It was fifty years ago...

A few days ago, Autosport's on-line site published an article that really got me thinking about the past.

Fifty years ago in the past.

My past, my history.

It was this article: https://www.autosport.com/f1/feature/10243/the-forgotten-f1-car-that-could-have-been-champion

Yes, it was about a Grand Prix car, one that only ever won one championship race (its very first race, in fact) and, at the time, was absolutely the car I DIDN'T want to see win. It was the BT33, driven by one of the true greats of motorsport, the late Jack Brabham. It was this car (credits to the Autosport site).

You see, a perfectly fine machine. A classic late 1960s design.

And that is why I didn't want it to win. Because it was competing with a certain car and a certain driver who, in combination, became my first ever sporting heroes. The car is the one that heads up this article and the shot that made me, as a 9 year-old, stop and stare in January or February 1970 would have been taken at the same time as this one. It was on the cover of my elder brother's copy of Motorsport magazine - at least I think it was the cover, memory over this timescale (fifty years - fifty? How the hell did that happen?) is a little hazy! I do remember the effect it had on me. I stared and stared at it and fell in love with the car. I needed to know everything about it, who built it, who was going to drive it?

Why did I feel like that? Well because it looked so MODERN. It was space age, like nothing I'd every seen before.

And for those who are lucky enough to be young enough not to remember this era, this was the height of the space age. A few months before Apollo 11 had landed on the moon. In April 1970 the drama of Apollo 13 was played out in front of a global audience over several tense days. Space X and the crewed Dragon capsule may be a major step but, fifty years ago was the time of the giant leap.

So this car, the Lotus 72, WAS the giant leap.

1970 was the year the World Cup in Mexico, of England's failed attempt to retain the Jules Rimet trophy, of Pele and Rivelino and the greatest World Cup team of all time in the best final. But to me it wasn't.

1970 for me was Lotus and Jochen Rindt, my first ever sporting hero.

It was the first time I'd every been interested in a sport. It's an interest that has stayed with me to this day. I can still tell you, from memory all of the world champions since 1950 and the car they drove. I can also remember who won most of the Grand Prix from the early sixties to teh early 1980s. Those who know me think I'm a nerd about aircraft. The truth is that my real supernerd credentials are about this era of F1 racing!

So I thought I'd turn the clock back fifty years and spend the summer blogging about the Summer of 1970. I've been on eBay (sorry Nic) and quite a few fifty-year old source material will be arriving in the post.

(Which raises another issue: How are people; in this digital age, going to be able to obtain reliable contemporary material in fifty years time?)

So you can look forward to some wallowing nostalgia.

And those of you with some knowledge of the history of motor sport will know that this is going to be a rough ride throughout without a happy ending...