Innholdsfortegnelse for September 2023 i Motor Sport Magazine

Our thirst for live motor sport shows no sign of abating. This summer I have been struck by the sheer scale and popularity of some of the headline events I have been to. They have moved from niche interest gatherings to truly mainstream juggernauts complete with all the trappings of a big business entertainment. The first of the three such events I attended in July was the Le Mans Classic. It is usually biennial and with the last one taking place in 2022 this year’s was a one-off to celebrate 100 years of Le Mans proper. Perhaps unsurprisingly then it was sold out. And although I had been to previous Classics pre-pandemic the scale of this one (which started in 2002 with a crowd of around 30,000) took me by…

Lewis Hamilton reckons the forthcoming Formula 1 movie starring Brad Pitt could have an even bigger impact on grand prix racing than Netflix’s divisive Drive to Survive series. Filming for the as-yet untitled film began during the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, with organisers preparing a garage for the fictional Apex GP, and the updated Formula 2 car, right, that is being used for the shoots hitting the track in the run-up to the race weekend in its black and gold livery. The new film aims to recreate the F1 experience in a manner that carries modern echoes of John Frankenheimer’s Grand Prix, which famously used cameras tagged on to cars running during F1 weekends in the mid-1960s. Hamilton is serving as a producer and adviser to the film crew,…

Anew supercar for the road claims to have its roots in both Formula 1 and Can-Am. Petersfield-based Nichols Cars, co-founded by renowned McLaren F1 engineer and designer Steve Nichols, has revealed its N1A. The man who worked with both John Barnard and Gordon Murray on some of the greatest F1 cars during McLaren’s halcyon 1980s has drawn on his racing experience to produce a car that also borrows heavily from McLaren’s formative M1A Can-Am contender. Indeed, the name of the mid-engined car itself is a clear reference to the 1960s sports racer. The N1A packs a 7-litre aluminium V8 into its lightweight chassis. The entire package weighs just 900kg, with a powerto-weight ratio of almost 700bhp/tonne. The first 15 built will be an individually numbered series to mark each of…

There were a total of 1200 possible track limit breaches during the Austrian Grand Prix. They were occurring faster than race control could keep up with and although several penalties were applied either in the race or immediately afterwards, after several hours of race control scrolling through the footage the official results were quite different to those across the line. The podium finishers were unaffected but the remainder of the pointspaying positions were wildly jumbled up. The main problem was the fast Turn 10, the final corner on the lap, taken in fifth gear, downhill and with a dip in the middle which tends to pull the cars out wide. The track limits are defined only by a white line and drivers were reporting that it was impossible to see…

GOOD F1 STAR POWER Sell-out Silverstone, drivers treated like rock stars, the British GP gripped by its own Hollywood fever – F1 really has hit the ‘big time’. SATURDAY STROLL Stroll actually managed to fend off his mentor/minder Alonso in the Austria sprint – rare 2023 bright spot for the Aramco Martin chosen one. McLAREN’S NEW METEOR Norris took the improved McLaren to fourth in Austria, then consecutive seconds – so is a first win on the cards? CHARM OFFENSIVE Apex F1 movie’s Brad Pitt and Jerry Bruckheimer are now hilariously keen to get Martin Brundle onside, giving the friendliest of interviews RICCIARDO RETURNS After an increasingly mediocre Formula 1 career petered out, the grinning Aussie is back – seemingly on force of sheer personality. BAD LAUGHABLE ANTHEM Brad Pitt…

Mark my words, this may look like a merely thoroughly face-lifted DB11, but the new DB12 is likely to be considered one of the more important cars in the history of Aston Martin. These come along every so often, vehicles that are meant to reset the direction of the company and return to the course from which it has wavered. This is perhaps not a car of DB2, DB7 or DB9 significance, but as the first new Aston produced entirely under the watchful eye of Canadian billionaire, largest shareholder and executive chairman Lawrence Stroll, it is surely not far away. Although derived from the DB11, the company says the car is 85% new, and it’s certainly true that no areas of its endeavours have been left untouched. The body is…

