KEN TYRRELL (1924-2001)

Ken Tyrrell (GPP photo)

KEN TYRRELL

Only the teams founded by Enzo Ferrari, Colin Chapman, Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren have contested more Grands Prix than the Tyrrell Racing Organization. After over three decades at the cutting edge of the sport, 'Uncle' Ken Tyrrell still flourishes as head of his own team. And with all those racing miles under his belt, all the triumph and tragedy he has seen, his enthusiasm remains undimmed, his sense of humour intact.

His craggy features are frequently creased in a snaggle-toothed grin, a smile that once required a certain amount of reconstruction. Back in the days when 'Chopper' Tyrrell performed in the cockpit himself, and used a woodsman's axe as his personal insignia on his 500cc Formula 3 Cooper, he came a cropper at Goodwood. He remembers his shunt was not in vain, however, since he was leading a certain Stirling Moss at the time.

"I was going down the Lavant Straight and a brake pipe failed and I went straight on, hit a bank, got some broken teeth, a split lip and all that sort of thing. In the daily paper the next day, there was the picture of me and the caption said 'Tyrrell leads Moss through the chicane at Goodwood.' And I read it in Chichester Hospital!"

Goodwood was Tyrrell's 'home circuit', though it was Silverstone where the racing bug first bit, and it was another sport that brought him there in 1951. "I played football, halfback, for the local village club, Ockham, and they got up a coach party to go and see a race at Silverstone and that was my first involvement or interest of any kind in motor sport.

"I was sitting in the grandstand and watching the race and looking through the program and there was a driver from Guildford taking part, Alan Brown. And so I sort of went and knocked on his door afterwards and said could I have a look at his car?  And so Alan being the salesman he was, got me involved and I bought his car from him at the end of the year. 

"It was a Mark V Cooper with a single knocker Norton engine in it. After I'd paid him the money, which I seem to remember was about 500 pounds, Alan said to me, 'Take it down to Brands and if you can't get 'round in a minute, sell it.' It was something which I just achieved, after spinning off several times in the attempt. But I thought it was wonderful, I thought it was fantastic! The nearness to the ground is what I remember most of all - sitting so close to the ground - being able to put your hand out and touch the front and rear wheel. I loved it!"

Consumed by racing euphoria (he admits to yelling "Yippee!" in his helmet), Tyrrell quickly became addicted to the sport, though it was a habit he was ill-equipped to finance. His father had been a gamekeeper, labourer and gardener and young Ken left school when he was 14. He had aspirations about going to technical college, but failed the entrance exam. He joined the RAF and was trained as a flight mechanic, then became a flight engineer on heavy bombers near the end of the war. After a couple of missions over Europe Tyrrell spent his last six months in the service flying bombers out to Singapore and Ceylon.

"My brother was in the reserve occupation as a tree feller during the war and when I came out of the RAF in '46 he suggested that we work together, and, in fact, we did a sort of tree-lopping and topping in people's gardens and things like that.  We never had any money, the only money I had when I came out of the RAF was I think a 30 pound gratuity for five and a half years service, and a new suit."

Tyrrell changed his driving suit for the civilian clothing of a team manager after becoming disenchanted with his own performances behind the wheel, though he always showed a fair turn of speed and won a Formula 3 race in Sweden. The move to the organizational side also made some financial sense.

"I seem to recall it was a combined Formula 1/Formula 2 race, probably the Aintree 200, and Michael Taylor drove my car. The opportunity arose probably because we could get more starting money if Michael drove. And he drove so much better than I did that I realized this was the slot that I ought to be in.

"I'd fallen in love with motor racing you see, and I had been driving from '52 until '58, and so by now I knew a bit about it. I obviously wanted to take part and wasn't satisfied with my own driving performance. I found I got as much pleasure, more really, from running a team. I just enjoyed doing it, I mean, we never made any money doing it - it cost us money to do it, you know. I just enjoyed doing it."

Tyrrell showed considerable aptitude for wheeling and dealing, and for finding drivers. In 1960 John Cooper loaned him chassis, BMC loaned him engines, and the Tyrrell Formula Junior team began. Three years later Formula Junior became an international Formula 3 category and Ken Tyrrell found a new driver that established his reputation as a talent-spotter par excellence.

"One day Robin Mackay, the circuit manager at Goodwood, called me up and said, 'Ken you're always looking for new young talent and this Scotsman does knock around here quick in an old Cooper Monaco.' I respected Robin's opinion and I had met Jimmy Stewart so I called him up and asked him about his younger brother. I asked him. 'Does your brother want to become a racing driver, or is he just having fun.' Jimmy said, 'No, I think he wants to take part seriously.'

