There are, of course, no shortage of places in Britain that would be a fitting venue given that he raced everywhere there was to race in period. But obvious choices would be Goodwood where his career effectively started in 1948 and where it ended in 1962. He won so much there, not least the World Sports Car Championship for Aston Martin in 1959. And there’s Aintree where in 1955 he won his first World Championship F1 race and at the same time became the first British driver to win the British Grand Prix. Or there’s Silverstone, home of his beloved BRDC, the RAC in London whose Tourist Trophy he won seven times – a number to this day no-one else has even approached.
But just as compelling, at least to me, are the cars you’d invite along. So let us say, just for the sake of amusement, whatever venue was chosen had space for just ten machines. Which would they be?
For me some are essential, like a little 500 of the kind in which he made his name. A C-type Jaguar too, because the work he did perfecting its disc brakes with Norman Dewis and others helped change not just motor racing, but motoring itself.
Of course there’s have to be a Mercedes 300SLR and a Vanwall in which he helped the marque become the first British make to win the Constructors’ title too. An Aston Martin DBR1 seems essential, as does a Cooper-Climax T43 in which he won Cooper’s first F1 race in Argentina in 1958 and the first by a mid-engined car. And a Lotus 18 because he always ranked his wins in Rob Walker’s at Monaco and the Nurburgring among his finest.
