Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2023 i Motor Sport Magazine

At the end of February it seems that the trustees of the Ruskin Museum, a modest institution in the Lake District, ran out of patience. In a post on their website they announced that they were to start legal action to regain possession of their most prized artefact: Bluebird K7, the hydroplane in which Donald Campbell died 56 years ago while attempting to break the World Water Speed Record. The tone of the announcement hinted at the frustration the museum clearly feels about an ongoing wrangle which has rumbled on for years. “It is with regret that we have had to take this action to gain physical possession of Donald Campbell’s record-breaking boat which was gifted to the museum by the Campbell family in 2006,” said deputy chairman of the…

A late collision eliminated the top three and decided the outcome of a dramatic 71st running of the Sebring 12 Hours. Taking place a day after the World Endurance Championship opener, the IMSAsanctioned classic offered Porsche Penske a second bite of Sebring glory this year – only for Mathieu Jaminet to get together with the Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-06 of Filipe Albuquerque as they lapped GTD cars with less than 20 minutes left on the clock. To make matters worse, the other Porsche 963 driven by Felipe Nasr ploughed into the melée, in what was ruled a racing incident. The carnage opened the door for the Action Express Cadillac to take victory in the hands of one-time Williams Formula 1 grand prix starter Jack Aitken. The winning Caddy V-LMDh…

How nice it was – compensation for a fundamentally boring opening race of this year’s Formula 1 World Championship – to see the beaming 41-yearold Fernando Alonso back on the finish podium in Bahrain. Third place in a Red Bull seem-alike Aston Martin was a great revelation. It was in some measure amends for the demeaning manner in which the metallic green Aston Martin course car of last year somehow looked more in place than the sister-liveried F1 team cars following it, buried some way back down the starting grid. So the grand old marque looks to be not just back in the fray, but showing genuinely competitive top-three-team pace. One has to reflect that Aston Martin – as a much-storied marque which has survived (just) over so many years…

Adrian Newey belongs in the company of Colin Chapman and Gordon Murray when it comes to great Formula 1 designers. He’s the most amazing in my time, largely because of his career longevity. Yes, I know Rory Byrne is still working in the background at Ferrari but Newey has achieved so much at three different teams: Williams, McLaren and Red Bull. He’s still the leader of the pack and he’s still up for it, too. How the rules have developed since the early 1990s – it’s almost as if they have followed him rather than the other way around. It’s amazing how he always comes up with the next big thing that everyone else then jumps on, just as Chapman used to. Such figures have an ability to understand what…

To celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Le Mans 24 Hours we have teamed up with Classic & Sports Finance to bring you an evening with Tom Kristensen at IET London, 2 Savoy Place, WC2 on May 17. The nine-times winner will be discussing the greatest moments in the history of the endurance classic and also signing copies of his book Mr Le Mans. Afterwards there will be a dinner with Kristensen at Smith & Wollensky in Covent Garden for Supper Club members only – with limited tickets remaining. WHAT TO EXPECT Join us from 6pm where Kristensen will be signing copies of his award-winning book Mr Le Mans. Guests can bring their own copies or there will be the chance to purchase on the night. The main talk will…

Models often form the centrepiece of most people’s collections and are great to display and gaze at. But model kits are also brilliant to build then display, so let’s sidestep the usual ready-made scaled offerings and look instead at model kits, which to me are one of the great joys of the collectibles market. In my mind, the bigger the better for things like this, and there are some stunning 1:8 and 1:12 scale kits out there. I’m an amateur model-maker and have recently just completed a 1:4 diecast of a Valentino Rossi Yamaha, inset, which weighed in at 10kg when finished. It helped that I sold it on for a profit, but it’s hardly a ‘business model’ I’d pursue, as it would be difficult to justify the 40 hours…

Sébastien Ogier reminded the World Rally Championship what it’s missing out on by his insistence on only competing part-time as he dominated to score a recordbreaking seventh victory on Rally Mexico. The result has lifted the eight-time WRC king to the top of the points standings, despite Ogier having only competed in two of the three rounds this season. He also won the Monte Carlo Rally in January for a record ninth time. The Toyota ace is three points ahead of Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville, who caught and beat Elfyn Evans to second place in Mexico. But is there any hope Ogier might be enticed to pitch for a ninth title and equal the tally set by former nemesis Sébastien Loeb? After his win, he revealed he’ll also compete on the asphalt…

The scale of Red Bull’s advantage this season had Max Verstappen acknowledging in Jeddah that the world championship is unlikely to go to anyone other than himself or team-mate Sergio Pérez. Having finished second to Pérez in the race, essentially because he had to start 14 places behind him after a driveshaft failure in qualifying, Max was airing his dissatisfaction with the reliability, exactly because it could influence the title outcome. Could Sergio Pérez, good driver though he is, seriously be considered Verstappen’s title rival? The chances of him outperforming Verstappen over a season have to be considered remote. But that’s an ‘outside looking in’ perspective. There is absolutely no reason why Pérez, as a fully competitive F1 driver, should even begin to think like that – and he’s almost…

