Silverstone meeting may have given Clarkson a lucrative new outlet for his farm produce
Simon Galloway/LAT
He’s already bought a farm, established a brewery and taken over a pub. Now Jeremy Clarkson is looking to get into business with Formula 1 teams..
The former Top Gear presenter has begun growing flax, which is already used in some F1 cars as a cheaper, greener alternative to carbon fibre.
Clarkson said that he discussed using the material to create car parts with a member of the Alpine Formula 1 team, based six miles away from his Diddly Squat farm in Chipping Norton.
Writing in The Sunday Times, he described how he initially decided to grow flax for its traditional purpose of making linen.
In a scenario familiar to viewers of his Clarkson’s Farm Amazon Prime series, he went on to detail a series of disasters and unforeseen issues that threatened to turn the project into a debacle.
Clarkson was a guest of Alpine at Silverstone after supplying food for the team
Sam Bagnall/Sutton Images
Then, this summer at Silverstone, where his farm was supplying food for Alpine’s hospitality unit, the team was unexpectedly interested in his new crop, Clarkson wrote.
“I was at the British Grand Prix chatting to the marketing guy … and he said, out of nowhere, ‘Do you know anything about flax?’ It turns out that they’re toying with the idea of using it alongside carbon fibre to make panels for their race car.
“Imagine if we have enough to make an F1 car. How cool would that be? To watch it thundering round the track thinking, I grew that.”
Formula 1 teams have been investigating the use of flax for more than five years, after realising that a material humans first spun more than 30,000 years ago offers a cheaper, less energy-intensive alternative to carbon fibre.
The stalks can be woven and layered in a similar way to carbon fibre, providing a lightweight and strong material that’s highly resistant to bending.
Norris’s 2021 race seat with light brown sections of flax
McLaren
In 2021 McLaren announced that Lando Norris was racing with a seat made of flax, bringing benefits beyond simple cost savings.
It was more comfortable because it absorbed a greater amount of vibration than the carbon fibre seat, and was made with 85% fewer CO2 emissions. McLaren, like all teams, has signed up to F1’s net zero goal.
In 1974, Roger Sloman suggested building F1 chassis with carbon fibre and devoted seven years to making it happen. Romain Grosjean is only the latest to benefit from the foresight of this great unsung innovator
Flax components are also less hazardous if they break, without the sharp edges and toxic dust of carbon fibre.
McLaren worked with Swiss firm Bcomp, which makes several flax products including a lattice frame of twisted strands, which supports layers of woven flax sheets.
This increases strength, but the material still can’t match carbon fibre which will continue to be used for safety critical parts, including F1 monocoque chassis.
There are opportunities elsewhere though. Bcomp is guarded about its Formula 1 work, which is now said to involve two teams, but can say more about its projects with Porsche and BMW — which owns a stake in the firm.
Both car manufacturers have fitted flax bodywork to their GT4 racing cars, and BMW has used it for interior elements too. Flax has also been used in Formula E and Super Formula components and bodywork.
BMW M4 GT4 uses flax laid over lattice (inset) for several body panels
BMW/Bcomp
Bcomp’s supplies are currently sourced from France and Belgium. If Clarkson is to enter the supply chain, then he’ll need to invest: one of his many problems was a lack of machinery to pick the cut stalks off the ground, a problem that even co-star Kaleb Cooper was unable to resolve.
“I consulted Britain’s leading expert on flax,” wrote Clarkson. “He said there is no equipment anywhere near the Cotswolds that could do it, so it would have to be done by hand. And how long would this take? ‘Working a 50-hour week, it would take a team of 40 people a year’.
“Kaleb, meanwhile, is not talking to me. He says I’ve got to stop coming up with harebrained schemes without thinking them through.”
It sounds likely that Amazon viewers will be able to watch events unfold in the next series of Clarkson’s Farm next year, which would follow Oscar Piastri’s cameo appearance in the latest season.
However, based on previous episodes, there’s as much chance of the flax project ending in fiasco as there is of Clarkson’s crops making the F1 grid.
