Original subtitles

(somber music)

(indistinct chattering)

- [Narrator] 70 years ago, something special started.

(engine revving)

Formula One.

Man and machine in perfect unison.

Pushing each other to their limits.

Supported by teams

aiming for that top step.

- The name of the game was winning.

- [Narrator] Seeking perfection.

The road hasn't always been smooth.

(tires screeching)

We've marveled at great moments.

Had smiles brought to our faces.

(men laughing)

Cried with our heroes.

Witnessed incredible bravery

and terrible sadness.

(engine revving)

Moments, never to be forgotten.

For 70 years,

this has been their Everest.

(engine revving)

This is what makes them special.

This is the story of Formula One.

(somber music)

- I like going racing.

I've always been involved in racing.

I like the competitiveness of it.

I like the comradeship of it.

- There was nothing conventional about Colin Chapman.

(engine revving)

- You know, Colin was a genius.

(engine revving)

- Frequently you're faced with making a decision

between two evils

and you're gonna hurt somebody.

(engine revving)

We majorly go racing 'cause I like it.

(somber music)

- Colin Chapman was an exciting man, a glamorous character

and the man will go down in history.

- [Interviewer] You think you're still gonna win

the world championship?

- Oh, it's still a long way to go, you know

but we have to try.

- He had intuition to get the car right.

It was also, he could read exactly my comments

and could put on the car.

- Well have a go, see if you can get him back on it.

- Colin Chapman could motivate people

over and above the norm.

- People would go to the end of the earth for him.

- [Boy] Come on, Gad, do a summersault, Gad.

(children screaming)

- Post-war I think if you had a bit of a spark

then you could really stand out and make a difference.

I guess his characteristics of determination

and hard work and courage and all those things

were just perfectly suited to motor sport in particular.

- I think you have

to have the right opportunities, most certainly.

I don't know that luck really comes into it,

I think it's more a question of seizing

the opportunities that present themselves.

- Colin Chapman, he was a genius.

He was an out and out racer.

He lived for his racing.

- Colin was a phenomenal person

and he seemed to be able to do everything.

He could drive the cars as quick as the drivers.

- What a terrible shame it was

that he had the shunt when he got in the Vanwall at Reims.

We might've seen something completely different.

(tires screeching)

(indistinct chattering)

- I think he had a break problem

and he went off and caught a marker stone

and so they couldn't fix the car

and so he didn't get to race it.

But then Lotus might have taken

a completely different course.

It could've changed the course of history, couldn't it?

- My father was so busy with the business growing

and his ambitions were so big that I think he realized

that something had to go.

And having found Jimmy,

particularly 'cause of his technical input,

it wasn't just he was quick

but he also understood the car and they had a great rapport.

Jimmy was an extraordinary man who was genuinely loved

by the team and the fans and the media.

He was one of those drivers who was quick

and would get the car home.

(engine revving)

Jimmy was the closest friend that dad ever had.

In the same way my dad was

the perfect engineer for motor sport,

Jimmy was the perfect driver for motor sport.

So you put those two things together and that's exceptional.

- [Announcer] Jim Clark crosses the finish line

to win the 500.

It is the culmination of three years of effort

by car builder Colin Chapman.

And he dances down the pits like a ballet artist.

- Unbelievable car.

I had been that time testing the BRM

and when I got into the Lotus,

it was like the Lotus level of bite in the car

it was like it's with three inches

underneath the ground, the grip

and the BRM was like two inches above the ground.

The car was so good

that I couldn't believe a car could have that much grip.

But it was too fragile.

- [Narrator] Chapman's talent has been to develop his cars

to the limit of what is allowed.

With the monocoque body,

he was the first to sit the driver in effect

in the middle of the petrol tank.

- I was at Brands Hatch

when suddenly I saw a J B Krombag,

the Sport journalist and great friend

of Lotus and Jim Clark as well.

And he came into the back of the pit Brands

and he was in tears.

I walked across to him, what's up with you?

He said 'I've just heard

that Jimmy was killed at Hockenheim'.

- [Colin] I did get very close to Jim Clark.