Twenty-five years ago, Richard Attwood let me drive his Porsche 917. At the time it was the greatest automotive experience of my life and in the quarter century of unfathomable good luck that has since passed under my wheels, only a handful of other experiences get anywhere near it. And it was not just because I had a 917 and Silverstone to myself. What I remember as much as the fear, the excitement, the sight, sound and feel of the car was Richard’s attitude. Every time I came in he’d ask me how it was. I’d tell him and he’d say, “Yes, yes, but have you had a proper go yet?” Truth is that out of respect for the car, its value, its reputation and its owner, I was driving…

In 1993 Ayrton Senna – cited so often as Formula 1’s greatest driver – produced what many feel was his finest racing lap, on a rain-sodden day in the East Midlands. Simon Arron was standing trackside. He remembered Senna’s circuit of the gods, going from fifth to first place on the opening lap of the European Grand Prix at Donington. As the precipitation pounded down at lights out, the three-time world champion found himself starting fourth. Though Senna, hard up for horsepower in his McLaren-Ford MP4/8, was 1.5sec off Alain Prost’s ‘nonemore-gizmoed’ Williams FW15C in qualifying, come Sunday said rain was the equaliser. The Brazilian fell to fifth, then took in the opening couple of corners before carefully before pressing on. “Senna dealt quickly with Schumacher and Wendlinger, passing them…

It has been almost four years since we featured a new watch launch from New York-based designer and classic car enthusiast Bradley Price, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been busy at the drawing board creating interesting new models for his thriving Autodromo brand. For those unfamiliar with the name, it was established by Price in 2011 after he decided to take his increasingly in-demand skills as an industrial designer down a different road and establish a business that combined his twin passions of old cars and old watches. Initially an aside to his day job, Autodromo grew organically (and unexpectedly) after being embraced by the global car community which quickly caught on to the automotive influences Price subtly worked in when creating his early, quartz-powered watches such as the…

When I was young, our family car was… A Morris Minor, which my mother let me race once. We also had an MG TF 1250 which my father raced against Stirling Moss at Ardmore. He let me drive it on the road, but not in a race, as I wasn’t old enough. There were also various Vauxhalls and a Ford Anglia 105E. The first car I owned was… A Morris Eight, inset, which I bought from an uncle for £50. It had a number of mechanical defects that I couldn’t fix because I was then working as a newspaper reporter. I first became hooked on racing when… My father took me and my brother Denis to the New Zealand Grand Prix at Ardmore in 1955 where I saw real grand…

2023 HISTORICS SPECIAL Donington Historic Festival DONINGTON PARK, LEICESTERSHIRE, APRIL 29-30 The Donington Historic Festival is one of the key early season historic racing festivals in Europe with two days of action on the fabulous Donington Park circuit. This is very much a Motor Racing Legends event and that organisation provides the bulk of the races. Though there are some off-track attractions, it is nothing like the scale of the Silverstone Festival. This one is largely about good quality racing. For the casual spectator, longer races are not always appealing and the DHF includes a series of one-hour races and the three-hour Pall Mall Cup as well as a couple of shorter contests. The Pall Mall Cup on Saturday afternoon features a field of pre-’66 GT and pre-’63 sports racers…

6: ERA R5B REMUS WINS WOODCOTE TROPHY, 1998 The moment the union flag dropped to start the opening race of Goodwood’s modern era was the culmination of a dream for Lord March, 50 years after his grandfather hosted the first event in 1948. Ludovic Lindsay’s Woodcote Trophy victory with an immaculate drive in the ex-Bira ERA R5B, above, leading – left dormant on opening day when its engine ran a bearing in practice with future Goodwood commentator John Bolster driving – was fitting. The gallant warhorse returned subsequently in period with Philip Fotheringham-Parker and Duncan Hamilton (1951), Bill Moss (1957-58) and then Ludo’s father The Hon Patrick Lindsay (who won in 1961, then raced 1962-65). After bagging six Revival golds in Lindsay Jr’s deft hands, Remus astonishes still. 5: NINE…

● The last time MARCH saw victory in F1 was at Monza in 1976 with this 761, inset right, now on sale at SPEEDMASTER in Wetherby. It was driven by RONNIE PETERSON for his first GP win in two years; in fact Superswede solely raced Chassis 6 before his manager Staffan Svenby took ownership. Rebuilt, it’s now ready for dozens of historic events. £POA. ● As it’s the centenary of the Le Mans 24 Hours, perhaps owning a bona fide bruiser from La Sarthe is timely. This RILEY & SCOTT MARK IIIC, below, was placed seventh on the grid at Le Mans 2003 by MARC GOOSSENS and was raced in the Sebring 12 Hours in ’04. More recently it won last year’s Endurance Racing Legends title. It’s on sale, £POA,…

