Andy Wallace on hitting 300mph and the secrets behind speed records | part two
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Car
Mclaren F1
The McLaren F1 is a famous supercar that was made in the 1990s. It has a special design where the driver sits in the middle of the car, and it was one of the fastest cars when it was released.
Concept
Le Mans
Le Mans is a famous car race that lasts for 24 hours. Cars race around a track, and the goal is to go as far as possible in that time. It's a big deal in the car racing world.
Car
Ford Cortina
The Ford Cortina is an older car that many families in the UK used to drive from the 1960s to the 1980s. It was known for being practical and not too expensive, making it a common choice for everyday use. People remember it because it was a big part of many people's lives back then.
Concept
restomod
A restomod is when you take an old car and fix it up, adding new parts to make it better while keeping its classic look. It's like giving an old car a new life with modern features.
Car
Dodge Journey
The Dodge Journey is a type of SUV that can carry a lot of people and stuff, making it great for families. It has a comfortable interior and is good for long trips. People talk about it because it's a practical choice for those who need space.
Brand
Lamborghini
Lamborghini is a brand that makes very expensive and fast sports cars. They're famous for their flashy designs and powerful engines.
Car
Ford Fiesta
The Ford Fiesta is a small car that's easy to drive and doesn't cost a lot of money to buy or maintain. It's a good choice for people who want something practical.
Term
synthetic oil
Synthetic oil is a special kind of oil made in a lab, which helps engines run better and last longer than regular oil. It works well in both hot and cold weather.
Concept
Jim Russell Racing School
Jim Russell Racing School is a place where people can learn how to drive race cars. They teach you how to handle the car and improve your driving skills on a racetrack.
Car
Van Diemen
Van Diemen makes race cars, especially for beginners in racing. The '77 model is one of the cars they made in that year, focusing on helping new drivers learn how to race.
Car
Landyman
The Landyman is a type of Land Rover that was built for tough jobs, often used on farms or for work. It's known for being strong and able to drive on rough ground.
Concept
Formula One
Formula One is a top-level racing series where cars compete in races called Grands Prix. It's famous for fast cars and exciting races held in different countries.
Concept
Formula Ford
Formula Ford is a type of race car that is simple and light. It's often where new drivers start their racing careers because it focuses on driving skills rather than fancy technology.
Car
Suzuki AP50
The Suzuki AP50 is a small motorcycle that is easy to ride, making it great for beginners. It has a tiny engine, which means it's not very fast but is perfect for getting around town.
Term
lap times
Lap times are how long it takes a car to go around a racetrack once. They help determine how fast a car is compared to others in a race.
Car
Hawk DL 11
The Hawk DL 11 is a type of sports car that is light and fast, often used for racing. It's a kit car, which means you can build it yourself or have someone else do it, and you can make it unique to your style.
Car
BMW M6
The BMW M6 is a fancy sports car that is very fast and has a lot of power. It's designed for people who want a mix of luxury and speed when they drive. People talk about it because it's one of the best cars for those who love driving.
Concept
Formula 40
Formula 40 refers to a specific class of race cars used in racing competitions. They are built to be very fast and are designed to perform well on race tracks.
Concept
Formula 1
Formula 1 is a popular car racing series where teams compete with very fast cars. It's known for exciting races and advanced technology.
Concept
chicane
A chicane is a part of a racetrack that has a series of sharp turns. It makes drivers slow down and be more careful when racing through that section.
Concept
Donington Park
Donington Park is a well-known racetrack in England where many car and motorcycle races take place. It's famous for its challenging layout and exciting races.
Concept
F3 championship
F3 is a type of car racing for younger drivers. It's a way for them to gain experience before moving up to bigger races like Formula 1.
Concept
Formula Four
Formula Four is a type of car racing for beginners. It uses small, fast cars that help new drivers learn how to race before moving on to faster and more expensive cars.
Term
horsepower
Horsepower is a way to measure how powerful an engine is. The higher the horsepower, the more powerful the engine, which usually means it can go faster.
Term
paddock
The paddock is like a pit area where race teams park their cars and work on them during a race event. It's where they make repairs and adjustments before the next race.
Concept
Formula Three
Formula Three is a racing series where drivers use fast single-seater cars. It's an important level for young drivers who want to eventually race in Formula One.
Brand
Jaguar
Jaguar is a luxury car brand from Britain that makes elegant and fast cars, like the F-Type sports car.
Company
TWR
TWR stands for Tom Walkinshaw Racing, a company that was involved in car racing and engineering.
Term
traction control
Traction control helps your car maintain grip on the road by stopping the wheels from spinning too fast when you accelerate. This is especially useful when it's wet or slippery outside.
Car
Ford Mustang
The Ford Mustang is a famous car that many people love because it's fast and looks cool. It has been around for a long time, starting in the 1960s, and is often seen as a fun car to drive. People talk about it because it represents a sense of adventure and excitement.
Term
55 miles an hour limit
A speed limit is the highest speed you can legally drive on a road. In this case, it's 55 miles per hour, which means you shouldn't go faster than that.
Car
Bugatti Veyron
The Bugatti Veyron is a super-fast car that is very expensive and known for being one of the fastest cars ever made. It can go really, really fast, faster than most cars you see on the road. People talk about it because it's like a dream car for many and shows what amazing things can be done with cars.
LIVE
We did over 1,000 kilometres above 400.
I had to drive back the next day.
I drove for a week, I drove everywhere,
10 miles an hour under the speed limit.
They're making you do that, you know.
And now they can't.
Welcome back to the second half of our podcast with Andy Wallace.
We're talking so much, we don't actually have time to introduce ourselves.
Anyway, so where were we?
We uncovered the meat of your racing career,
some of the things that people wouldn't have known,
a lot of the things that people fondly remember you for.
But the other side of your career with cars came...
I would guess there's a consequence of your relationship with McLaren
and the famous Harrods.
McLaren F1 third place at Le Mans in 1995,
and then you were already associated with the F1 at that point.
Before we get into that, where did your interest in cars come from?
Were you always, because it's something you were surrounded by
because of your parents or, you know, it's a bit about that.
I'm one of four kids and our family didn't have any money,
but my dad was crazy about cars.
So although he was absolutely crazy about them,
all of his cars were just buckets, basically.
Not very good, but I did learn from him,
I learned the names of all the cars,
just about when your first word wasn't like juice or daddy or mummy,
it was, oh look, there's a full Cortina, things like that.
So I had that, but also, again,
when you haven't got a lot of resources,
but you still want to be mobile on the road
or you want to drive something,
you get ever so creative, and I know you two guys
are on the same page because you've done the same thing to yourselves,
but you buy a really nasty old thing and then you try and do it up.
And in the end, it's not cost you very much in money,
it's cost you a lot of time in time.
But you end up with something, it really means something to you,
even if it's not very fast or it's not very nice,
because a lot of work went into it.
And that's kind of where it all started, I suppose.
And then as time went by...
So it was that urge for independence and mobility,
but you liked the engineering side
or you wanted something to drive or all of those things?
It was the mobility and independence,
but I probably should have said also,
my dad used to take me to some racetracks to watch every now and again.