He was, I would say, my best friend.

Best friend I ever had.

Jimmy was in my opinion

probably the greatest racing driver there's ever been.

I don't think there are any other drivers

in my experience in Grand Prix racing

over the last 10 years that have ever equalled

the total race driver concept that Jimmy was.

And this is the tragedy of motor racing

is when you do get close to a driver

and there is an accident,

of course it hurts you so much more.

- I can't imagine how he got over it

and not just the loss of Jimmy

but the loss of other team Lotus drivers.

Particularly when it's your car

which is on the track, you know?

And there was an initial period, I think, of doubt

when no one really knew where dad was

and what he was gonna do.

That's when Graham Hill stepped in

and Bob Dance and together the team carried on.

(engine revving)

- Put it back on?

- Yes, I should thinks so. - Ask them to get it on.

- Yeah, if you can, if you can get it on, on time.

(engine revving)

Can we set the slow running up a sniff?

How difficult is that?

All right now, we'll do that out in the paddock, right?

You're bringing it out again, now.

Are they're all back on? - [Man] They're all back on.

- Right, it's all back on again.

- Now, wait a minute, wait a minute.

- Isn't it great?

(indistinct chattering)

(engine revving)

- The sort of standard he sets for himself

and his own mechanics, more or less sets the tone.

And of course, you've got to come up to that anyway.

And consequently and by example, you get the standard set

which of course is a very high one.

- In '65 when I was a rookie,

Jim won and I finished third

and I became rookie there.

I says, 'Colin, someday, I would like to do Formula One'.

And he said, 'Mario, when you think you're ready,

you call me. I will have a car for you'.

(engine revving)

- People don't realize he was extremely human

and close to the drivers.

(engine revving)

- Dude, you were white, yeah, you're better now.

You're were pretty white 10 minutes ago.

I think you ought to sit down, sit down in the chair.

- No, I can stand actually. - Really?

- [Jim] I thought I won't be coming out.

- [Lady Crew] Do you want a break?

- [Jim] No.

(indistinct chattering)

(engine revving)

- [Colin] Are you sure that's all right?

- [Man Crew 1] Why, what else could it be?

- You didn't hit anything, did you?

Jim, you actually haven't hit anything all the time

when you spun. - No.

- No, he didn't hit anything.

- [Jim] It's more like that was spun of (indistinct)

- You see the whole of the rear suspension is in fact

hung on that gear box.

- Oh, yeah.

- Is that brace still there? - Yeah.

- Then they're all on the same braces.

(foreign language)

- Here, Bruce, I don't know how better to tell you

the gear box bell housing broke

and you know the whole of our rear suspension's

hung on the gearbox, same as yours.

And it's just broken half in the middle.

(foreign language)

- You know, the bell housing's got a hell of a load

and if you think about it, that's all that's happened.

It's now broken in half.

I'm bringing Brown in, we're not gonna run him like that.

(foreign language)

- You better have a look and see

if there's any cracks in your bell housing.

(indistinct)

- When Colin Chapman invites you to his office

I sit down in front and I say 'Mr. Chapman'

he said, 'No, no, call me Colin'

and my legs were shaking.

I say I'm in front of Colin Chapman,

with all the history, Jim Clark and Graham Hill.

(indistinct)

And I was there talking to talking to Colin Chapman,

I couldn't believe it.

(crowd cheering)

- How're you doing? - I'm good.

- Fantastic. Great.

- Thank you very much.

(indistinct chattering)

- Hey, take that off, you don't need it.

(indistinct chattering)

- Colin come to me and he said, 'Emerson, I'm afraid

I'm getting too close to you

and I don't want to lose you'.

- I think you have to be prepared to make

some unpalatable decisions at times

'cause frequently you're faced with making a decision

between two evils and you're going to hurt somebody.

- All the drivers knew how light and how quick

a Lotus could be.

We all would have driven it because we want to win.

And he wanted to win.

Everybody knew when you drive a Lotus

this is the risk you take.

It's your decision, if you want to do it

I would have driven a Lotus, no question.

If I can win a championship.