Forty years ago, on April 2, 1983, a British teenager made history at Le Mans. Eighteen-year-old Alan Carter won the French 250cc Grand Prix to become the youngest-ever intermediate-class GP winner, an accolade he retained for the next two decades. Even now, his achievement has only been surpassed by six-times MotoGP world champion Marc Márquez and Dani Pedrosa, the most successful MotoGP rider never to have won the world title. Alan’s success happened in the strangest circumstances, which perhaps wasn’t all that surprising considering his sadly unusual upbringing. Alan’s father was Mal Carter – car dealer, sponsor, boxer, bit of a gangster and a scary presence in British race paddocks for a couple of decades. These were the days when riders, mechanics and girlfriends kept their flimsy cardboard paddock passes…

GOOD FASTER ASTON Cheeky ’Nando’s Aston Martin heroics are the only thing saving the F1 season so far. MERCEDES’ WEB ADMIN Filming the return of his third place Saudi trophy to Aston Martin turned an awkward moment into social media gold for George Russell FULL GAS Life at L’Equipe de France is off to a good start for Pierre Gasly with two points finishes from two races. UNBELIEVABLE ENGINEERING AlphaTauri boss Franz Tost hauled his engineers over the coals via interview in Saudi because – according to him – the car’s rubbish. Great to see. MIRACLE WORKER Self-proclaimed worst team on the grid Williams actually looked quite handy in Bahrain, with Alex Albon snaring a point. BAD CROSS JOS Jos Verstappen had F1 fans up in arms for being Saudi’s…

Confession time: I’m not much interested in F1 drivers’ wages, their social media blunders or their ‘mental challenges for the forthcoming season’. I am interested in the racing, and especially the machinery they’re in charge of. As one-time technical editor at Haynes of much-missed manuals memory (and he wrote three on race cars), Steve Rendle is well placed to show us what is underneath all those sponsor stickers, to back up the informed insight that Mark Hughes gives us. Using generous graphics (many by Giorgio Piola) and well-chosen photos, the book takes us through the physical components from suspension shim to entire monocoques, as well as the less visible elements – aerodynamics, hydraulics, the incredible balancing act the ERS does between harvesting and applying energy. Just to prove how far…

This is the edge of the unique and beautiful Montreal paddock, as it was in June 1991. But ‘beautiful’ only in the sense of its location on the edge of the rowing lake used during the 1976 Olympic Games. As a place of work and centre for socialising, it was hopeless. The paddock’s open area – if you could call it that – was the towpath you can see, the inner limit of which can be determined by the fact that I had my back to one of the team motorhomes positioned more or less bumper-to-bumper directly behind the garages. The cramped conditions would eventually be alleviated by the construction of pontoons to house hospitality and team facilities along the water’s edge. The plus side was that participants in chance…

2023 Goodwood Events: Members’ Meeting April 15 - 16 Festival of Speed July 13-16 Revival September 8-10 Tom Kristensen Having won Le Mans nine times, the Great Dane headed for historics, becoming a crowd favourite at the Goodwood Revival where, in 2011, he won the Tourist Trophy race sharing a Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupé with Kenny Brack. Sliding the Cobra through pouring rain Kristensen showed us his huge natural talent. “I love the Revival, the cars, the dressing up, the incredible atmosphere,” he says. “That’s why I keep going back to Goodwood.” In 2017, the Festival of Speed celebrated the 20th anniversary of his first win at Le Mans when, at the last minute, he was drafted into the Joest team to drive their TWR Porsche WSC-95 alongside Michele Alboreto…

AUCTION HERO Are you feeling M-powered? If not, a trip to RM Sotheby’s Villa Erba auction taking place during this spring’s Villa d’Este Concorso d’Eleganza could put things right, because the sale is set to include a single-owner collection of no fewer than five BMWs spanning more than 30 years of the marque’s M in-house performance division. The cars on offer are a 2022 M4 CSL, a 2016 M4 GTS, a 2010 M3 GTS and a 2003 M3 CSL. But it’s the fifth and final car that’s most likely to have the world’s M power fans drooling the most – because it’s a superb example of arguably the most desirable variant of the legendary E30 M3, the Sport Evolution model. The E30 M3 was the first BMW 3 Series to…

ALL PRODUCTS AVAILABLE AT MOTORSPORTMAGAZINE.COM/SHOP VINTAGE RACING POSTERS If you’re not overly fussed by the modern age of mass-produced posters, then we have a solution for you. In a world of ten-a-penny designs, having something that is truly limited edition is a must, and there’s no better option than vintage posters. Yes, they were produced in their numbers back in the day, but so few now survive that they can be practically considered a protected species, perhaps even one-of-a-kind. If that’s of interest, take a look at some of the rare vintage offerings we currently have up for grabs. How about an art decoinspired colourised offering for Goodwood from 1961, Graham Hill in action ahead of the 1963 International Trophy at Silverstone, or even the wonderful randomness of Gilles Villeneuve…