What was your local?
So local was Silverstone, it was 30 miles away,
and you're leading me into this story, you probably know it already,
but you're going to hear it again, it's just that...
So my dad quite often had to work weekends
to look after all these kids that kept popping out.
So he couldn't take me.
And this is when I was like 14, 13, 14, 15, I guess.
I then used to ride my push-bike to Silverstone.
And quite a busy road,
a 43 with trucks coming in and asking things like that.
And it was, anyway, I'd ride there
and I had a spring-loaded rack on the back,
so I made a cheese and pickle sandwich on the rack
and I cycled all the way there.
I knew how to get to Silverstone as a little hole under the fence,
so being go and watch all the races.
And then sure as eggs is eggs at six o'clock when it was all over,
it's chucking it with rain and now you've got to ride home again.
And it was three hours, three hour journey on a bike.
On the 43 again.
Yeah, all four by truck.
Yeah, but I loved it so much that the cars,
I used to watch everything, I used to walk around.
I just, I couldn't get enough of the car thing.
So although, yeah, it was an independence thing,
it was also very, very interesting in cars,
but because I didn't have any resources at all,
I didn't ever sort of dream about,
you could have the Lamborghini picture on the wall,
but it wasn't like I'm going to get one of those one day.
I thought, you know, if I get to a Ford Fiesta,
I'm doing really well.
But then as things evolved, I got slightly luckier.
Were you a diligent student?
Were you a distracted student?
Or were the things you were good at?
Did you have an aptitude for certain subjects or a plan?
Yeah, to be honest, I was universally rubbish at everything,
except maths and physics.
They were the only two.
And I think the reason that I was okay at them,
which then developed into quite good at them,
was I was interested in that subject.
And that's quite often in the case, isn't it?
If you're really interested in something.
And the two things, yeah, maths and physics together,
just turns out, well, fancy that,
all cars are involving that.
So that took me down that path.
I do remember, I did have a Ford Fiesta at one point,
and it was a one litre or something like that.
It wasn't very fast.
And it was when Mobile One
brought out their synthetic oil.
And I thought, well, it's a really expensive oil,
but let's find out if it's any good.
So I lived, I was living quite close to Whitney
and the Whitney bypass.
So at 11 o'clock at night,
there's nobody on the Whitney bypass,
not that you need space for a one litre Ford Fiesta.
But I, right, although this isn't totally scientific,
it's gonna be good enough for my test.
So I had it already at home.
I had the drip tray and the synthetic oil already there,
and the jack ready and the whole thing.
And I went down the Whitney bypass,
several passes and got my VMAX.
Average, obviously.
Yeah, average, of course, yeah.
And then wheeled it in, took the bung out,
put the Mobile One in.
It was three miles an hour faster with the Mobile One in.
Wow.
So I was fascinated by that.
Sorry, this is great.
So small incremental improvements
and that's motor racing all along, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's all you need.
Lots of these little ones.
Normally I've had a lifetime sponsorship
from Mobile One with that endorsement.
Yeah.
Is that anybody's list?
Yes, exactly.
So it kind of, yeah, it went like that.
So how did you get into racing?
I mean, racing is famously expensive.
Oh, you're leading me into that story as well, aren't you?
I can see.
So, okay, so again, no money,
no hope of ever going motor racing.
It's a lot more difficult now than it was then.
But as luck would have it, as my dad realized,
how crazy I was at motor racing.
For my 17th birthday,
I got the trial lesson at Jim Russell Racing School
at Silverstone, which in those days
was a series of cones down the hangar straight,
up through the gears, break round the cones and back down.
In a ratty old, full of,
ratty old, full of fours, even.
It was a Van Diemen 77 or 76 or something like that.
What year was this?
So I was 17, I suppose.
So it would have been 68.
78.
78, yeah.
Yeah, so it would have been a 77 Landyman, most likely, yeah.
I mean, I hardly stay over the steering wheel,
although I stay, but I, this is fantastic, I love it.
So that was, I think it was 35 quid for this thing.
So then dad said, well, how was that?
I was like, oh, it was fantastic.
He said, right, well, if you want to do the rest of the course,
you best go get yourself some various jobs.
So that's what I did.
And people were flying in from all over the world
and staying for a week or so.
To do the international course.
Yeah, and just do the whole course.
You can do it in a week or even two weeks
if you did some races at the end.
Well, I did the entire course,
but I did it in two years and two months.
Because after I delivered letters and did this
and did that and did the other,
I had enough for another lesson
and they were quite spaced apart,
but it was just, it was fantastic.
And actually I've got the doger on
because I was 15, it was my 15th birthday.
Okay, so as it was.
No, 76, that would have been 76.
And of course you couldn't race in those days
till you were 17.
So the two years and two months
actually was a perfect timing.
That's now I remember.
And I did do two of the school races.
But they used to have this annoying little telltale
on the tap and you weren't allowed to go
past five and a half thousand revs.
And I had a couple of like,
I think the two rows, I think it was in first in a set.
Reset buttons, normally.
Yeah, it's around the back.
They put a tube on it so you couldn't get to it.
So I ended up getting dependency and I didn't win any of them.
But I crossed the line first, got the checkered flag.
There we go, yeah, got the feeling.
And then from then it was like, okay,
yeah, I want to go racing.
So I was working for British Gas.
I trained to be a gas service engineer.
So I had Marina Van for the bag of tools
and going around, obviously not a 15 or 17,
but I joined as an apprentice straight from school at 16.
And then I qualified on that and did that.
But at the same time, I was just always just still dreaming
about going racing.
So the racing was your purpose in life?
Had to do it.
And I thought, okay, I wanted to do it.
I wanted to try and get on the ladders for Formula One.
This was the thing.
So I wasn't looking at touring cars.
I just wanted to formula cars up.
So Formula Ford was quite expensive.
But then as luck would have it,
there was a series called the pre-74 Formula Ford series.
So this would have been 79, yeah.
So 79 and probably even 78,
I had a little AP50 Suzuki was my mode of transport.
And I went round to all the tracks
that the pre-74 went to, bought a ticket this time,
watched the races and actually got some time sheets
from the paddock and found out which cars were at the front.
And importantly, what lap times you needed to do
on all the tracks to be on the front.
So I did that for a while.
And then I thought, right,
okay, I'm going to buy a Hawk DL 11.
So looking in the classifieds,
there was a guy in Scotland who had...
That's Handily.
Yeah, Handily had a Hawk DL 11.
And he had an engineer that was built by Agra
or something like that.
I never heard of him.
I don't know what that was all about.
So we managed to,
anyway, there's no mobile phones and things
going on in these days.
So we said, right, we're looking at the map.
Yeah, in the middle was this Sandback services
on the M6 near Alton Park.
So we met there.
So it was a pretty good hike for us both.
We met there and he arrived
in one of those coach transporters here in the days.
They used to split the rear door open,
put the car in the back.
Anyway, he rocked up in one of these
and sort of met him in the service area,
opened the doors and said,
Formula 40, he wheeled it out.
We fired it up and he'll,
I don't know what I'm looking at.
This is a thing.
