deal with. At the Motor Sport centenary dinner I spoke to Adrian Newey and I said to him, “You’re not going to Ferrari,” and as we now know, he decided it wasn’t for him.

Nigel Mansell in Ferrari 1989

Nigel Mansell wasted little time proving the effectiveness of Barnard’s semi-automatic Ferrari – winning the first race of ’89

Getty Images

Enzo was still alive when you went to Ferrari. You refused to live in Italy for family reasons but did you spend time with him?

JB: Yes, I’d made it clear I’d only take the job if I could be based in England. I wasn’t taking my family to Italy, and they agreed to that. Importantly, I needed to be in complete control of production because their carbon-fibre facilities were not up to the standard I expected or wanted and they didn’t even have a decent wind tunnel.

I told [then-team principal] Marco Piccinini that things had to change, they needed to get serious, so he stopped the Italian sitdown lunches in the paddock and then blamed it all on me when the newspapers ran stories with headlines like Barnard stops the Ferrari lunches. I mean they just had to get more organised – at McLaren we’d have sandwiches while we worked between practice and qualifying.

Enzo was the one who’d hired me, so I went to see him and he was still going strong right up to the end. He would demand that dyno charts and graphs from every engine in the engine shop be put on his desk. He’d look at them and say this engine goes to this driver, that one goes to Alboreto, or whoever it was, this one has two more horsepower, that kind of thing, you know.

Barnard with Gerhard Berger 1988 Hungarian GP

Barnard with Gerhard Berger, who was driving Ferrari’s F1/87/88C at the 1988 Hungarian GP

Getty Images

One of your best-known innovations was the semi-automatic electronic gearbox. What led you to this idea for the Ferrari 640 in 1989?

JB: I wanted to do something new and different after the MP4 and I’d started playing around with keeping all the radiator flow inside the body and exit at the rear wing. The Ferrari 640 started the trend of internal radiator flow, and it had a totally new torsion bar set-up at the front. Giorgio Piola [F1 technical artist] told me he’d drawn that so many times but didn’t understand how it worked until he saw one of the torsion bars on a mechanic’s bench and finally saw how it all worked. The problem with internal airflow was the manual gearshift, the bulge for the gearlever, and getting all the linkage through the car, past the engine, through the suspension, and this compromised the chassis space.

“Schumacher’s way of driving was go-kart style, different from Prost”

I thought, “Now that we have electronic valves for active suspension, why can’t we use those and have buttons on the steering wheel with cables going to the back of the car?” It was a challenge for the drivers because, to begin with, we didn’t have proper control of the engine revs so they’d have to pick the shift points on down-changes precisely. It was a huge learning curve for them until computer technologies allowed us to perfect it and then they had all the advantages, both hands on the wheel while shifting through corners, and they could no longer over-rev the engine.

For me it solved all my packaging problems at the rear of the car. After Enzo’s death the new management from Fiat weren’t keen to continue with the automatic gearbox. They said they thought it would be unreliable, but when Nigel Mansell came in 1989 he drove the manual car at Fiorano and immediately told me he wanted the paddles back on the steering wheel. He then won his first race for Ferrari in Brazil in March, becoming the first driver to win a grand grix in a car with a semi-automatic gearbox. This, of course, is a long story cut short and the whole process was much longer and more complex. These days the electronics are so fast they can sense when there’s a gap in the dogs, on the dog rings, and gears shift just on the gap. We’re talking about milliseconds, the systems are so good.

Alain Prost Spa in 1985 with a McLaren MP4:2

In Barnard’s eyes, few could match Alain Prost for feedback – here at Spa in 1985 with a McLaren MP4/2

Getty Images

You worked with some great drivers – Alain Prost, for example. What made him stand out from the rest?

JB: He was one of the best there’s ever been, no question. At McLaren he could always outqualify Niki Lauda and Niki wanted to know how he did that, what he was doing with the car. He was a magic tyre reader, knew when and how to push the tyres, when it was a tyre problem and not a chassis problem. He had that magic feel for those things. The good guys don’t have to think about how to be quick, they have so much reserve capacity for gathering information, and he was one of the very best.

Feedback was so important when there was no telemetry. It all came from discussions with the driver, and Prost would always point you in the right direction. That was hugely valuable.

Barnard with Michael Schumacher at F1 testing, Estoril 1996

Barnard with Michael Schumacher at F1 testing, Estoril, ’96; Schuey had his own way of working

Was Michael Schumacher the same – able to identify problems and communicate clearly what he needed?

JB: I only worked with Schumacher in 1996 but at the first test at Estoril I could see that he had his own way of doing things. We had the 1995 car there, with a V12 engine, and he said he could have won his world championship the previous year a lot more easily with this car. We also had the V10 engine at that test. He drove that as well, and said he preferred the V12. I was surprised, so asked him why, and he explained that he didn’t have the engine braking he had with the V12, and he used that in the corners, so we went from a six-speed gearbox to a seven-speed. His way of driving was go-kart style, very different from Prost. He’d dive into the corners, control the rear on the throttle, on and off the power – that style requires lightning reactions, and for him that worked. He didn’t have Prost’s ability to isolate problems. He would describe what he needed in more general terms, but of course he was super-quick, and brave, a bit like Mansell.

Alessandro Nannini 1990 driving Barnard and Rory Byrne’s Benetton B190

Alessandro Nannini would take three podiums in 1990 driving Barnard and Rory Byrne’s Benetton B190

Interestingly, Wattie [John Watson] would be very clear about what he wanted. He always told me, “Give me a back end that I can rely on, that gives me traction, so I can open the throttle out of the corners.” This was tricky to get right in qualifying but in the race he was always bloody quick. So it’s really impossible to set up the car for two different drivers. If it’s set up for one, it won’t be as good for the other. Maybe that’s an element of what’s going on with Sergio Pérez at Red Bull where Max Verstappen wants a front end nailed to the track, a bit like Schumacher.

