‘The circuit is now open for Formula One practice.’ You’ve come halfway round the world to hear those nine magic words boom out across the pits. But now you wonder if the announcer can really be serious. Just minutes earlier the world champion Emerson Fittipaldi, with Niki Lauda, Jody Scheckter, James Hunt and Graham Hill, […]
ON THE STROKE OF TWO
The Art of Winning a Grand Prix After ceaseless campaigning by members of the Singapore Motor Club (SMC), His Highness, the Tunku Mahkota of Johore stepped forward to give the green light for what was to become the Johore Coronation Grand Prix of 1960 following a secession of street circuit racing in the […]
Takaharu ‘Koby’ Kobayakawa
Takaharu ‘Koby’ Kobayakawa It is impossible to imagine how Mazda’s image in 1976 could have been more disastrous. Boat loads of rotary-powered RX-2, RX-3 and RX-4s were turned back across the Pacific after US sales plummeted in the wake of the first energy crisis. Two years earlier, 50 percent of all Mazdas used a rotary engine: […]
Bob Knight
The meal had been lavish, the wine magnificent, under the chandelier of the ancient dining room in The Welcombe Hotel, a grand old English country house just outside Stratford-Upon-Avon. It was clearly an occasion the image makers felt worthy of a new Jaguar. My dinner companion that cold night late in February, 1979 was unknown […]
Tom McCahill
The Man Who Invented Zero to 60 ‘Uncle Tom” McCahill invented the benchmark 0-60mph acceleration test. British motoring magazines like The Autocar and The Motor performance tested cars over 20-years before Thomas Jay McCahill’s road tests appeared in the long defunct American magazine Mechanics Illustrated, but it was the American who made ‘nought to 60’ […]
Citroen
This is a mildly edited version of the talk AMHF board member Peter Robinson gave to the 51st National Citroen gathering in Bendigo on April 4. Good Evening….and thank you for inviting me to the 51st National Citroen gathering. It is far too long since I spent time in the presence of so many marvellously […]
Through Their Eyes – Thirteen Years Of Exciting Racing Around The Upper Thomson Road Circuit
“It was lovely and fast-flowing, a wonderful and challenging circuit, and so gratifying when you manage to put it all together. You never ever thought, ‘‘Ooo’, what if I go down there?’” Australian Vern Schuppan, the last winner of the Singapore Grand Prix, unfazed by all the hype about the treacherous monsoon drains, bus stops […]
Australia’s Greatest Motoring Writer – Bill Tuckey
This is a mildly edited version of the eulogy delivered by AMHF board member Peter Robinson at Bill Tuckey’s funeral in 2016. When Marcia and Stuart asked me to speak about Bill today, I was stumped. What could I possibly say that would properly honour Australia’s greatest motoring writer? Simple. Since he died, I’ve been […]
THE 1947 BUICK ROADMASTER IN INDIA
During British rule, which ended in 1947, and into the 1950s, British and American vehicles dominated Indian roads. Every conceivable marque from Rolls-Royce and Cadillac to Austin and Plymouth could be espied. Continental cars, fewer in numbers compared to their British and American counterparts, were mostly represented by the prestigious marques including Hispano-Suiza, Mercedes-Benz, Delahaye, […]