"So he gave me Jackie's number and I called him and I invited him down to try this new Cooper Formula 3 car which Bruce McLaren had been testing for us. He'd been a Cooper Formula 1 driver. So Bruce had been doing some laps around Goodwood and then Jackie got in the car and on his third or fourth lap he was quicker than Bruce. It was his first ever time in a single seater car - so this was quite outstanding. And in fact we called him in and I gave him a bit of a chat, you know, and said we'd got all day, we don't have to rush this thing. 

"So then Bruce, being the nice chap that he was, Bruce said, 'This is ridiculous, let me get back in that thing again'.  So Bruce got in and of course he went quicker. And then later on in the day Jackie got in again and he went quicker still.  And John Cooper, who'd been watching on the first corner at Goodwood, came rushing up and said, 'You want to get that boy signed up quickly, he's bloody good!' So we did. Incidentally, Jackie and I never did have a contract - ever. He drove for me on a handshake."

Thus began the illustrious Tyrrell/Stewart partnership that made so much racing history. The team swept through Formula 3 like a whirlwind, with Stewart winning 16 of 18 races, then they tackled Formula 2. An introduction to Matra, the French missile company, by the French journalist Jabby Crombac, resulted in Matra Formula 2 chassis for Tyrrell and another championship win for the team. The title went to Tyrrell's other driver Jacky Ickx, since Stewart was simultaneously racing in Formula 1 for BRM and thus not allowed to score Formula 2 points.

This was in 1967 and in June of that year the famed Ford-Cosworth Formula 1 engine made its debut in the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort. Jimmy Clark had one in the back of his Lotus and he made the motor a winner first time out, an achievment which was witnessed by Ken Tyrrell. "I took a flight over on the morning of the race. It was a day trip and as soon as I got back I sent a telegram to Cosworth ordering three engines.

"They replied saying they didn't know whether they were going to be selling engines. But then I got talking to Walter Hayes at Ford and he said they might be making engines available to other teams. So then I talked to Matra and said, 'Look, if we get the Ford engine, why don't you build a chassis.' And they agreed to that, and then we had to find some money, because the arrangement was that Matra loaned the car and we had to supply the gearboxes, the engines, and all the preparation. We had no money at that time.

"We had to buy engines and they were going to cost 7,500 pounds each, and I didn't have 7,500 pence, let alone pounds. I had already asked Jackie, if I put it all together, would he race for me? And he said yes, but what about some money? I asked him how much he wanted.  And he said 20,000 pounds. I said I didn't have 20,000 pounds. But I had already gone to Walter Hayes and told him: 'Look, this is what we're trying to do, and if we don't do it Jackie's going to go to Ferrari, and you don't want Jackie to go to Ferrari, do you? I think I can get the money together but Jackie wants 20,000. Will you guarantee me 20,000 so I can get Jackie sorted out, in case I can't find enough money?' Walter didn't hesitate, he said yes straight away and so I did the deal with Jackie.

"Then Jackie and I went to see Dunlop. Dunlop were a bit pissed off because Firestone and Goodyear were winning the races that were traditionally won by Dunlop-shod cars. And they said we're going to get out but we don't want to get out being beaten. So we will sponsor you. And they paid us 80,000 pounds. I was able to call Walter and say 'Thank you very much, I don't need the 20,000.' And I gave Jackie 20 of the 80 and we went racing. So we took part in Formula 1 for the first time in '68."

Driving Tyrrell's Matra-Ford, Stewart was World Champion in 1969, then Matra decided to make their own Formula 1 engine and told Tyrrell he would have to use it if he wished to continue using Matra chassis. The 12 cyclinder device made a terrific noise but produced little else when Tyrrell tested it. "So then we had to go and find a car and that proved much more difficult than I had thought. I went to McLarens, to Brabhams, to Lotus and none of them would sell us a car.

"As it happened, this group called March set themselves up and said they were going to make Formula 1 and Formula 2 and Formula 3 cars, so we did a deal with them. But it wasn't a very good car at all. It was too heavy, it was like a truck. And so the writing was on the wall that if we wanted to continue in Formula 1 we were going to have to build our own car. Early in 1970 I approached Derek Gardner and asked him if he would like to join us and design a Formula 1 car. We wanted to keep it quiet because there was no reason making a fuss about it until something really happened."

This project established another hallmark of Ken Tyrrell's character: a penchant for secrecy and springing surprises on the Formula 1 world. The first car bearing his name, built under cover in a shed at his Ockham premises, emerged fully formed and very quickly became a world beater. Stewart was Champion in a Tyrrell Ford in 1971, finished second the next year, won his third title in 1973, then retired at the end of that season.