And I said, what?
He said, well, we'll have a drive in it.
Yeah, no problem.
I did some laps with some of us.
In a Formula foot.
Bogdale 11.
He probably stepped up a lap though.
Yes.
So he wanted 1,250 quid for it.
And then I had 10,
it was all in 10 pounds.
You should be cashing those days, isn't it?
So I counted it all out
and I got the 1,240, 1,250.
And then he took the money.
He said, thank you very much.
And he took one look at me on the bit scruffy
and I was starving, hungry.
And I said, he's 10 quid.
Get yourself some breakfast.
So it was 2,140 quid.
It was brilliant test.
Well, that was that.
I'd sort of forgot to mention
as we're sitting here in Bedford Autodrome
or close by,
I bought a trailer,
a ratty old trailer from Jonathan Palmer.
50 quid.
And it was a trailer that used mini wheels.
Yeah.
Wheels from Minis.
Oh, that's brilliant.
There's loads of mini wheels in the world.
It must be great.
But the reason people don't use mini wheels as trailers
is because you drive along and then they go bang.
Yeah, that was in a lot of quick.
Yeah, they're absolutely hopeless.
So he sold me this trailer.
Thanks, John.
And there were,
I think there were like two or three spare wheels.
Oh, that's handy.
We've got spare wheels as well.
Well, I used them all before I even got home.
Anyway, that's another story.
So, yeah, so where are we going with this?
It was really just to get a sense of how you...
Oh, I haven't finished yet.
I'll drive.
No, no, no.
It gets better.
It gets better.
No, I'm sorry about that.
It's not, how long has this podcast been there?
No, so then I got surprised, I think.
No, no, no, I've got to test it.
You've got to test it.
Ah, to benchmark yourself, yes, your research.
How do you know?
So, Silverstone Club Circuit
with the 3.5 miles straight and woodcut corner.
Used to watch loads of races from there.
Right, so I booked and it was like a 30 quid Friday test.
It was, in fact, 31st of August, 1979.
So I remember that.
It's another one of those things you learn.
And so you can tell me if that was a Friday,
but I think it was.
I had my dad there, a brother was there,
some mates there were helping tire pressure
and things like that.
I did a few laps, it's going quite well.
It was a big mix of cars, open and closed wheel as well.
All at the same time.
Got to the point where I reckon that was a front row time.
So I was, wow, this is great.
Let's just try doing a couple of small changes,
see what it does.
Made another change, went back out.
Ah, it's even faster.
Ah, this is going to be fine.
Then I'm coming down the club straight
and there was a Clubman's car coming.
So they were on slicks.
Yeah.
Probably wings also.
In any case, he pulled out, passed me, pulled back in,
coming into the braking area.
So everything's still fine.
Hasn't upset my line or anything.
Turns in at the corner and spun.
And I'm directly behind him.
So I was only used to,
I had spun the Formula Ford car a couple of times
and that's on traded tires.
I was used to doing it, it's going a long way after you spin.
Well, I completely misunderstood this.
I thought he was going to spin and go that way.
And he stopped so quickly, I couldn't get inside.
So I was committed to going inside him.
So my left front wheel here is right front wheel.
Three, three barrel rolls.
Oh, geez.
Upside down, scraping along the ground with all sparks,
fuel all over me and sparks from the roll hoop.
And this is absolutely straight up.
It parked in pole position.
Upside down, perfectly.
Apart from it was upside down.
And all of a sudden it stopped flat.
And there it was.
Yeah, it almost stopped flat, yeah.
And then I was like,
I could smell so much fuel all over me.
And I think I probably should get out now.
I was in a massive panic.
And I was struggling to get out.
I couldn't get out.
Well, I've since learned,
first if you want to get out,
you've got to undo the seamers.
Always happens.
They were still fully attached.
That's why I couldn't get out.
And this hand came out under the car.
It was Silverstone Sid.
Out.
And then he said,
and the track was still live.
There's some yellow flags,
but people were ignoring them.
And he said,
stand there, don't move, don't move.
And I just stood with Silverstone Sid
by this upside down car with petrol on the floor,
watching all these other cars coming round.
And that was that.
And basically it messed up the chassis a bit,
twisted it a bit,
made a mess of the roll hoop.
And it was over a grand to put it right.
Oh no.
So this was, I was going to enter a race
at the end of 79.
That obviously didn't happen.
And so it took from 31st August 79,
until January 80,
before I had enough bits and money
and to put it back together.
So I rebuilt it all just in the garage.
I was living with my parents at the time.
So just at their garage at home.
Excuse me.
And we got everything done.
The roll hoop thing we fixed
by just putting the world over it.
And then, you know,
it's in it blank.
That was all nice.
Thank you very much.
I already, before we went to the test,
I thought I better just check what gear ratios I've got.
So I only do all the bolts,
put a little tray underneath
and I pulled and pulled and pulled
and it wouldn't come off.
And then I give it one big massive yank
and it back came off
and all the gears fell in the tray.
I'm like, oh no.
That's never going to go back to bear.
You know, you know that feeling.
Yeah.
Well anyway, it did.
So it was fine.
But yeah.
So then okay, what are we going to do?
Right, 1980.
I thought I'll enter the whole championship.
It was 12 races.
And I better cut this a bit short
because it's getting quite long now.
Sorry, but the short version is,
the very short version is
did okay in the first race,
came third, got fastest lap
but I'd spun in the middle of the race.
Next race, I crashed.
Did another 500 quiz with the damage
and I crashed because I was third
coming into the chicane on the club circuit at Donington.
One, two, three, we've been battling all race.
I'd had a couple of bits in the lead
and I got to the chicane and I was like,
I'm just going to win.
So I pulled out in the past,
both the cars in front of me
and crashed into the wall.
So by this time, everybody that I know,
my dad was like, you just need to just forget this.
You never going to, it's never going to work.
You're going to spend all your money.
You're going to get nowhere.
You should just stop this stupidness.
Rebuilt it again, went to Cadwall Park
and it was a joint motorcycle and car event.
And most cycle guests were on the Friday
and Saturday, maybe on Thursday and Friday or whatever.
So I slept in a little tent next to my Formula Ford
and then when I opened the tent in the morning,
the whole panic's full of bikes everywhere.
And they're all coming up,
oh, it's got too many wheels for the sidecar race.
And then anyway, I ended up winning the race.
That was my fourth race.
So won it and I didn't crash.
And I realised that then, if you stay on the road
and you're doing reasonably well, you're going to be okay.
So I won six of the 12 races and won the championship
and sold the car at the end of the year
for double what I paid for it.
Obviously there were some other costs in good
during the year, but that was kind of the start.
So that was a championship winning car at that point.
Yeah, exactly.
I don't really know how we're going to leapfrog from 1980.
But I know people progressed through careers quickly,
but it was different times then.
I'm still struggling with the,
from 1980 to say, 85 or 86, you win the F3 championship,
88, you win Le Mans, and 90, you win Datoi.
But it's 10 years of your life, isn't it?
So it's a big chunk of dedication.
It's a good to get to that point.
It is and I, not to take anything away from anybody
but to go racing now is incredibly expensive
and you need some...