Since leaving his job as head designer for Morgan in 2012, 40-year-old Matthew Humphries has juggled his life between freelance work, lecturing, finding time to drive the beloved MGB he bought 18 years ago – oh, and running his own watch brand. He founded the latter in 2014, customising classic Seikos before creating his own carthemed watch, the SQ1 Daily Driver, which took inspiration for its dial from the rev counters of classic 911s (Humphries has one of those, too). Since then, the MHD watch offering has expanded to include more than 20 designs, most of which major on a vintage vibe – and all of which are affordable. As well as benefiting from the Humphries touch, the watches are tough and reliable thanks to the use of tried and…

Romain Dumas Took four N24 wins in five years in Manthey Porsches between 2007 and ’11, but it’s the stunning lap record he achieved in the electricpowered Volkswagen ID R that made Dumas a modern king of the ’Ring. 6min 05.336sec? Woosh! Uwe Alzen Fiery German who won the N24 twice, 10 years apart: in 2000 in a Phoenix Racing Porsche 996, then in 2010 in a Schnitzer BMW. Was still setting lap records as late as 2013. Check out the onboard YouTube videos. Along with brother Jürgen, a true Nürburgring folk-hero. Marc Duez The great Belgian all-rounder is probably more associated with his local circuit (Spa-Francorchamps), but perhaps it was the rally experience that helped Duez also shine at the ’Ring. He won the N24 four times in eight…

I’d been watching him in 2020, he looked pretty handy, doing a good job in his first season, and when we did the first test with him at Laguna Seca ahead of the 2021 season we thought ‘this guy is really good’. That’s when we called Chip and told him, ‘This kid is mega.’ I don’t think anyone else was looking at him at the time so the deal was done.” That’s four-time IndyCar champion Dario Franchitti, now a key adviser at Chip Ganassi Racing. We could say the rest is history, Alex Palou winning the IndyCar title in his first year with Ganassi and looking red hot for a second this season. But... when we catch up with him in early July the rumour mill about his future…

One benefit of buying this twinwinged Brabham BT23C is that you’ll always have somewhere to put your tea – but you’ll also be getting one of the most historically interesting of Jack Brabham’s late ’60s F2 racers ever to take to the track. The Australian triple F1 world champion moved into the construction business with his eponymous marque at the start of the decade having teamed with the celebrated engineer/ designer Ron Tauranac. Between them they put their talents to use developing cars across multiple classes, from Formula Junior to F3, F2 and F1 as well as sports racing cars. Brabham famously became the first driver to win the F1 drivers’ title in a car bearing his own name in 1966, while team-mate Denny Hulme took the laurels the following…

Is Ferrari driver Luigi Villoresi thinking through his strategy before the start of the British Grand Prix? Villoresi is in notable company. Ferrari team manager Nello ‘Maestro’ Ugolini is studying a watch and chart. In 1957 he’d switch to Maserati after falling out with Enzo Ferrari. To the left is Giulio Ramponi, who had been a mechanic/engineer with Alfa Romeo before the war and in the 1950s became a Champion sparkplug rep. He had settled in the UK around 1930 and masterminded the modernisation of Dick Seaman’s straight-8 Delage for 1936…

The 2024 Le Mans Hypercar grid was made complete as Lamborghini became the last brand to show off its new design during the Goodwood Festival of Speed. With French brand Alpine pulling the covers off its new A424, inset right, during the centenary Le Mans weekend back in June and BMW already racing its M Hybrid V8 in America, Lamborghini was the last confirmed 2024 top-class entry yet to show off its new challenger. It did plenty to set tongues wagging when it unveiled the SC63 LMDh in Sussex. Featuring some trademark Lambo looks – such as those Y-shaped front and rear lights, the sharp angles of the bodywork and the fact the cars will run in lurid green – the SC63 is the most advanced racing product ever created…

Valentino Rossi celebrated an emotional maiden outright race victory in a GT3 car when he and team-mate Maxime Martin triumphed in race two of the GT World Challenge Europe Sprint Cup at Misano. Having secured his maiden podium at Brands Hatch, Rossi and Martin controlled the second hour-long outing in Italy in their Team WRT-run BMW M4 GT3 to secure an emotional win in front of a partisan crowd clad in yellow. Misano circuit is located just 20 minutes from Rossi’s home town of Tavullia. When asked how the win compared to the multitude of two-wheeled successes the ninetimes MotoGP champion has celebrated, Rossi said: “It cannot be better today. Winning my first race in this series, at Misano, that’s really special. The level is so high and the drivers…

