Memories of Ken Tyrrell, 25 years on from his passing

McLaren’s magnificent trophy cabinet must be about half a mile long. At least, that’s how it seems when you take a walk along the McLaren Technology Centre’s boulevard and admire the silverware. A mention in the last issue of Autosport that McLaren needs to extend this massive display cabinet brought a wry smile that had nothing to do with the thought that Stefano Domenicali will feel the need to issue another statement saying how wonderful Formula 1 is. I was actually thinking about a former F1 team principal’s attitude to the trappings of success.

When Ken Tyrrell passed away 25 years ago this August, a member of his family idly wondered what he had done with the trophies. After all, the Tyrrell Racing Organisation had won three drivers’ world championships, two constructors’ crowns and 33 grands prix. So, where was the silverware? None had been on display in the team’s modest headquarters in the former woodyard in deepest Surrey. It was only while rummaging around in the attic of the family home that they found cups blackened with age and barely recognisable – but no less significant for what they represented.

Here was the trophy for the 1968 Dutch GP, the F1 team’s first win (running a Matra); then a cup from the German GP of the same year, marking a truly incredible drive on the Nurburgring Nordschleife by Jackie Stewart in appalling wet and foggy conditions that would never be countenanced today; and then two official mementoes of Stewart’s victories at Monaco. And so it went on, each dust-caked award being the tangible evidence of how an F1 team of no more than 25 people had beaten the likes of Ferrari, Lotus and McLaren with cars built in a wooden hut bought for a song from an army barracks in Guildford. They don’t make race teams like that anymore and none of the current F1 team principals come from the same mould as Robert Kenneth Tyrrell.

But here’s the thing. If Ken were still around today and you wistfully repeated that thought, he would curtly dismiss the comparison as romantic claptrap. “I think a lot of people have sentimental diarrhoea,” was his colourful response – delivered with a toothy grin – when I raised the subject during an interview in 1993 on the 25th anniversary of the birth of his F1 team. “Look,” he said, “it’s different. The cars are more advanced, there’s more money but, when it comes to racing – when it comes to winning – it’s exactly the same. It’s bloody difficult; always has been, always will be.”

One of Tyrrell's trophies in use before collecting dust in a family attic

Photo by: David Phipps / Sutton Images via Getty Images

It is easy to imagine that his view would be similar if discussing the current state of Duracell F1 (other batteries are available). He would also be in total accord with 24 races – or however many F1 manage to cram onto their Profit and Loss Account (aka F1 Calendar). Yes, the money would be nice. (Tyrrell was smart enough to take a third car to the United States GP in the days when the event at Watkins Glen was the biggest payer of prize money – by quite some way – on the 12-race calendar.) But Ken simply loved going racing. Mind you, his enthusiasm for motorsport was only marginally ahead of a passion for Tottenham Hotspur and the England first XI. Particularly the latter.

In what now seem wonderfully carefree days before the internet and social media, it was almost impossible when away from home to keep abreast of the latest test match score. When on the telephone to their respective sports desks back in the UK, F1 correspondents for national newspapers soon learned, even if they didn’t know a wicket from a walking stick, to enquire about the test match. It was a cast iron certainty this would be the first question Ken would ask if you walked into the Tyrrell garage with the misguided intention of talking F1. Being ignorant of the latest state of play at Lords would be treated with the same disdain as not knowing your mother’s maiden name.

Tyrrell bent down, leaned into the cockpit, his craggy face an inch from Stewart’s. “You think you’ve got problems,” he roared. “England are 78 for six!”

Stewart tells the story of practice at the Nordschleife. The Scot had come into the pits, flipped up his visor and was reeling off a catalogue of problems: the handling, the tyres, the track, the weather, the engine; nothing was right. Tyrrell, clipboard tucked under his arm, listened impassively. When the monologue had finished (bear in mind, this was in the days before headsets and radio communication), Tyrrell bent down, leaned into the cockpit, his craggy face an inch from Stewart’s. “You think you’ve got problems,” he roared. “England are 78 for six!”

Having watched from the spectator fence during the previous decade as his team set the standard, I was never in doubt that Ken Tyrrell was the man I wanted to interview first when I became a professional writer and travelled to the 1977 South African GP. Not only did Ken agree to see me, a complete stranger and novice, he also suggested we meet over a gin and tonic with his wife Norah at their room in the Kyalami Ranch. The chat lasted for more than an hour. It was the first of many we would enjoy until that sad day 25 years ago. At no time did Ken ever ask me to come and look at his trophies – largely because he hadn’t the faintest clue where they were.