And there's less of that hands-on sleep in a tent, isn't there?
You send them a big bank transfer, rock up,
and it's like a mini version of Formula One, isn't it?
Yeah, mechanics are doing your car,
you're staying in a hotel, you've got a rental car.
Which I'm sure is from fleshball, actually.
No, but in order to arrive there,
you've either got to be very good commercially
or you've got to have some family backing or whatever it is.
And then, usually, if you've got that,
the position that you're in, the racing is not...
It's something you want to do and you really want to succeed,
but it's not life or death.
And that sounds a bit dramatic, but I...
Basically, I'd put all my eggs in that basket,
I was rubbish at pretty much everything.
If this didn't work...
Yeah, there is no plan B, isn't there?
There's no plan B, it has to work.
And so you would do anything.
I mean, I was still at the gas college,
actually at one point when I had probably this first Formula Four.
And I would be working all the day,
either at the college or on the job,
and then all night I'd be working on the car
and I would just go inside, wash my hands,
change the thing and go, and that's what you did.
But I wasn't alone, everybody else was doing the same thing.
But you come to this corner
and you want to beat the car in front,
and it's not like it'd be really nice if we could win this.
I need to win this, and if I don't, I'm going nowhere.
You really have to have a result
before anybody's even going to look at you.
So that still is the case,
so that's why I say I don't want to belittle anything.
It's a different sort of pressure though, isn't it?
If you have parents who've just sunk 15 million into you.
There's going to be a certain amount of pressure,
but it's not the same thing, is it, I suppose?
It's not, and also just to fill that into a circle
on this money side.
So it used to be that it wasn't easy,
but it was relatively easy in sports car racing
to be paid to drive.
There were drivers bringing money,
but generally the ones that brought money were rubbish.
But over time, that is now not the case.
There are some people who were able to bring money
and they are absolutely on it.
So that's the bit where it changed.
So you were lucky, as long as you could do okay
in the car, you could usually rise to the top.
So yeah, what was that?
So Formula Ford, pretty 74,
the only way to go from that,
the next two steps up to expensive,
so contemporary Formula Ford, had some success in that.
I had, you know, remember the engine patch?
Yes, yeah.
I had son of patch.
And that year, Andrew Gilbert Scott won the festival
in 83 and I had son of patch and we were second.
And the interesting bit about that was,
this was minister engines, surprise these engines,
and they would supply you with two cylinder heads
because it was so competitive, Formula Ford,
that if you just, you lapped all the valves in,
put the thing on, it was crisp as you like.
They were a 105 horsepower.
So now you got 105 and a quarter of a horsepower.
And as soon as you did one run,
they're not quite as crispy as they were.
So you've already got the other one that's already lapped in.
You rush back to the paddock, roll your sleeves up,
drain the water out, oil out,
spank the gasket off, swap heads,
tighten that one down, get it all filled up
with water warmed up, wash your hands back in the car.
And you did it, so it was the heat,
the quarters of the semias in the final,
every single time with a swap of...
Amazing.
They had to do that.
They had to do it, I suppose, to help.
Well, although I did that and I still didn't win.
It came second, so there you go.
But anyway, that was Formula Four.
And then we did do Formula Four 2000
because when I say we,
my dad was working in a printing company called VAP Group.
And the boss of that company was really keen on my choice.
And probably the worst thing that ever happened to us,
it was...
Philip Fluke was his name.
Probably the worst thing that ever happened to us.
My dad was working for it.
He was badgering him the whole time.
And eventually, he did start to give it a little bit of sponsorship.
So he had VAP on the car.
But he also had a few friends who owned this and owned that.
And it would be like, you know, 50 quid there, 100 quid there,
1,000 quid there to put it together.
And eventually, after doing Formula Four 2000,
which was quite an eye-opener because you know you've got slicks and wings.
And that's another thing to learn.
We were able to put some money together to do Formula Three.
And we never...
Even the year we won, so the budget for a year then
would be about £130,000.
And I...
That's a lot of money in...
It's a lot of money in 85s, wasn't it?
And I think, in total, I think we were able to raise 50.
So we ended up doing it on that.
But we had a loan chassis from Reynard, we had a loan engine,
Volkswagen engine, which is where my connection with Volkswagen came from.
I know, bit by bit.
Well, that kind of brings us back to where we pretty much where we came
in at the start of the first half.
But, so...
You're now known for your roles,
well, role with Bugatti currently in the Claren prior to that,
and you're saying about Jaguar.
So should we...
Let's step into your, I guess you were straddling professional driver
and sort of starting to get involved in some development driving
or when they needed a nutcase to go as fast as something possibly could.
They'd phone you and set you off.
So you were saying about a Jaguar.
We know you well for the McLaren's B record and the Bugatti record,
but there was something before that.
Yeah, so actually, in the 2020s, I was driving for TWR.
And then Tom Wilkinshire said to me,
and I know John Nielsen had done a bit of development on that 222.
He did the Nürburgring.
He didn't have time to do it.
Exactly, yeah.
Yes, he did.
And he said,
we need somebody to do some development driving for this.
And so basically we sat down and I had a contract to do 50 days of development with a car.
And I was remembering him saying to one moment, I was all done and everything.
And he said, now, look, this is not a race car.
If you crash a race car, I'm really annoyed.
If you crash one of these bad news and it wasn't from hurting yourself, just the cost.
Yeah, they're not designed to be crashed.
Yeah, exactly.
So I thought I took that on board.
OK, that's fine.
So I started to do development and I was working with Alistair McQueen one day
and we were in, I think it was Millbrook.
I think it was Millbrook, not going crazy fast, but it was wet.
And that was a V6 turbo engine and I think it had like 547 horsepower or something.
But it came when the boost came in, it was pretty rapid.
So we just were driving relatively slowly.
We were still on the access roads and things inside, but there's a roundabout.
Went around the roundabout, came off the roundabout, just sort of tipped into the throttle,
went over a bump and the car did a 360 and kept going.
I looked at each other and I was like, what the hell just happened, you know?
And I really wasn't pushing or anything.
So then what had happened actually got back through the system
and we then realised that in the rain it was a bit of a handful
because there's no traction control or ABS or anything.
So between us we had about one bar boost and we thought, OK, so if we have a button
that you press when it's raining and you have a half a bar boost,
it should stop it doing that because that's not really what we want.
And that was what we started to develop.
And then the Jaguar legal department came down and said, no, you can't do that.
If somebody doesn't press a button, they'll sue us anyway.
Yeah, so we had to get rid of the button.
So whenever it was raining with that car, it was quite an interesting...
An interesting legal perspective, but...
Yeah, it is a no, we do have the fun that could take you from the side, but we're not going to be.
No, but Sidney, you started to, I guess, that engage the same part of your brain.
Yeah, the development side always interested me,
especially because I did do a lot of race car development during the time,
like the Panos, for example, but also even for Formula Ford,
I was Ralph Ferman's test driver in Formula 4.
Formula 4 1600 and I tested that for a couple of years,
living over three hours away on the road.
He used to call me every morning and say, it's dry today, come and go for the day and do that.