Tyrrell has featured within these pages quite a lot recently following the nowsettled saga over the fate of its famous shed, but more recently Ken Tyrrell’s worldbeaters had another matter to celebrate. To coincide with the release of Richard Jenkins’ new book Tyrrell: The Story of the Tyrrell Racing Organisation, publisher Evro organised the biggest reunion in four decades for the crew, bringing together former drivers, employees and key figures from the Tyrrell dynasty. Five former drivers – Sir Jackie Stewart, Martin Brundle, Eddie Cheever, Brian Henton and Geoff Lees – were among 50 former employees to meet at the event at the Brooklands Museum. Three-time world champion Stewart was accompanied by his very first Tyrrell car, the 001, and four of his original mechanics from his spell with the…

Many people in the MotoGP paddock – including rightsholder Dorna – are worried that the last remaining, embattled Japanese factories will quit the championship. Merely thinking this a few years ago would have been ridiculous, but not any more. Suzuki withdrew from MotoGP at the end of last season, despite having won the championship as recently as 2020 and winning two of the last three races of 2022. So far this year Honda and Yamaha have been humiliated by their European rivals: Italian brands Ducati and Aprilia and Austrian brand KTM. Twenty-two of the 24 podium positions at the first eight grands prix were occupied by riders of European machines. And June’s German Grand Prix was the first since the 1969 Adriatic GP without a single Japanese motorcycle in the…

  30 Race report The trials and tribulations of racing for Red Bull when your name is not Max Verstappen 40 Word on the beat Hamilton’s ‘emotional’ contract, a new name for Alpha Tauri, rain guards in F1 36 Tactical analysis Why the Ferraris proved tyred and out of sorts in yet another frustrating grand prix 37 Good month, bad month Brad Pitt sprinkles Hollywood stardust as crooning actor drops a Silverstone clanger 39 Johnny Herbert Reflections on the British GP, the end of the road for de Vries and Ricciardo’s comeback…

F1 seemingly used to have a select yet steady flow of drivers like René Arnoux on tap – charisma-bottled with talent to spare, but a potential never fully realised. A dual personality defined the Frenchman, who took his final GP win 40 years ago this month: bravery and flair behind the wheel, but a shy, nervous country boy out of it. Arnoux’s non-careerist, passionate approach always limited him to being a good rather than great racing driver. Mark Hughes recounts the Grenoble native’s rock’n’roll racing story in our May 2001 issue. An otherworldly talent elevated him from humble beginnings to F1 with Renault in 1979 and then a Ferrari drive in ’83. That prodigious ability brought Arnoux a sizeable 18 poles, but ‘only’ seven GP wins to go with them.…

There is always an opportunity to be had when a model line reaches its conclusion. Take a small number from the end of production, add a spoiler here, a wing there, a spot of chintz perhaps, tell the world it’s a limited edition, limit that number to the amount you were going to sell anyway, then use all the above to charge a fortune for it. That, precisely, is the recipe for this Audi TT RS Iconic Edition, of which just 100 will be made, 11 of which are destined for the UK and all are sold despite a price of – wait for it – £87,650, some £26,775 more than the standard TT RS to which it is mechanically identical. So you’re paying for those front winglets and spoiler,…

Goodwood Revival, Goodwood Motor Circuit, West Sussex, September 8-10 Goodwood is providing a spectacular rendezvous to end summer with a bang, as thousands join to celebrate the annual Revival. From celebrity faces, to vintage attires, and historic race meetings, it’s an event that never fails to impress. It will be a weekend of anniversaries for the Revival’s 25th running. Goodwood will celebrate 100 years since the birth of legendary racer and car tuner Carroll Shelby, who won at the circuit as a driver in 1959. His impact on motor sport was huge and that will be seen across the weekend. Various Ford GT40s will race in the Whitsun Trophy, while an assortment of AC Cobras will partake in the all-star Royal Automobile Club TT celebration. The signature tribute will celebrate…

