Great Read

Interviews by Rob Widdows & Nigel Roebuck With the death of Gilles Villeneuve Grand Prix racing will not be the same. It will still go on and one day another…

Toyota, like its great rival Nissan, was a company in a hurry in the late 1960s. A 1300bhp per tonne sort of a hurry. A Group 7 twin-turbocharged 5-litre V8…

Motor racing is essentially a science; it's supposed to be about nuts and bolts, numbers on lap charts and on stopwatches. But sometimes other, less tangible factors seem to play…

One of the many pleasures in going to New York used to be dinner with René Dreyfus, who personified the word 'gentleman' like few folk I have known. It would…

We all remember our first grand prix. You can watch it for years on the television but until you actually go and watch a gridful of Formula 1 cars come past, feel…

How do you put together a new Formula One car in Bognor Regis, with an assembly team switched from making refrigerators, and expect anything but trouble? Well, the Lec CRP1…

It was a novel, if not naïve, concept: bringing 10 of the best and bravest IndyCar drivers from America to Italy to compete against an equal number of Formula 1’s…

I am sometimes asked about past Williams drivers and Carlos Reutemann in particular, who is always referred to as enigmatic because he was sparing with his true thoughts and often…

In 1988 Ben Johnson was first across the line in the 100 metres final at the Seoul Olympic Games. Those words are chosen carefully, for the Canadian sprinter did not…

Will Riccardo Patrese's record of 256 GP starts ever be beaten? Today it's hard to imagine anyone surviving 17 years at the top level of the sport without burning out…

Countless schoolboys have fantasised about winning Le Mans, perhaps in a car painted in patriotic dark green; perhaps – even better – in a self-built car carrying their own name.…

Just to prove that dying embers burn hottest, the De Varzarez Enterprises squad droned around to claim surprise honours in the 1984 Sebring 12 Hours. That would be surprise in…

Thirty years ago, AJ Foyt ensured his legendary status in motor racing history by becoming the first man to win four Indy 500s. Foyt scored his third Indy 500 win…

Like many schoolboys in post-War Britain, I had an insatiable appetite for stories about a character called Wilson. He'd swim the Channel before breakfast, score a pre-lunch century against the…

The initiation of the Williams FW14B goes back to the winter of 1984 when we were approached by AP Racing, with whom we worked closely on brakes and clutches. They…

The man in the cowboy hat pushes open the café door. The few people tucking in to breakfast stop, forks poised, mouths open. The tiny, wiry figure is wearing pale…

Jansen van Vuuren is loving this. Usually he works as a booking clerk at Jan Smuts Airport, but this week the 19-year-old from Johannesburg has taken up station at the…