But, what should have been a time of celebration for the team turned out to be the worst time of Ken Tyrrell's racing life. "We lost Francois Cevert in practice for the very last race that Jackie was going to drive in, at Watkins Glen. It was absolutely.  terrible. Unbelievable. Of all the drivers that drove for me, the relationship between Francois and Jackie and ourselves was fantastic. Francois, for example, worshipped Jackie and Jackie helped him tremendously, and Francois of course was going to lead the team the following year.

"And when he got in the car to go out for that last time, he said, 'I'm going to get on pole.' He was very confident that he was going to put the car on pole. And it wasn't to be.

He just lost it. He lost it on that part of the circuit where the track went over the entrance road and the guardrail was right up close to the track. The car went between two guard rails and forced them apart. Obviously it was a terrible shock to us all and we came home in a very depressed state.

"But I can't say that I gave serious thought to giving it up because of it. I thought that we should be able to contribute to making the cars more safer so that they could survive such an accident. And just leaving and going away wasn't going to help. And I think, almost certainly, today's car would have survived the accident.

"We lost so many drivers in the era when Jackie was driving. And it's still always a possibility. And when you know that your car's gone off the road, you've always got those terrible few minutes of wondering, first of all, if the driver is okay. It's become much less so in the last few years because the cars have become so much safer that the drivers walk away from accidents so often now."

Stewart, Cevert, Scheckter, Cheever, Peterson, Pironi, Depaillier, Palmer, Alesi... Tyrrell has a reputation for being very close to those who drive for him, often having what has been described as a father-son relationship. "Well, I don't go for the father-son bit, but certainly, I suppose because I once drove myself, you know, I've got a great deal of sympathy for the problems of a racing driver. But I'd agree, generally speaking, we were always friends. And the team mates always had a good relationship."

Entering the 1990's, the Tyrrell Racing Organization had won 23 Grand Prix races, though the last one was in 1983, when Alboreto was victorious in Detroit. Yet the team has never been disgracefully uncompetitive and, in fact, it is the most successful of the smaller-budgeted teams. The head of the team places the blame for any lack of resources firmly at his own feet.

"We've had some bad cars in the last few years and I can't say that the design team was solely responsible for it. It was really my failure to attract the right sort of sponsorship to enable them to do the research that was necessary. You see, the first responsibility of a team owner, such as myself, is to go out and find the money to do the job - and if you don't find the money to do the job you can't expect your design team to be able to produce competitive cars. And if you can't produce competitive cars then it's difficult to get the major sponsors. It's the chicken and egg thing, you know. We started to look quite good again when Harvey Postlethwaite designed a very good car for us. Alesi drove it well and our good results attracted sponsors and also helped us to get Honda engines for 1991. So success breeds success which encourages sponsors which enables you to have more success."

Still, several times in the past, the red ink on Tyrrell's financial statement had him waking up in the middle of the night with his hair standing on end. "It was quite frightening, actually. But this sport has always been a business. When we got into Formula 1 I sold my interest in the timber company because it was obviously going to be a full time business and it's been a full time business really since '68. But it's all been worth it. Because I know it can be done. Ron Dennis has shown everyone how to do it, and Frank Williams. It's up to us to get on with it and I think we're on our way to doing that now."

Tyrrell could have solved his financial problems some time ago had he sold his team, as others have done, But he refused to relinquish control, "For several reasons. First of all, I like the business. It's true that I'm getting on now and I'm going to be playing a lesser role in the future. I'm 66 years of age and my youngest son Bob is very much involved with the team, and I would like to be able to hand it over to him. That would give me a lot of pleasure, being able to do that. The easy thing to do is go out and sell the team, but why would I want to do that?"

Ken Tyrrell's staunchest backer is a member of his own household. Norah married him forty years ago and has been coming to the races with him ever since. Their oldest son is a captain with British Airways and one of their young two grandchildren wants to become a racing car designer. Should that happen, chances are his grandfather will still be in a position to give him a job.

Formula 1 racing is Ken Tyrrell's fountain of youth, though his sporting blood is also raised by cricket and football. "I follow football quite closely and I'm a fan of Tottenham Hotspur and England. I go to watch as many of those games as motor racing allows me and then in the summer I follow cricket. England is going through a difficult time at the moment but test match cricket is something special for me. I could sit in front of a television set watching all five days of it, without any trouble at all."

Another Tyrrell interest is reading about his main passion and he is something of a connoisseur of motor sport writing. "I think it's very much better now than it used to be. I always remember Francois Guiter of Elf saying to me years ago, a long time ago, that the quality of the motor racing press was very poor. The writers were paid so little that it didn't attract the right sort. But we've got wonderful writers now. I think all the lead writers are good. Nigel Roebuck, and Tremayne of Motoring News, Alan Henry, and what's his name, the Irishman...Hamilton! Maurice - a wonderful writer."