MOTOR SPORT FLASHBACK
MICHAEL CLARK TAKES US FROM THE PERSONALITIES OF ’ 50S AND ’ 60S MOTOR RACING AND ITS UNOFFICIAL TRIPLE CROWN TO FOUR KIWIS MAKING THEIR MARK ON THE WORLD S TAGE
Perhaps there was something in England’s water 90 years ago because not only were three of the nation’s best immediate-post-war drivers born, but each of them was also an extraordinary personality. Easily the best driver was Stirling Moss, born in September 1929. The compilation of any list of top drivers of all time that doesn’t include Moss near the very top due to the fact he was — famously — never world champion, instantly loses credibility. I’ve seen top 10s that exclude him, yet seem to award placings based on the number of wins. Analytical stuff — not.
Stirling Moss is not only the greatest English driver of the past century but he is also a contender for one of the most loved living Brits. He oozes personality, and his love of the sport was such that it wasn’t uncommon for him to sometimes race a basic family saloon (think Standard Ten), a big front-engined sports racer, and a Formula 1 (F1) Grand Prix (GP) car all on the same weekend — often on the same day, and frequently winning the lot.
Britain’s first world champion was Mike Hawthorn. He was born in April 1929, some five months before Moss, the man he would have to beat to win the 1958 title. In many respects, Hawthorn and Moss were extremely different — Hawthorn was tall, Moss was short; the former very much a pipe and a pint man, whereas Moss was teetotal throughout his career. While Moss was a serious professional, Hawthorn gave the impression of considering his chosen sport as a bit of a lark — how we might imagine a Spitfire pilot’s personality. After all, the debonair Hawthorn always raced wearing a bow tie. After the death of his best friend and teammate Peter Collins early in the 1958 season, Hawthorn announced his retirement on being crowned champion. He was killed in a road crash three months after taking the title.
If Moss and Hawthorn were personalities in their own right, then the enormously popular pilot Norman Graham Hill was a force of nature. Born on 15 February 1929, he was not only the eldest of this trio, but he also started, and finished, last. We first saw him in New Zealand in 1961, when virtually an entire F1 field lined up at Ardmore in British Racing Motors’ (BRM) first rearengined car. He was back in ’63 as newly crowned world champion with the unique Ferguson four-wheel-drive machine for our first GP at Pukekohe before winning the next two on the trot. In 1964, he was aboard Scuderia Veloce’s Brabham-climax and, the following year, was back with the marque he is most associated with — BRM. We last saw him 50 years ago as reigning world champion with the high-wing Lotus 49. By then he had, in addition to winning two world championships, won the Indianapolis 500. Impressively, this was on debut, when the field included Jim Clark and Jackie Stewart plus all the US heavyweights such as AJ Foyt, Mario Andretti, Bobby and Al Unser, and the incomparable Rufus Parnell ‘Parnelli’ Jones.
In 1972, Hill was part of the threecar Matra team determined to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the glory of France. Each car contained one Frenchman and one ‘ foreigner’ — in addition to Hill, the other two were a pair of Kiwis in the form of Chris Amon and Howden Ganley. By then, Hill’s best days in F1 were behind him and so, when he won Le Mans, a previously unknown term, the ‘Triple Crown’ was coined, comprising Le Mans, the Indianapolis 500, and the Monaco GP, which Hill had largely dominated through most of the ’60s. Strangely, the term was essentially parked until word got out that Mario Andretti was heading back to Le Mans in an attempt to join Graham Hill as a winner of the Triple Crown; however, the American hero had never won Monaco, so the title now involved the world championship instead of merely one round.
That the Triple Crown is an unofficial motor sport achievement doesn’t undermine the achievements of a late-starting Englishman, who stayed in F1 into his mid 40s only to lose his life in a plane crash after retiring from the sport during its most dangerous time. Had Graham Hill not taken up motor racing, the general consensus is that he would have had a successful career as a stand-up comedian. Jim Clark aside, he was one of the leading drivers throughout the ’60s who was every bit as popular here as he was in his homeland. Forty-seven years after Graham Hill achieved the first Triple Crown, there is now another contender. One of the greatest drivers ever, Fernando Alonso, has finally reached the end of the road with his F1 career — to date at least — and this year will line up at the Indianapolis 500. He was there in 2017, but, this time, it is much more his focus, and, given that he has won both Monaco and the world championship, should he beat Scott Dixon and the others, he will be the second winner of the Triple Crown, irrespective of what criteria is chosen.
