Steve Cropley
Mum’s the word, Sir James
SUNDAY
Lots of unrestrained guff about Sir James Dyson’s planned electric car in the Sunday rags, although there’s very little new detail about the machine itself. Just the fact that it’ll be ‘different’ and not cheap. My considerable bystander’s experience at clocking approaching car launches – and at maximising sketchy details in news stories – makes me quite certain the Malmsbury entrepreneur is right to keep the lid on things. (Staff get deadly serious warnings about ‘careless talk’.) The road to automotive failure is paved with tales of well-meaning car creators who gave away too much too soon, and eventually (a) didn’t live up to promises, and/or (b) had reduced the body of potential customers to boredom by the time the car was ready. That will not happen in Malmsbury...
Was chatting to Land Rover’s design boss, Gerry Mcgovern, the other day, suggesting that the new Defender (also kept very effectively under wraps) might just be the most keenly anticipated new model in history. On reflection, I reckon the new Dyson battery car runs it close for that accolade.
Sir James Dyson is right to keep the lid on things
TUESDAY PM
Have been enjoying the Royal Automobile Club’s London Motor Week more than ever before, partly because it keeps getting bigger and more interesting (29 separate events this year, culminating in the London-brighton Veteran Car Run, the world’s oldest motoring event), and partly because I’ve been fortunate enough to be a bit player this year.
Conducted a Q&A with former BMW bigwig Ian Robertson after he’d delivered a riveting evening lecture on motoring’s complex future (during which he confirmed my own expectation that full autonomy is a long way off).
WEDNESDAY AM
Stayed in splendour at the club’s Pall Mall HQ overnight, then kicked off a press conference the following morning with the bosses of Integral Powertrain (IP), Milton-keynes-based winner of this year’s Dewar Trophy, the UK’S foremost annual award for technical excellence. IP’S extremely compact and ‘torque-dense’ electric motors were chosen by VW to power its ID-R electric racer to its recent record-shattering run up the Pike’s Peak hillclimb. Similar IP engines are to be used in Aston Martin’s forthcoming Rapide E.
As we viewed big-screen action of the ID-R pulverising the famous track all the way to its 14,000ft summit, two important things struck me: the unearthly sound of this car was stirring and powerful, and the motors themselves looked satisfyingly impressive. Different from a conventional petrol race engine, for sure, but sculpturally impressive in their own right. That’s important progress.
THURSDAY
Our editorial director, Jim Holder, reports running into Sir Jackie Stewart in a BBC breakfast studio. Holder was on hand to talk ‘budget vs motorist’; the three-time Formula 1 world champ was publicising his £2 million campaign to bring the speed of F1 technical progress to the fight against dementia, which has lately afflicted Lady Helen, his life’s companion, number one supporter and the mother of his sons. Jackie’s clarity, energy and undimmed determination shone through, says Holder, especially since they were all deployed with irresistible good humour. It’s worth watching Stewart’s moving Twitter presentation for Alzheimers Research UK (@aruknews).
FRIDAY
Feeling smug, as I’ve already read the tome that has just been dubbed Motoring Book of the Year: ace race designer Adrian Newey’s autobiography ‘How to Build a Car’ that presents his life history as a progression through the creation of 10 of his hugely successful designs. My own family became aware of this superb volume’s existence last Christmas – which is why I can say here and now it’s one of the most absorbing car books I’ve read.