- Lotus were renowned for innovation.

You know, the ground effect cars, the twin chassis car

all sorts of things.

Lotus were always at the forefront of innovation

and I think he led that.

That was his mantra.

That's what he wanted to see for his people.

- Quite often in race car building, designing

it's not whether you know,

but it's whether you know the people who know

and you can put the right resource.

For example, on the ground effect cars, Peter Wright

had done that work at BRM and Colin knew to channel that

into getting the 78 and then the 79 going.

- With Colin, he expected you to work 24-7.

There was never any kind of relaxed time with Colin.

- Tony Wright said, Peter, don't go to Lotus.

Which surprised me 'cause I've thought

as the next best after BRM sort of thing.

And he said, 'No, no.

He said, 'You're not ready for Lotus'.

And I had no idea what he meant until years later

when I know exactly what he meant.

Colin Chapman was mercurial, very tough.

- [Interviewer] Does he got a temper?

- Yes, he's got a definite temper.

He doesn't lose it very often though

unless there is something that disturbs it

or, so there you can get him really going.

- In that first two years, he'd fired me twice.

One time he took me outside, took his hat off

the famous Colin Chapman hat,

threw it on the ground and jumped up and down on it

while he was firing me.

And then I explained that he was actually wrong

and he just picked the hat up, dusted it off,

put it back on his head

and we went on with what we were doing before.

- Didn't she signal to me? - Don't hold him up.

- Listen to Colin, it's his job to get past.

I'm entitled.

If I'm leading a race, I don't have to give way, right?

- Okay. - Colin, that is true.

Would you ask your driver to give way?

It's his job to find a way around.

He's very quick, all he has to do is find a space as he-

(engine revving)

- At one point I said

I gotta commit my career to Formula One

if it's gonna happen.

And I was already in my thirties

so I told him, I said 'Colin, believe it or not,

I don't have a ride'.

And he says, 'I wish I had a decent car for you'.

I said, 'Do you have a spot for me'?

He says, 'Oh yes'.

He says, 'You want to drive for me'?

I said, 'But I don't have a good car'.

And he said, 'We'll make it good'.

And he said this to me,

he says, 'Next year's cars are gonna make this one look

like a London bus'.

- Well, for years of course, we've all been concerned

with the effect that air has when it flows over the car

and we've been trying to do our best to stop it

so it will go under the car.

What we're really trying to do is to promote air flow

under the car in order to be able to come

to the underside of the car.

So produces a negative lift.

In other words, the air passing under the car

helps to hold it on the road.

- He wanted you to finish the race with

no more than a liter of fuel in a car

and that costs us a world championship.

In '77, twice, leaner race

South Africa ran out of fuel,

the last lap leading.

In South Africa actually he pulled some fuel out of the car

because I used to tell Bob Dance put just a little bit more.

Colin got wind of it.

And so they siphon some fuel out of my car on a grid

and I was on pole.

And I said, 'Colin, if I'm leading this race

and I run out of fuel,

I'm going to take it out of your hide'.

The Sweden actually was his fault in a sense

because he didn't have radio communication

and when I pulled in with two laps ago

they didn't have any fuel.

So by the time they got it, I was classified sixth.

Any of those two races, we could have won,

it would have been a world championship

in '77 as well.

- Worked for him as an engineer

and basically he put me on the road

to go and visit various suppliers and factories

to see if they had the the will and the desire

to make some of the components for a Formula One car.

So I guess it progressed from there then to obviously

having some testing then a year or so after

and then getting the first drive in 1980.

I think I went to a different level of adrenaline that day

to have the great Gilles Villeneuve

breathing down my neck for that whole race

and fighting him for podium place was sensational.

And yeah, it turned out great and I finished that.

Colin was just so happy and so pleased.

And I think he was more pleased than I was

and it was just terrific for the teams, terrific for us

and to get the first trophy and take it back

to the Isle of Man was a very proud moment.

- I always like to succeed at anything I try to do

and I always like to try to do anything better

than I see it being done before.

- There was a clouds of dust of a car

coming into the paddock which was Peter Wall

who announced that during the night

Colin Chapman had died.

