Time and Two Seats

By Janos L Wimpffen

ISBN 967 22 52 05

Published by Motorsport Research Group, £129.99

I am willing to bet that this will never be supplanted. In two huge volumes, Wimpffen (historian for Bruce McCaw’s collection) has recorded the complete history of championship sportscars in Europe and USA from 1953 on. The detail is astounding, the weight of facts overwhelming, and the structure so complex that the book actually has a chapter of instructions.

Of the three sections, the first gives an overview of sportscar racing, changing rules, and national differences. The next, the actual racing, has a chapter per season, previews, reviews, tables and several pages of workmanlike text on every race. Photos are relatively few, but they can be found elsewhere, whereas you won’t find anywhere else detail like who was entered for a certain race and then replaced before practice. The final section is called Superlatives — page after page of driver listings, results, fatalities, race records by speed, distance, country — there are even eight pages of driver pseudonyms.

Combining complete narrative and results in a context of climate and politics over five decades of the sport, this is bound to become a main arbiter for sports-racing history. An amazing achievement. GC