So that was great.
Then later on, obviously, then the car was for sale at exactly the wrong time,
the X-Day through to the end of the World Recession came in.
But then later on, they said, we want to do a speed record.
We're going to do it in Fort Stockton in Texas, doing that, yeah, why not?
I mean, let's go and do it.
So landed in this airport is Midland Odessa Airport,
then I think there's a name applies, it shares those two towns.
You get in the car, drive into Fort Stockton, Texas,
and there's this long, long, long, long straight road with a 55 miles an hour speed limit.
And it kept going over the brown down the other side, long over the brown,
but you could see far into the distance.
And I was like, 55 miles an hour, I mean, this road goes for hours in this straight
road, how stupid is that?
So then I caught a car up who was doing 55 miles an hour.
I'm like, anyway, I passed him, you idiot, you know, I passed him.
And now I'm going quite a bit faster than that.
Going along for about another 10 minutes,
dead straight over the browser hill and then in a distance car came the other way.
It was like a black car coming, coming, coming, coming.
Here's a Mustang with white doors and some lights on the top.
They all passed me, spin turn, proper spanking in the bandit.
Chases after me, stops me and he says, do you know how fast you were going?
I'm like, um, what?
I don't know, but it's a dead straight road and there's nobody on the road.
He says, not the point, it's 55 miles an hour limit.
He said, I got you 11 miles away on my radar.
I know he did, but he said it.
So anyways, I'm going to give you a ticket.
OK, so he goes in the car, comes back and he gives me a menu, literally a menu.
And on the menu is everything you can do wrong and the cost.
So it was like, you know, parked in the wrong direction on a street.
You have to park in the direction of trouble, don't you?
And that was like $40.50.
Everything was in 50 cents.
So and then my favorite one on there was exhibition of acceleration.
And that was $60.50 exhibition of acceleration.
Now, can somebody tell me how you stop at a red light?
It goes green and you you now legally go.
You are exhibiting acceleration, right?
So I didn't point that out to him because the irony probably wouldn't have worked.
But I got a ticket and it was 80 and it was 80 dollars and 50 cents.
And he said, and I said, what do I do with that?
And he said, well, you need to go to a gas station or something
and get a money order and you need to bring it to the courthouse on Monday morning
or something. So I think it was a Friday and we did the running on the weekend.
So I was a big fan of Jigs of Hazard.
Right. Who wasn't?
Specifically Daisy Jig, I'm assuming.
Well, yeah, yeah.
That's a different podcast, but yeah.
But so you got Boss Hogg with this guy.
So I kid you not, I went to the courthouse on Monday
after we did the speed record and knock on the door.
Yeah, I've got to pay this ticket.
OK, yeah, just knock on the door.
The boss is in there.
So I knocked on the door and said, enter, open the door, big table.
Big guy, big cigar at the table.
It was Boss Hogg.
Yeah, it absolutely was.
And I paid the ticket and he was very thankful.
I paid the ticket and the guy who got me came in and it was a weekend.
It was shut, I guess.
And he popped on the desk a whole load of tickets
that he got over the weekend and before.
And then he said something like, ah, good job, boy.
And of course, that's how they find the clear.
But it just is just absolutely insane.
So what speed did you do in the in the two?
Two hundred and seven point one.
And so Martin Brunner had done two hundred and thirteen in Nardo.
Yeah. But Nardo's continuously turning, as you know.
So so so now with the speed where we are now,
you can't do it in Nardo because you razz up the tyres too much.
Yeah, put too much load on.
But in the days when they did it with that one,
they'd actually give you a little bit of extra speed because of the scrub.
Yeah, which is which is complete nonsense.
Because if you if you if your top gear reaches peak power
and that's the speed you're going, you can't go really fast there.
Anyway, so anyway, he did two hundred and thirteen,
which was relatively fast, but not fast enough, was it?
So we went to Fort Stockton.
It's an oval, I think it was four miles around or a bit more than that.
And say, nice, steep banking, no barriers on the top.
Oh, so you could just go over the top.
And the other side were cactus.
What's the plural of cactus?
Cacti. Cacti.
Yeah, everywhere.
And inside all of that rattlesnakes.
So the guy said, look.
And it was like, be really careful.
Don't go off the top.
You might hurt yourself.
Be careful.
Don't go off the top because of the rattlesnakes.
And he said, OK, OK, OK, OK, so he did it.
And I had I was having some issues, I know,
two hundred and ten miles an hour or something.
And the car started to really weave around everywhere.
And we were using Bridgestone tyres.
The facility was owned by Firestone Bridgestone.
And I always remember the engineer's name.
It was Cowbatta San.
And he said, what's the problem?
And I told him, he said, oh, show me.
So I put him in the plastic seat, went along.
I know what that is.
He said, so he came back, put the wheels on the balancing machine,
get a little cutter and just he just took a mil or two mil off the tread.
Oh, was it just squirming around on the tread?
Yeah, put them back on the car.
It's fine. Absolutely fine.
I was like, oh, he's an absolute genius.
So, yeah, so we did two hundred and seventeen point one.
It wouldn't quite make the two twenty, which the name would even lie.
But then we did some wet weather testing there, too,
on their little wet circuit.
And I was really impressed with that kind of wet
because normally supercars on a flooded road are hopeless, aren't they?
But these were really, these tyres were really good.
And then that was when that would meet nine early nineties.
Yeah, there would have been probably ninety one.
I think it was ninety one.
So that was the first one.
And I so I hadn't actually ever set out to do a speed record.
It's just I was in the right place or the wrong place at the right time.
And got that.
And then later on, having raced McLaren a couple of times,
I was doing some customer handovers in fronting thought.
Yeah, quite a few of those for McLaren.
And then later on, they said, look, we're going to do that was ninety eight.
Wasn't it the speed record?
We're going to do a speed record.
Do you not see that seem like a different kettle of.
I mean, we have the benefit of being car camera.
Yeah, McLaren.
And I haven't ever seen what the Jagran was like,
but the McLaren run looked pretty squeaky to me.
Yeah, I mean, because the cars didn't have much horsepower.
It was at six twenty seven in McLaren.
And and so you you got to the speed by having low drag,
which meant you had a low downforce and it was a bit sketchy.
But it was, you know, shouldn't from from two seventeen to two forties,
not a big jump in your mind, but actually it is.
In terms of arrow, anything rotating, stuff coming towards you,
it seemed like a big jump.
And that was a lesson, wasn't it?
Yeah. How did you get there?
Because nobody else can test that.
No, and still can't now.
And yeah, even Bugatti can't go there anymore.
And was that VW owned?
There's always been VW circuit.
Yeah. So of course, we had BMW engine in the McLaren.
So someone must have owned the whole rush.
I think I would imagine.
Yeah, it must have been a favor from from somewhere.
Yeah, I don't know how I was swung, but yeah, it was interesting.
And like now, the last two records that I've done with Bugatti,
you you you do a lot of times you go to the test track
and you test and you come back with all the data
and you you look at everything and you go back again
and you spend, you know, weeks there doing it.
We just rocked up.
Just feel upset.
