Motorsport People Profiles
The World's Greatest Drivers, Owners, Engineers & Personalities
Profiles of past and present automotive personalities. The drivers who risked their lives in the early days to the engineers who creatively changed the world of automobiles, this is a celebration of the people who played a major role in the world we love.
Pantheon of Speed: Legends of Motorsports
Dive into a captivating collection of profiles and exclusive interviews with the greatest names in motorsports history – the drivers who defied limits, the engineers who pushed boundaries, the designers who shaped iconic machines, and the visionaries who built racing empires. From the daredevils of early Grand Prix racing to the modern masters of Formula 1, we celebrate the men and women who have etched their names into the annals of motorsport legend.
Ronnie Peterson Biography Ronnie Peterson was born on 1944 in Örebro, Sweden, the son of an avid racer of moderate accomplishments. His father’s love for all things mechanical was inherited by his son. When Peterson was only eight years old his father built him a car, or at least the young Ronnie...
Legendary team owner Frank Arciero has died from the aftereffects of an aneurysm. Arciero was a 14-year-old Italian immigrant when he arrived in America just prior to the outbreak of World War II, and despite speaking no English proceeded to craft a classic American Dream success story in three different...
Edmund Rahal, who though mainly unknown was the first of the racing Rahals, passed away last December 16 at the age of 84. Ed and Michael (the better-known father of Bobby) Rahal’s grandfathers were brothers, so Michael (a racer himself) and Bobby are distantly related to Ed. In VR’s January...
Rallying’s original Flying Finn, Timo Mäkinen, passed away last Thursday at the age of 79. Mäkinen is perhaps best known for his pair of “hat tricks” of consecutive wins in the 1000 Lakes Rally in Finland — in 1965, ’66 and ’67 — with a works Mini Cooper S, and...
After years of research, Ed McDonough reveals the influences and pressures that drove Mexican racing hero Pedro Rodriguez to the pinnacle of motorsport…and an untimely death. July 11 marks 31 years since Pedro Rodriguez took part in what a number of writers subsequently called a “meaningless Interseries race” at the...
John Von Neumann is an important name in the history of the second half of the twentieth century. A Princeton professor, he was an eminent mathematician and physicist, instrumental in the development of computer science, a participant in the Manhattan Project to develop the atom bomb and a Nobel laureate....
Gilles Villeneuve Biography “He’s different from the rest of us, on a separate level …” Jacques Laffite describing Gilles Gilles Villeneuve was born in Quebec on 18 January, 1950. He rose up through snowmobile racing and Formula Atlantic. In fact he credits some of his success to his snowmobiling days:...
Being a dedicated student of the arcane (or having entirely too much time on my hands), I once calculated that in the entire history of Formula One, from its inception in 1948 to present day, only nine drivers ever managed to compete in three successive decades. They are Harry Schell,...
Giuseppe Nino Farina Biography Born in Turin, in the Piedmont region of Italy on October 30, 1906. Nicknamed “Nino”, Farina was the son of Giovanni Farina who had established Stabilimente Farina, a bodywork shop in Turin, the industrial city where much of Italy’s car manufacturing industry was initially located it...
In the youth of our racing enthusiasm, we tend to think obituaries are for drivers. We don’t foresee, or at least don’t want to, that time also will rob us of friends who don’t court risk on the track. Art Eastman, artist, photographer, writer, editor, passionate enthusiast, and friend, departed...
Piero Taruffi Biography Piero Taruffi was born in Rome, Italy on October 10th, 1906. Like many of his peers Taruffi started his racing career on two wheels but unlike others he continued to race motorcycles after gaining success on four wheels. He won his first race on two wheels in...
Like his uncle Gianni Agnelli, Ludovico Scarfiotti was a suave, well-mannered gentleman who was no stranger to the privileges of wealth. He was, perhaps, no Grand Prix star—except on one gifted day in 1966—but he turned himself into an immensely capable hillclimber and sports car racer. Born in Turin in...
Frank Falkner got me into racing way back when, he was my mentor who lived in my hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, and was the father of my school friend. So, I think I knew Frank from when I was around 10 years old. To give him his proper title, it’s...
Paul Rosche, the engine wizard who guided BMW to multiple international racing successes, including the Formula One World Championship and victory at Le Mans, has passed away at the age of 82. Joining BMW fresh out of university in 1957, Rosche logged 42 years with the Bavarian company. In 1969...