Thank the automotive gods for the Nürburgring. Since its creation in 1927, the rollercoaster through the verdant Eifel forests has been considered the ultimate test, and it still is today. Hence the steady drip of car manufacturer record attempts that keep the Nordschleife regularly in the news. It’s still absolutely relevant. And yet it’s also a strange anachronism in our fast-changing world. Yes, the ’Ring is safer than it used to be, but relative to other old-school hairy race circuits neutered for the modern age, not by much. Better barriers, debris fencing and track surfaces are all very well, but the sheer physicality and pure-bred nature of threading it through the trees without respite until you get to the big straight cannot be diluted. Its throwback character is precisely why…

Thirty minutes in a kart is usually enough to leave most drivers feeling physically battered, so when my next-door neighbour William mentioned he was taking part in a 24-hour race featuring multiple 90-minute stints, I thought he was mad. But a few weeks later I found myself embedded with Team Deneros at Buckmore Park in Chatham, Kent, eager to see how its first attempt at the race would unfold. Captained by friends William Mount and Jack Etheridge, Team Deneros is made up of two father-son duos and another pair of mates thrown into the mix. Split into Pro and Rookie categories, the Buckmore Park 24 Hours welcomes teams with a mixture of experience, largely made up of amateur teams of casual racing enthusiasts, to online racing celebrities and the occasional…

● Ford’s North American Sierra was the MERKUR XR4Ti, sold from 1985-89. Only two Eggenberger Group A XR4Tis were built, paving the way for the RS Cosworth and RS500. This 1986 example, far right, is one of them and was driven by Steve Soper and Klaus Niedzwiedz to victory at Estoril in the 1986 ETCC. Fully restored, it’s on sale at CNC MOTORSPORT AWS in Cheltenham; £200,000. ● ASTON MARTIN has opened its first ULTRA-LUXURY FLAGSHIP but to experience such opulence you’ll need to book a flight to the US. Q NEW YORK, below, on Park Avenue features “quintessentially British” design features. Think: chandeliers and fireplaces. “It’s where dreams come true,” said Aston’s executive vice president Marek Reichman, ● If your plan is to purchase an all-electric ROLLS-ROYCE SPECTRE…

With more than 800 cars in action and a crowd that topped 235,000, this year’s Le Mans Classic has gone down as the biggest historic race meeting ever. Running in the shadow of the centenary edition of the modern-day Le Mans 24 Hours, the Classic proved it was no mere sideshow by selling out its ticket allocation easily, the heaving crowd witnessing 24 races, each with an average grid size of 70 starters. Groups of cars divided by age have three 45-minute outings across the span of 24 hours. These six groups, or Plateaux, cover the years of 1923 up to 1981, with aggregates of their three outings creating a final result. There is also a final group for more modern machinery from 1996-2010 that includes GT1s, Group C cars…

What? £200,000 for a Ford Capri!” we hear you cry. Yes, that really is the pre-sale estimate. But the guide price is for a brace of the Blue Oval’s grooviest British coupés, not just for one – and they come with the added bonus of having been immortalised on screen as the cars driven by Bodie and Doyle in the cult 1970s/80s TV show The Professionals. Readers of a certain age who grew up in Britain will probably remember London Weekend Television’s 57-episode series in which Bodie (Lewis Collins) and Doyle (Martin Shaw) worked for a fictional crimefighting agency called CI5 under the direction of boss George Cowley (played by Upstairs, Downstairs butler Gordon Jackson). Neither police officers nor security types, Bodie and Doyle could be described as the UK’s…

Ferrari got itself into an awkward interference pattern with the strategies of its two cars in the Hungarian Grand Prix. Partly this came about through the experimental tyre allocation for this race, introduced as part of the joint sustainability drive of the FIA and Pirelli, whereby each car had only 11 tyre sets for the weekend rather than the usual 13 and each of the three qualifying sessions had its own stipulated compound – hards in Q1, mediums in Q2, softs in Q3. For Ferrari, things became complicated when it found that it just could not get the medium tyre working on their car. Carlos Sainz was finding it a particular problem and he failed to make it out of Q2 as a result, going 11th fastest. Charles Leclerc was…