Hartley moves on
Also leaving F1 is Brendon Hartley. After the fairy tale of finding himself in a F1 GP in late 2017 (remember, he was selected by Red Bull for their Toro Rosso team from pretty much nowhere), he got the nod for a full season in 2018. There were some positives — such as qualifying sixth in Japan and frequently outpointing his teammate over the last part of the season — and some negatives, some of his making and some that can only be referred to as bad luck.
The Kiwi remains a firm favourite at Porsche, and he will head its Formula E programme. His F1 career may not be over, but, if he has run his last GP, hopefully he’ll look back with enormous pride at the excitement he gave to so many Kiwis during 2018. Brendon’s a class act — on and off the track.
Teo Fabi and Murray Taylor
Forty years ago, many of us were still shaking ourselves down after witnessing a ‘wonder car’ pedalled by a tiny Italian called Teo Fabi. The so-called wonder car flattered to deceive: a decade ago, when we spoke to Murray Taylor, the team manager, he confirmed that the seemingly magical ground-effect-producing side pods were little more than “smoke and mirrors”. It turned out that Fabi was quite good. He went on to have a strange F1 career that included two poles but no podiums, and also sat on pole at the Indy 500 — so, clearly, bravery wasn’t an issue.
It also turned out that Christchurchborn Taylor, globetrotting journalist and a part-time team manager with great ambitions, ran a good outfit. He was soon running a car in the prestigious British
Formula 3 (F3) Championship, and, in 1981, Murray Taylor Racing (MTR) ran a twocar outfit. In 1982, he pinned all his hopes — and money — on a wild Irishman called Tommy Byrne. Somehow, Murray managed to harness the best of Byrne and, in a closefought title fight, they won. Byrne’s career went nowhere, but MTR soldiered on and eventually made the move up to Formula 3000.
Eventually, Murray and his delightful wife Glenice decided that New Zealand was the place to raise their family, and Murray has since used his PR skills across both motor racing and America’s Cup yachting. His passion for our sport is enormous. It looks like things worked out pretty well for the ambitious 21-year-old who left here in 1970 to see what was out there. West Surrey Racing The term ‘quiet achiever’ could have been specially coined for Dunedinborn Dick Bennetts, principal of West Surrey Racing ( WSR) in England. After years of being one of the top British F3 teams, Bennetts redirected WSR towards the British Touring Car Championship (BTCC), and the successes have kept coming. WSR’S title-winning successes were recently honoured at the prestigious annual Professional Motorsport World Expo Awards. On receiving the award, Bennetts said, “It’s a great honour for everybody at WSR to be named European Series Team of the Year by Professional Motorsport World, a publication that’s not only essential reading for me but also influential within the technology sector of the industry. The BTCC is a championship in which it’s incredibly hard to get to the front, and even more difficult to stay there. The fact that we’ve remained competitive throughout the past six seasons with the BMW 125i M Sport and won three titles this year speaks volumes about the ability and determination of every member of our team.”
An email from Murray Taylor when the award was announced simply said “Fantastic achievement for our Riccardo; and a richly deserved accolade. He is quite simply The Guru (aged 71).” Although he has been based in England for many decades, Bennetts remains a proud Kiwi, and although he flies below the radar of many people, he is all that Taylor describes, and then some.
Liam Lawson and TACCOC
Liam Lawson has just turned 16, meaning that he now qualifies to compete in the wonderful Toyota Racing Series. He spent 2017 dovetailing schoolwork at Pukekohe High School with competing in the Australian Formula 4 Championship, where he placed runner-up. This year has seen him go more international, competing in the German Formula 4 title race, again placing runner-up. Back in New Zealand, he answered a call to get himself to Malaysia for a F3 race and, despite never seeing the circuit before or ever sitting in an F3 car, he cleaned up — poles, race wins, fastest laps; in other words, the trifecta.
If you look carefully at the side of his race cars, you’ll notice a sponsor’s roundel, and closer inspection will reveal it to be the distinctive logo of Auckland’s Thoroughbred and Classic Car Owners Club (TACCOC). As club stalwart John Holmes tells it, “In 2017, we heard that this promising kid was heading to Australia and was scratching around trying to find the money to get from meeting to meeting and so we, as a committee, decided we’d help.”
TACCOC has done well since it was founded in 1976, and the club was so pleased with Lawson’s performance that it again helped support him to Germany in 2018 and, according to John, “fully intend to continue to help him this year as well — hopefully in F3”. This is a unique situation in which a club comprising members who own cars of yesterday are helping to support the career of a young driver of tomorrow.