To Finish First

Life-long friend and former co-director of Sir Jack Brabham and Bruce McLaren reveals the inside story behind the successes and tragedies, the deals and disasters, of the Cooper, Brabham and McLaren teams during the 1960s to '70s, a period widely recognised today as the golden years of international motor racing.This lavishly produced book fills an important gap in the history of top-level motor racing during an historic era. The author was at the centre of it all, first as Sir Jack Brabham's right-hand man during his leadership of the Cooper team, and later when he formed his own Brabham Racing Organisation.Subsequently, when Phil Kerr joined his great friend Bruce McLaren, to become joint managing director of an ever expanding company which was to achieve unrivalled success in Can-Am racing as well as being at the forefront of Formula One, he and his colleagues had to cope with the tragedy of the founder's untimely death while testing a car at Goodwood.
The author's description of how the shattered team was saved and ultimately restored by the bravery of Bruce's co-driver Denny Hulme, already sidelined by agonising burns to his hands, is a poignant highlight of his elegantly written manuscript of more than 120,000 words.Printed on high-quality art paper and beautifully illustrated, with a balanced mix of racing and off-duty pictures, many being seen for the first time, in addition to 15 reproductions of the paintings by the renowned artist Michael Turner, this is a handsome book being made available at an attractively low price.