{"id":491749,"date":"2011-03-01T15:00:29","date_gmt":"2011-03-01T15:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportscardigest.com\/\/?p=35970"},"modified":"2024-12-27T03:07:48","modified_gmt":"2024-12-27T03:07:48","slug":"trying-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.supercars.net\/blog\/trying-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Trying Times"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Monza 1970\u00a0 was where I realized that Grand Prix racing, certainly with Team Lotus, wasn\u2019t for me. I believe too that, in the eyes of Colin Chapman, the writing may have been already on the wall. We were testing the Lotus 72 without wings, I had a major disagreement with him and we fell out. The weekend went from bad to worse with Jochen Rindt\u2019s fatal accident, following that it was easy to simply walk away. I think in the shadow of the events at Monza I was at an all time low, and there was no effort on my part to take the action I did.<\/p>\n

The Lotus 72 was a radically designed racing car that was very fragile and broke on many occasions. These constant breakages conspired to affect my confidence with the car, especially as I was from an engineering background. Looking back at the Grand Prix racing era of the 1969 and 1970 seasons, it was a period of flux, especially at Team Lotus. These included the aerodynamic developments from high wings to low wings on the Lotus 49, the experimental four-wheel-drive Lotus 63, then the Pratt & Whitney turbine Lotus 56, and sandwiched in between was the Lotus 72. Many would consider my role almost as a test and development driver rather than a racer, however, I didn\u2019t mind. Jochen Rindt didn\u2019t particularly like the testing, on the other hand it was something I really enjoyed. Again, with my roots being in engineering, when one is testing one is usually learning.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n