Spare a set of tyres, maybe.
No, we just, yeah, we got there and Gordon Murray was there
and some mechanics and engineers and stuff.
And I went out on the first run and yeah, it was it was floating a bit.
And then I was going on me and all I say, it went.
So what the hell was that?
No, we lost. I hit the rev limiter in top gear, you know, straight away.
So we came back and then we had the guys who were doing the speed measurement
for us, we said, look, can we move?
Does that still count if we move the rev limiter?
So apparently, yes, it's OK.
I think it's a grey area now.
Yeah. With Bugatti, you can we have to remove the speed limiter
because all the cars are limited and the super sports limited to 440.
So you can remove that.
But I don't think you can do this rev limiter anymore.
But anyway, they said, yes, you can.
So we went from 7000 to 8000.
And the BMW guys that were there supporting us said that basically
you've got with 7000 rev limit, you were 100,000 mile on the engine.
And if you go to 8000, it's 10,000 miles.
It's that big a difference, which is why the obviously the limits there.
So you took the limiter off and then did a couple more runs.
And yeah, do you remember what it did with the limiter in place?
Probably about in miles, it was all in kilometers and I'm all in kilometers.
I'm always factoring it back.
But I think it would have been miles.
It would have been about 232, something like that.
Yeah.
Was it over 240 makes a big difference to the impact of the.
Yeah, I think.
Yeah, I think the the grey area isn't that great because material
it's exactly the same car. Yeah.
And I think that was that was the argument for that.
I think, yeah, probably was. Yeah.
Because you haven't boosted it up or changed anything.
No, that's right. And then also when if sorry, if I'm going too far forward
from that, if we go to the Super Sport 300 plus, so Michelin did
all the tire testing with the standard sheer on tire.
Came back with the data and said, look, you know, if you if you estimate
your top speed is going to be 300 or 300 and a bit miles an hour.
I said, the tire can do it, but it's too close for us.
It's too close. We're not happy to do it.
So OK, so what's the what's the solution?
Well, we'll build another tire and then we'll homologate that tire
for the Super Sport.
So all of the normal share of this on the side of the tires is BG,
the Bugatti and the ones on the Super Sport is BG2.
And the difference between the tyres, the same, the carcass is the same,
from my understanding. But before the last layer of rubber goes on,
you've got these radial metal strands that go around.
They changed the material for a lot stronger material.
But the important thing is it can't be any heavier.
There's the heavier. Yeah, it's a different force in players.
Well, exactly.
So they changed it to a stronger material all the way around.
Then the last bit of rubber goes on the top.
And now we're happy you can do that speed with that tire.
But what did that feel like compared to 240?
It felt so much faster.
Because, I mean, in kilometres, we're talking about 3, 390 and 490.
Yeah, it's a it's a it's a big, big, big jump.
And I was struggling a little bit.
We the first thing the first time I went to the test track,
they gave me a standard serum, which is limited to 420
261 miles an hour, I think.
And they took the speed limiter off and said, right, just have a
have a play with the car with the speed limiter off.
And it goes more than 420.
But I think I drove a couple of times like 430.
And I'd driven a 420 before.
Well, that's a 430, I'm thinking.
Shit, that's a lot faster than 420.
I mean, it's not. Is it six miles an hour?
It feels a lot faster.
It's certainly to me, it did.
And then originally, they said, I said to myself, how fast do you think
we're going to go with the, you know, with the Super Sport?
I said, we estimate 470 to 490.
But they said, we think it would be a lot closer to 490.
You're depending on how hot the day is and all the rest of it.
Yeah. So I at that point, I think my best idea was,
I think it was like a four.
I did a 435 comes as an hour in the standard car.
I was shitting my tail.
I was going to say, because what what is the fear?
Because you you've been in risky situations.
I think in you, I'm sure you'll back this up when you're in a car and
you something happens or you want to change direction, you
use an input.
And if the result of your input comes back, it matches the map
you have in your mind, things fine.
If the output matches the you're all right.
Yeah, I want to turn left. I'm going to do that.
Oh, look, the cars turn left.
Happy days, heart rates normal.
When it starts to be out of sync to what should or you would like to happen,
then it's like, what's happening?
What will happen next? What will happen next?
You don't know.
You also get a sense of the energy that you are part of.
Yeah.
Danny, you get a lot of metal moving at a lot of speed.
Well, it is.
And I also made a mistake of watching up against the fence
because they had some other shear on there doing.
Stuff and they were they were coming past about
because they were all with the limiter on still.
And they're still down 50 hours an hour, 40 hours an hour slower,
probably they were coming past it, probably, probably close to 400, perhaps.
And the violence and the noise of the ripping air and the
thinking, bloody hell.
Anyway, I got back in the car and it's you have to keep doing it.
So then I did it again and again and again and again.
Yeah. And then eventually then 430 didn't seem too bad.
Well, it did seem bad, especially as I knew that you had to go even faster.
So I was like, all right, OK,
well, like I'm just going to keep this for me because obviously
they'll get somebody else.
Well, I was going to say, I had Pierre, Henry, Raffin, I've already done a big speed.
He did 431 in the Veyron Super Sport.
Yeah. And the DL for any tips?
Or yeah, he gave me the whole story.
And while he while he's telling the story,
he's sweating and his hair is stinging up on his own.
Yeah, on his arms.
And of course, they asked him if he wanted to do this when he's like,
no way in hell am I doing that?
So so and I said, well, what happened?
And and he said, look, you're going along and it's it can move a little bit.
And then all of a sudden, for no reason, it just swaps lanes.
Oh, well, what was that then?
Well, we never really did find out.
And so he just has it in his mind and he's he is trembling.
It's proper petapilot stuff, though, is he kind of think everything's
everything's safe and sanitised and simulated and but it's still at a certain point.
It still requires someone to put themselves in the car and do it, doesn't it?
Yeah, but it is all simulated and checked and, you know, anything to do with
the VW group, their their their attention to detail, their processes,
their quality control, it's right up there.
I mean, they they will have known that this was OK all along.
But but still something can go wrong.
So an example, 20 kilometre lap, they spend five hours
with airport cleaning mats, completely cleaning the track.
And then nobody else is on it except you.
Yeah. So there's no separate or yeah.
Because about crosswinds or anything.
Yeah, birds, dry, cool. Yeah, anything like that.
And and so this is, of course, the cleaning procedures when I'm now there
to do it for real, they don't they don't seem to be too worried
at the limit that the cars got.
I mean, that's sold to the public as a homologated car.
And it's safe to do that.
So they're not worried.
But when you start to go considerably more, they are worried.
The other thing that we we did notice now,
just remember this was which this thought I don't think anybody
they must know it, but they never they never thought about it.
But the the speed of the wheels turning.
So really, the effect is on the front wheels more than anything
because they're steered wheels.
But the speed of the wheel turning gets to such a high velocity
that the gyroscopic effect of that turning
overcomes the suspension geometry.
Yeah, so all your self centering is gone.
So it locks it in unless you know, actually, the opposite.
It seemed to be the opposite.
So, you know, see, you guys, although you're quite young,
both of you, but you did have a spinning top as a kid, right?