Barnard technical consultant 1999

After Arrows, Barnard was a technical consultant with Prost GP from 1999 until its demise in 2001

Looking at your career it seems that Benetton was a glitch. You didn’t have the notable success that you’d had with McLaren and Ferrari. Is that fair?

JB: Yes, it is. I’d left Ferrari and I told Flavio Briatore what I thought the team needed in terms of budget and facilities, and started work on the B190. I told them they needed to get rid of the big tea-tray front wings they’d been running, which made no sense to me. The car would step sideways in the corners. It was all over the place.

“Wherever I went people expected me to move them up the grid”

Rory Byrne had started designing the B190 and I was setting up my own design office in Godalming where we had a proper composite facility that Benetton didn’t have at the time and nor did they have a proper wind tunnel so we had to get that up and running. My biggest regret is what Rory Byrne and all the Benetton guys learnt from what I was doing, and it soon became clear to me that they didn’t want to work with me, but my job was to fix the problems, not to make everyone feel super-comfortable.

I had started work on the B191 but my contract had still not been signed and I went to see Luciano Benetton because Briatore wasn’t getting it sorted. It was a horrible situation and in the end Briatore told me there’d been a board meeting and they wanted me to go. Again, this is to cut a long story short but I felt they hadn’t honoured my contract and I was no longer prepared to toe the line.

Damon Hill, Johnny Herbert and Jacques Villeneuve

Damon Hill came close to an Arrows win in Hungary, ’97.

DPPI

Barnard with Surface Table, which he co-designed

Barnard with Surface Table, which he co-designed

To précis the other parts of your career, you went back to Ferrari where Luca di Montezemolo was now in charge, you went on to work with Arrows, and then did time with Alain Prost’s new F1 team with the Peugeot engine until it was disbanded. You also did some consultancy at Toyota when they were first considering Formula 1.

JB: It was difficult for me to step back and join a lesser team than I’d been used to. Wherever I went people expected me to move the team up the grid, and we did do that at Arrows – Damon [Hill] so nearly won the Hungarian Grand Prix in 1997 – but every time you join a new team your name is on the line and it’s the same today when a leading designer or engineer changes teams. I had bought back the factory set-up I had created for Ferrari so I was now running B3 Technologies commercially and we were busy.

Schumacher in Benetton cathing air

Schumacher led a Benetton 5-6 in just his second F1 appearance – his first drive in Barnard and Byrne’s B191

Grand Prix Photo

How did you satisfy your creative drive once you’d left the Formula 1 paddock? 

JB: I got involved with a leading furniture designer, Terence Woodgate. He came to B3 and I introduced him to carbon composites. We did a carbon table which did very well, got lots of accolades in that world, and I still get involved in the design of furniture with Terence. He is a minimalist type of guy, but I’m not so into the aesthetics. I like more detail. I do the engineering side of it and he comes up with the aesthetics and this keeps me in the composite world.

Arrows, 1997 Barnard, Pedro Diniz, Hill and Tom Walkinshaw

Arrows, 1997 – the best team to never win a GP, from left: Barnard, Pedro Diniz, Hill and Tom Walkinshaw

DPPI

For the last six years my wife and I have been kept busy designing and building a new house. I’ve drawn bits of it and got very involved in the project. When I left Formula 1 we moved to Switzerland and built a new house there too. We’re back now to be close to the family but these things have kept me busy enough. Looking back, I get some pleasure from knowing that I contributed all those ideas and designs that changed the way Formula 1 cars were made.

Issue Contents Archive - Motor Sport Magazine
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Wish you were here?

At Motor Sport’s centenary gala in 2024, Formula 1’s most successful car designer, Adrian Newey, attributed the origins of his engineering genius to a 1:12-scale, build-it-yourself model of a Lotus 49, which was a Christmas gift in 1968.

“The car had all the right details, moving suspension, the works,” he said. “But more importantly, I was suddenly able to put a name to all the bits and pieces I’d later see on the garage floor. The lessons it taught me were invaluable.”

In the years since then, car modelling has become a gradually more niche and expensive pastime, with customers desiring a level of detail, inset, that can only be achieved by highly skilled artisans. But that is something that Pocher, a brand which built its first 1:8-scale model in 1966, is aiming to change through a “once-in-a-lifetime” experience.

Car model details

The Pocher Pitstop retreat – a £2635 per person, six-night stay at a three-bedroom flat in Le Mans – has been created to give modellers the ideal space to build the company’s newly released model of the Gulf-livered Porsche 917K, mere minutes from where it tore down the Mulsanne over 50 years ago.

For those struggling for inspiration, pictures of the 917K in its heyday festoon the walls of the apartment; the Le Mans Museum, which houses the model’s real-life counterpart, is just a 20-minute walk away; and Pocher also includes a helicopter trip so that modellers can take in La Sarthe from the sky.

Much like the models built by Amalgam, Pocher’s 1:8-scale 917K took over two years of design and development, utilising CAD software and lidar scanning of original 917s to ensure authenticity. It contains 312 labelled pieces. Even the most experienced modellers will spend around 30 hours glueing and screwing it together.

But in doing so, could it inspire the rise of the next Adrian Newey? Or, as Pocher suggests, is it just a perfect getaway for those wanting to rediscover an old hobby? Regardless, there’s something tranquil about building these superb kits.

Tickets for the Pocher Pitstop are now sold out for 2025 but the company has not ruled out organising similar experiences in the future.