After recently being thoroughly surprised in an entirely positive way by the Maserati Grecale [Sometimes less is so much more, August], I approach the Alfa Tonale, another Italian SUV from the same Stellantis stable, with hope soaring in my heart. It certainly looks the part – quite the most attractive car in its class I’d say – and the interior is no less easy on the eye, effective and spacious too. So far so good. Sadly then, as a thing to drive this is a deeply disappointing Alfa, probably the least likeable car (if not the worst) to come from that stable that I have driven. And, no, that’s not just because it’s an SUV, for I’d never dream of saying the same or anything close to it of its…

How many people first competed in an MG? Until diluted to a mere badge, these unassuming machines based on common mechanicals were a reliable way into many competitive car pleasures. Here is the man who made it happen – Cecil Kimber, known as ‘Kim’, warts and all. Jon Pressnell, known for detailed research on lesser-known figures of the motoring sphere, goes to town on Kim, including his infidelity and his conservative views such as loathing jazz and disapproving of increasing women’s rights – he refused to let one daughter take up her scholarship to Oxford – alongside his more positive capabilities. You have to be impressed by his work ethic – running his several Morris garages and developing his own sporty variations on a Morris theme. Yet MG was never…

My family car as a child... The first family car I remember was my Father’s DeSoto in the 1940s, an American car. In the war years they had a bag tank on the roof, running on gas, but I wasn’t interested in cars as a small child, that came later when we moved to Melbourne when I was 12-years old. My first road car... A Standard Vanguard (below). I needed a car to tow my Lotus 18. I was working for a BMC dealer and this old lady came in with this car, the paintwork was all faded, but it had low mileage, so I bought it for next to nothing. I was hooked on motor racing when... The father of a friend of mine had a hillclimb car, and…

1 1953 Staride-Norton Notable by its up-front cockpit, Xavier Kingsland’s Staride unusually boasts a central fuel tank. After finding the much-modified car in the US he returned it to original spec, including its swing-axle rear suspension and original Manx. Prices of 500s are fairly static, he says, and he’s pleased about that because it “keeps them affordable for newcomers”. 2 1947 Wasp Though his father Cliff had raced it after buying it from Duncan Rabagliati, Edwin Jowsey’s Wasp sat unused for years while he and Cliff raced other things before an invitation to the 2019 Revival sparked a rebuild. The oldest 500 still racing and famous in period, it dates at least to 1947 with the Fry family, though now in ’52 spec with a Manx replica motor. 3 1956…

1997 LAND ROVER DISCOVERY 300 TDI SOLD BY ARTCURIAL, £76,720 The superb condition of this Discovery belied that it was one of the 20 examples built for, and used in, the 1997 Camel Trophy which took place in deepest Mongolia. Campaigned by a Spanish team and then stored for a decade, it had retained all of the accessories originally added for the adventure, including bumper-mounted winch, snorkel, roof rack and canoe. Even the multitude of stickers had clung on for 25 years. Subsequently sold to a Dutch buyer and then moved on to a French enthusiast in 2009, it had been in the vendor’s ownership since 2020 – but still had a mere 33,500km on the clock. 2007 BUGATTI VEYRON SOLD BY ARTCURIAL, £1.2M Announced in 2000 but not delivered…

The internet has given us many great things but sometimes it’s just better to go back to the analogue ways, and that makes the summer festival period a great time for the collectibles market. Yes, buying collectibles online is quick and convenient, but buying from a seller face-to-face has a multitude of benefits that the internet just can’t match. And with a host of motoring-themed festival events coming up across the next few months, the time has never been better to get out hunting a rarity in real life. The Signature Store has been exhibiting and selling direct to the public at the Goodwood Festival of Speed for years, and we love this old-school way of supply. From our side we get to meet the clients directly, assess their needs,…

CadwellPark, dubbed by many as the ‘mini Nürburgring’, is one of my favourite circuits. Sadly, I missed out last year with a broken Mord, so I was even more excited to get out on track this time around. First of all, getting there was quite the adventure. Having persuaded my parents to lend me their 1973 Winnebago Brave camper van for Glastonbury the following weekend, Cadwell came as the perfect opportunity to practice driving it – ahuge challenge in itself! Arriving safe and sound, after a mere four and a half hours, we set up camp for a BBQ. Entered in the VSCC Specials race again I was hoping to improve my times from my last outing at the track; however, practice showed that may be harder than first thought.…