Yeah. Yeah. So you do this, pick it up.
It's off all over the place.
Yeah. So so generally, if you release your grip on a car at high speed,
it'll it'll fly into again.
Yeah, any tow or camera kind of holds it.
But is that does it effectively stood?
No, what it does, it's almost like your three degrees of car
to roll over much you've got.
It's overcome that.
And now it won't go straight or perhaps it does go straight.
But if you get blown off course slightly with a tiny bit of width,
if you then put an input in to bring it straight, it doesn't stop.
It keeps going to the right.
And now you need another one and it keeps going to the left.
And now you need like your biggest tank slapper.
Yeah, just every input makes it worse.
Yes, if you really careful not to increase the inputs,
but you just you want to go over there.
You sort of almost like the elbow at Le Mans.
It's like I want to go there.
So and it keeps going.
So you there's lots of micro movements to go straight,
which doesn't feel good.
And then you also you don't know how do any of us know?
Is there a point where all of a sudden it's going to go right over there?
You don't know.
Was there a major distance?
We just do it on VMAX.
So it's just a peak.
It's a peak and you need, I believe it was four different measuring devices
that you have. So you do various GPS and you do accelerometer.
And then they take all the speeds and they give you the slowest one.
I think the one that gave us was the accelerometer.
They're all the same, you know, with him.
Because the bigger change now is it used to be a two way thing,
and then now people are using one way because of the test facilities.
You know, that's not allowed.
Yeah, all the barriers are set up to go to go one way.
But then some of the like SSC and
Coney said both use that they used to stretch a public road.
Does it just seems terrifying to me?
But it's a bit weird because it's actually it's downhill as well, isn't it?
That one very slightly downhill.
Not that that, you know, take away.
You still got to do the speed no matter what.
But but yes, so so if we go back, so we did this
three hundred and four point seven seven two four miles an hour
on the second of August 19.
Excuse me.
And then on that was a Friday and on the on the Thursday night
Thursday afternoon, I several times got to again, it's all in kilometers.
I got to like four hundred and eighty two.
So eventually it was four ninety.
And at four eighty two, I completely lost all confidence in what I was doing.
It feels like I can't keep this wear on it.
And I don't know where it's going to go.
And you and everything was in pass quickly.
And you just it wouldn't take you stupidly think that if it did something weird,
you could catch it. Of course, you can't.
So I at that point, I lifted off and I did this about like 10 or 12 times
and kept coming back and they're like, what do you want?
What do you want? What mom?
Yeah, yeah, some confidence.
Yeah. And then I said, look, OK, there's three lanes.
I'm using the middle lane.
So I don't mind if it's wondering about in the lane, but I don't want to do.
I don't want to wonder about across all three lanes.
That's why I won. Yeah.
So actually, they they I think they stayed up all night
and they did all the toes and the cameras and everything again.
And they they did see a slight difference on the rear toe side to side.
They leveled it up.
And these are electromechanical steering.
So they they reflashed the steering program again.
Because there's any anomalies in that.
Went out in the morning just to do a slow run and straight,
excuse me, straight away, it just felt the felt easier.
And I think if you get the toe slightly different side to side,
I'm on a racetrack and not normal speeds.
It's not really going to make much difference.
But I think it does make a difference in this case, because if you.
And you're all you're always making bigger inputs.
Yeah, it's such a strange thing to be just to go into holding a car.
Spray. Yeah.
But you're, you know, so if one side is in more than the other,
because it's toe out on the front, toe in on the back.
If one's in, all it happens is it, of course, it will be straight.
But you'll have a little bit of you won't notice.
We're talking about miniscule and that's what the car will then not
react the same to the left as to the right.
Even if it's miniscule, multiplies everything.
So they weren't saying like.
We we found something.
But they said this is what we did find and we checked everything.
Everything's tight. Everything's that it should be.
OK, what do you want to do?
So I did a slow run.
I thought and we'd had some issues with there's windsocks all the way down
the straight and there was quite a sidewind.
And all the windsocks were pointing dead straight down.
There was no wind at all.
They said, well, what do you want to do?
I was like, well, that's got to go.
Let's be a put off a tank of fuel in it and send me.
So I set off and I I've got to also imagine
there's this bit where they've resurfaced this end of the track,
but not the end where you go VMAX.
So unfortunately, so there is a point where the two join
and I was crossing there at four hundred and
very fast anyway, probably 270 or 280 miles an hour is going across this thing.
And it would go it would actually lift off the ground momentarily.
And then when it landed, it will be doing that just a little bit at 280 miles an hour.
So on this particular run with no crosswind,
no wind at all and all the things they done
came off the banking and I come off even faster than before.
And I saw and I passed where they were looking over the
and I passed them and I was going faster because I come off the banking faster.
Then I can see this bloody jump thing coming.
I was sitting in there and I said, oh, come on.
So and I went over this jump, landed and I thought I was not too bad.
It's really not too bad.
Then I kept going and the speed was climbing and climbing and climbing and climbing.
I passed the radar, which is on the left hand side on the track.
And as I went past that, it said 516, which is obviously completely wrong.
Yeah, bloody hell, that's fast.
And then I was looking at the GPS on the thing
and it was wandering in the lane.
And if you see the the raw footage,
I'm not sure if it's in the one that's posted, but it might be.
You see the white line is is going across and back from the screen in the center.
And this one sometimes disappearing in the back.
So it is moving, but it wasn't as bad.
Then I got to the 482 thing again.
And sure enough, it starts again more.
And I think to myself, well, if I come back again,
they're just going to make me do it again.
I might as well just get this over and done with it.
So I just kept my foot in it.
And Ashley, although it started to do that, it didn't get any worse.
I was expecting it just to really get us and he didn't.
And then I'm looking at the other end, the other ends coming.
And you have no idea where to lift off
because you you're now arriving faster than you've ever.
And you have to.
Yes, kind of squealing down a bit as well, like rather than just snap.
Yeah, because this is the issue.
And this is the issue with making sure there's nothing on the track
because the the rake angle of the car is very important.
And the car controls it when you when you turn the high speed key,
it already takes some break out, but it makes sure that there's enough rake.
And then if you suddenly lift off or jump on the break,
you of course, you're increasing the rake angle.
So you get a lot more front arrow.
But then also if you were to get a puncher on the rear and it dropped down at the back,
you fly, so you have to be really careful.
None of this happens. So so yeah, so you lift off and they were always saying,
like, you know, you need to get the speed down to about two twenty to thirty
when you enter the bank and say, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's no problem.
So four ninety and lift off, lift off, lift off, lift off.
And it has a little bit of wobble, but then it then it's kind of it's OK.
And you really feel like you slow down a lot.
And then the bankings come in as everything's great.
I'll better just check the speed. Look up on my big GPS.
Three sixty two.
A bank is there.
So oh, shit.
So just I'm Johnny for all I was worth and just turned.
And it was fine.
High speed is such a weirdly discombobulating feeling.
Those and banking as well.
I know you come back down on to a straight, but even at Millbrook,
you drive around Millbrook for four or five laps and then you come back down to the level
and it feels like you a that you could own the door and get out and everything
sloshed to one need to dry some head, I think, to stop all the it is.
