It is a bit of a different show this time around. Our broadcast colleague and producer Jim Roller is marooned in the basement of his home in North Carolina dealing with the recent devastation caused by Storm Helene. Consequently we are unable to bring you the intended podcast but instead Paul Jurd and Paul Tarsey sat down and reminisced about the racetracks of the UK mainland. Amongst their memories, Tarsey remembers his first ever motor sport outing to see the Silver Arrows demonstrated by Peter Collins and Tony Brooks at Oulton Park and PJ recalls Thruxton in the 1960s.
Historic Racing News
Motorsport legend Dick Bennetts talks about everything from being Ayrton Senna’s team owner before the Brazilian superstar got to Formula One to running Nigel Mansell in a Ford Mondeo. Derek Drinkwater met up with Jim Roller at Watkins Glen and they talked about Derek’s epic coast-to-coast-and-back-again trip across the USA in his Cadillac Le Monstre, and Joe Bradley investigates the best and worst books about Ayrton Senna.
Richard Petty is on the show this month! ‘The King’ tells Paul Tarsey about his NASCAR career, the highs and lows of being the leading stock car driver of his generation as well as a team owner. He brought over that incredible Plymouth Superbird from 1970 and his son Kyle drove that up the Goodwood Hill. Martin Warner brings us up to date on plans for the wonderful Shere Hill Climb which will take place on 1st September near Guildford in the Surrey Hills, plus auction news from Jim Roller and Paul Jurd’s reflections of this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed.
Peter Stevens talks about his amazing career as a designer of road cars, supercars and much more, including the Group C derived Jaguar XJR15 and the notorious one-make series for these cars which supported 3 Grands Prix in 1991 and had a $1million prize fund. Plus Derek Drinkwater, who raced his Cadillac ‘Le Monstre’ re-creation at Daytona last November and then drove it (towing a caravan!) all the way across the USA to Laguna Seca in California.
The team takes a look back to Monaco Historique and Nick Padmore talks Paul Tarsey about how he he raced two of Colin Chapman’s famous JPS Lotus cars at this year’s event. He also explains some of the unique challenges which Monaco can pose and how he was invited to take Zak Brown and Adrian Newey on a track walk, the day before the action started, to explain to them both where Monaco’s most treacherous spots await the unwary. Zak was racing the ex-Alan Jones Williams FW07 and Adrian was racing his GLTL Lotus 49 over the weekend. Monaco is not just about the racing and Jim Roller discusses the three high-profile auctions which took place over the same weekend in the principality, especially looking at the sale of Jody Scheckter’s collection. Paul Jurd has been reading Peter Higham’s latest book in his ‘Grand Prix Cars, Car by car’ series which covers the decade 2000 to 2009.
May 1st marks the 30th anniversary of Ayrton Senna’s death and the HRN team talk about the legendary Brazilian and the legacy he left. The team play a Senna-themed round of their gameshow ‘Corridors of Power’ when they look for Ayrton’s greatest-ever Monaco Grand Prix. Nick Whale joins the team once again and this time talks about when is a historic racing car genuine and when is it just a new car with an old chassis plate!
Jim Roller talks to Ray Evernham about his full and varied career from the early days as a driver in ‘modifieds’ through his big break with the International Race of Champions (IROC) team, to his career defining role as one of the greatest-ever NASCAR crew chiefs. Bruce Jones, Peter Snowdon and Nick Padmore discuss the recent Goodwood Members Meeting and Joe Bradley looks back at the life of journalist and writer Michael Cotton.
Joe Bradley, Jim Roller, Paul Jurdand Damien Smith discuss ‘My Favourite BTCC Car’. The choices are wide ranging and Paul Tarsey is faced with some are pretty surprising ideas. Goodwood has asked for our help about what becomes of the famous Tyrrell Shed recently installed at the Motor Circuit and we have a look around the Goodwood Members Meeting test day. Gordon Shedden tells us about some of the cars he is now driving and just why he loves historic racing.
The team talks to Alan Brewer from the Goodwood Road Racing Club about the upcoming Members Meeting and John Pearson from Equipe Classic Racing tells us about their very ambitious 2024 calendar which includes historic F2 cars for the first time. Jim Roller, Paul Jurd, Joe Bradley and Paul Tarsey look into the surprising news that Felipe Massa is suing the FIA because he was ‘robbed’ of the 2008 World Championship and then discuss the surprisingly long history of the Australian Grand Prix.
The team look back on the life of Hugh Chamberlain, who died at the end of February. They also share personal memories and stories about a man described as ‘one of the last great characters of motorsport’. Nick Whale, boss of Iconic Auctioneers, talks about all the behind-the-scenes work that goes on simply to stage the auctions for which his company is famous and Corridors of Power this time is about the inventions of Lotus founder Colin Chapman.