Colin Chapman Biography Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman was born on 9 May, 1928 in a suburb of London. He grew up living at the Railway Hotel, Hornsey, which his father managed. One of the first significant events of Chapman’s life occurred in March of 1944 when he met his future...
Texas professional and historic racer Charles Nearburg has a long and diversified motorsport resume. At the profession level, he’s competed in everything from Super Vee and Toyota Atlantic to Le Mans and Champ cars, while even breaking the Land Speed Record for piston-powered, wheel-driven vehicles at 414.316 mph along the...
On September 24, the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, California, opened a new retrospective exhibit honoring the automotive and motorcycle legacy of actor Steve McQueen. On screen, McQueen captured the high-horsepower car culture of the ’60s and ’70s with some of Hollywood’s most memorable car chase scenes in such...
Dozens of books and thousands of articles have been written about Enzo Ferrari and the Scuderia he founded in 1929, which eventually led to his bright red cars winning 31 combined Formula One World Championships and 13 World Sports Car titles, plus a string of the world’s most famous races,...
Englishman Dan Wheldon was killed in a 15-car crash on the 11th lap of the scheduled 200-lap IndyCar season finale at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in mid-October. The two-time and reigning Indy 500 winner and former IRL champion became the victim of massive blunt force head trauma when his car...
Vintage Racecar was immensely saddened to hear of the passing of “Gentleman” Jack Sears following a long fight with cancer. Jack was born into a farming family in Northampton. His love of cars came through his father Stanley’s interest and participation in motoring events. Jack first took part in the...
Georges Louis Frederic Boillot Biography Georges Louis Frederic Boillot was born in Valentigney, France on August 3rd, 1884 A mechanic by training he began automobile racing in 1908. He went on to join drivers Paul Zuccarelli and Jules Goux to help create a novel range of racing cars as part...
Surtees qualified his Ferrari 158 5th for the 1964 British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch and drove up to finish 3rd behind Jim Clark and Graham Hill. How do you get to be the only man to have won both the motorcycle and Formula One World Championships in a single...
Sad news emerging today that British driver and team manager, Reginald Harold Haslam “Tim” Parnell has passed away at the age of 84. The son of racing great Reg Parnell, Tim qualified for two Grands Prix in 1959, but eventually went on become a noted team manager, including the BRM...
Known simply as “Prof” to many in the motor racing community and Sid to his near friends, Professor Watkins may have made more of a mark on motor racing safety over the past 30 years than anyone else. Indeed, his dogged determination and stubbornness to get things right nearly cancelled...
This large, domineering man invented the job of motor racing team manager and in doing so changed the way the sport was run forever. Believe it or not, racing drivers of the 1920s used to thrash around circuits for hours on end without ever knowing their position or even whether...
Paddy Hopkirk’s strength and wit at the Monte Carlo Rally in 1964 launched the Northern Ireland racing driver into the United Kingdom’s most celebrated rally driver and propelled the Mini into racing stardom. Now 87, Paddy still enjoys his enthusiasm for the Mini and savors the trials of winding country...
George Herbert Skinner (also known as Bert) and Thomas Carlyle Skinner (also known as Carl) created the Skinners Union (SU) brand. Experimenting with fuel mixtures in the early 1900s they made their first carburetor in 1904 and went on to form The SU Company in 1910. Carl Skinner had two...
Longtime SCCA stalwart Andy Porterfield died in mid-April at the age of 80 from complications following heart valve surgery. Beyond being honored with the club’s premier award, the Woolf Barnato Trophy, in 2009, Porterfield’s list of on-track accomplishments are highlighted by an unprecedented 22 Southern Pacific Division championships, back-to-back B-Production...
Recognized as Australia’s first professional racing driver, David McKay died on Boxing Day, December 26, 2004. Starting out racing MGs during the mid-1950s, McKay soon realized that his income as a motoring writer did not support his sport. As early as 1958, he convinced Australian oil company Ampol of the...
Gianpiero Moretti, founder of the Italian automotive equipment company Momo, for MOretti-MOnza, and a gentleman sportscar racer, has died at his home in Milan, Italy, at the age of 71 following a long battle with lung cancer. Moretti was a regular campaigner in IMSA competition during the organization’s glory days...
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