And and actually they initially when you're going really fast
on the on the banking, it it confuses the ESC system.
They they they fixed it now because on the mistrial when we did the 282
in in Papemburg, all the systems are left on and they're fine.
They don't act away.
But in these we have to turn everything off because it kept activating.
Oh, God, you don't know it keeps thinking it's sliding.
And if you've got time for another short one in there,
story in there, then Homestead in Florida in South Miami, it's an oval,
which I think any cars were using it on one point maybe, but NASCAR's use it a lot.
And the banking is 17, 18 and 19 on the banking.
And normally when you with an endurance car, you you have an infield like
the Daytona. So same is here.
But when you finish the infield, you're right at the far end of this straight.
So you go all the way down.
Then when you get to NASCAR three and four, you've already gone the whole
length of the back straight.
So you're going quite fast when you get there.
It's a smaller oval than Daytona.
But when you go into the corner, you can hear all the guys
and all they're doing is flat out through there.
And you go through there and you are absolutely convinced you're sliding.
So you back out.
And it's the same thing as what's confusing the ESC system.
Yeah, you just know some things.
Yeah, so it's weird.
And so in the end, I was like, doing something wrong.
It was I was doing grand am at the time there.
So I went and found, I think it was Jimmy Johnson was obviously there.
One NASCAR champion. I said, but what am I doing wrong?
Because I'm I'm sliding through there.
It feels like I'm saying no.
So look, OK, go into the corner, sort of switch off your mental being
and just look at your hands.
He said, if you're left down, down, you're not sliding.
Sounds really simple.
So I went out after two laps.
Easy, easy, easy, easy.
Easy when you know. So yeah.
So anyway, so that's why the ESC systems and such.
I have a question.
Do you invoice the same for a day's work when you've done the max speed
as every other day?
Yeah, unfortunately, it's the same.
Yeah, it's the same.
But when I did that thing where we took the limiter off
for standard serum and it's playing all weekend going quickly.
After after that, I had to.
Yeah, it's about five, five, five and a half hour drive down.
And a lot of it's unrestricted.
What about I had a polo max speed?
I think it was two or four.
I got it to a couple of times.
And then I drove all the way to Molson, the bits that were unrestricted at two or four.
And it felt like you could open the door and walk by the side of the car.
It's so weird.
So it's like, yeah, remember we we did the feature
when we went to the autobahns to do two hundred.
Oh, yes.
And you were a Raj Spen.
Yeah, best of a day on the autobahns trying to get the Bugani over two hundred.
That's it. Yeah, yeah.
And it wouldn't do it. Yeah.
Yeah, the exhaust had all gone.
There's lovely. Yeah.
Corn and all the color.
Yeah, yeah.
Because no, it's crazy.
But but perversely, though, after doing the four hundred and ninety,
though, three hundred and four,
we did during the during that week that we were there,
we did over a thousand kilometers above four hundred k's.
So you get used to the area.
You're used to it.
After doing the record, everything fine.
We went out a couple of beers and a curry and whatever and stuff.
And I had to drive back the next day.
I drove for a week.
I drove everywhere ten miles an hour under the speed limit, just because I can.
They're making you do that, you know, and now they can't.
So I just just driving really slow.
I'm back up to the speed limit now,
but I was driving really, really slowly everywhere like Cusac cars behind me.
Yeah.
I mean, I guess they well, first of all,
we weren't talking about the mistral, but that that was very interesting.
I I really seriously got into that one we were doing, you know,
fastest roof off car.
Yeah.
So before I went to have a quick go in it, didn't I?
Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah, you did.
Yeah. And the interesting thing with that, of course,
because you've got a lot shorter straight
and you still got the same horsepower, but presumably you also got more drag.
So you've got to come off for banking really, really fast.
Yeah.
But the the the thing without, you know, there's no
buffeting inside the car.
I did some runs at 300 k.
You think it would be unbearable, didn't you?
Yeah, there's nothing.
You just sit there and you're just driving along.
And it's this you can hear stuff.
Yeah. But there's no buffeting in the car.
You said aerodynamics are so perfect.
That's what you said.
Yeah, no ruffeting.
It's like aerodynamics.
Yeah, it's really it's amazing.
But then, of course, when you start going
two hundred and eighty two miles an hour, the the the sat,
especially the air coming off the top of the window.
Yeah, it's ripping and it's really loud.
But it was but it was fun.
Yeah, that's really.
Yeah, you did say it was slightly damp when you did it.
Yeah, well, just a bit.
Yeah, because we'd been there already a couple of times for a week each
and we knew what we were doing and we ran through different things.
And then they said, oh, right, because the customer's going to be there
and we're going to set him up in a nice hospitality unit
right where you're going to do VMAX.
But we don't want you to just go out and do it straight away.
You know, just do a few runs and build up to it.
And you know, everything's great.
I'm seeing myself, well, this is all very well, but the sky's really dark
and I can feel some some moisture in the air.
And each time I did a couple of runs, I came back and we had a chat.
Like, guys, I need to go now.
Like now, now, please.
So I basically I'd like to stay and talk to you.
I'm going and go and there was there's a lot of moisture on the window.
And then you don't know how much grip there is.
It was great.
And it was quite cold as well.
So the air density was high.
And obviously you have to come off the bank in really fast.
Yeah, it's good, though.
It's great to living.
No, no, it's great.
But if I go back to the beginnings of all this, where we were talking earlier,
you know, obviously winning Le Mans is a massive thrill.
And that's that's a no-trace inside.
But because I was always interested in cars as a kid,
and I would say all the times I worked with you guys with EVO,
it was fantastic driving all these different cars and listening to
you guys have experts at this.
And this is this fantastic to hear what you say.
Then I'm fast forward.
I'm on sat in the Sharon's Super Sport 300 plus, all the mistrial,
which in terms of speed until recently, anyway, is the daddy of all cars.
And I'm thinking to myself, how did I go from there?
I'm now in the daddy of all cars.
And I'm going over for any miles out.
How did that happen?
It's brilliant.
It is certainly is.
Well, we could I was going to say we could talk for us.
We have talked for us.
Andy, thank you, as ever.
It was a pleasure always, always with you guys.
It's been brilliant.
Now we've had some good times.
Yeah, more to come.
Yeah, more to come.
Thanks, everyone.
See you again soon.
About this episode
Andy Wallace shares captivating stories from his racing career, including his journey to hitting 300 mph and the intricacies of speed records. He recounts his early fascination with cars, his unconventional path to racing, and the challenges he faced in motorsport. The conversation delves into the technical aspects of high-speed driving, the evolution of racing technology, and the unique pressures of being a professional driver. Wallace's anecdotes about testing cars and the thrill of speed provide a fascinating glimpse into the world of automotive performance.
Original notes
In this episode of the evo podcast, Richard Meaden and John Barker are joined by Andy Wallace for part two of our special on the man behind the most iconic road car speed records of recent times. This week, he speaks about his time behind the wheel of the world's fastest road cars and what it takes to achieve those record numbers.
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