Everybody who worked for Colin Chapman was affected by him.

So yes, we were stunned by that.

I don't know, like all the stages of grief,

the first thing you do is you don't believe it.

So I think we probably went through the day

not really believing it.

There was undoubtedly an emotion. I still feel it.

He was a great person to work for.

- It was just traumatic.

I didn't just lose a team boss, I lost a fairy godfather

because without Colin and Hazel and Chapman and the family

I'd never have had the opportunity.

It was very premature, very unexpected

and a big shock to the system.

- Not many people have this incredible collection

of their father's achievements and are able to work

with lots of people who worked together with him

realizing those achievements.

- Look at his record, in his career.

I mean, he was a maverick in every way

and he was one not to maintain the status quo.

He just want to explore the limits in every way.

And some of them was costly

because deep down, he wanted to give the driver

as much of an advantage as possible.

- The team, they played harder

but they really worked hard, but evidently had great fun.

(somber music)

- At boarding school in Scotland,

which is when I was about 11, 12

up to 17, 18 or something,

I used to run around pretending

I was a racing car (grunts) and all this other stuff.

(indistinct chattering)

- Dad's story is one of those fairytales

where he came from absolutely nothing

and he went on to achieve huge things

in the sport and dominate it.

- Frank was, how can I say it?

He had absolutely no money at all.

In fact, we once paid him 10 shillings

it was a ground floor flat,

to run naked round the flat

while opposite was a church

and they were all coming out of mass.

And then we locked him out of the flat.

I mean, it was that sort of school boy antic

silly joke world that we lived in.

And he traded car parts,

which we all did,

selling to continental Formula Three drivers

who couldn't get the wheels and parts

for Brabham's or Coopers.

And that helped sort of fund your own racing.

(engine revving)

- I'd won quite a lot in the Formula Two.

That was evident to me, that I can drive

that type of car which could possibly win races.

- In 1970 when Piers died, was killed in an accident

and from that time on, until the end of 1975

I had a very difficult period financially.

I sold control of what was then called

Frank Williams Racing Cars, to Walter Wolf.

And basically that cleaned the slate

and we had a fresh start

although it didn't work out too well.

I left Walter, started a fresh company.

Patrick had joined that company from day one

and together we set up what is now known

as Williams Grand Prix Engineering Limited

with its good history of success to date.

- The start of Frank properly in Formula One

I think was when he set up

Williams Grand Prix Engineering with Patrick.

And he said to Patrick, 'Would you be on board'?

And Patrick said, 'Well, Frank, faint heart

never won fair lady'.

And that's how they started.

- I always got on fine with Frank.

He was always, as you well know

passionate and enthusiastic about motor sport.

It struck me pretty early on

that he didn't know much about the technical side.

- It might advantage of take a chance,

and whip it and put dries on to maximize

the possible dry running. - [Crew] Yeah.

- 'Cause most guys are saying (beep) no, do it next lap.

No, I won't do it now, there's only 30 laps to go,

maybe I can just manage.

- We're gonna fill (beep) into the drag until

it's absolutely impossible. - Correct.

- And then we change. - And then we change.

I'll tell you how much.

- I always remember about Frank.

I thought a guy that persuasive

is gonna go a long way in racing, and he did.

But unfortunately at that state

didn't have near enough money.

- I think we've got the wrong mounting.

(engine revving)

Joe, have we got another wheel mounted?

(indistinct)

- Formula One is always very expensive.

It was very difficult even to find the money.

Sufficient money.

- Everything that Frank did was motivated towards racing.

So I had to become motivated towards racing as well

so that's how we lived.

And we did live from hand to mouth a bit.

We did fail to pay our rent in rented houses

and became evicted,

and were generally a nuisance to everybody, I think.

- Frank never ever thought about money.

It didn't come into his head.

- He was basically

using the sponsorship money

that he earned each year,

that he obtained each year to pay the previous year's bills.

He was actually having to...

For example for Cosworth Engines rebuilds,

he would have to go there and pay cash.

- We used to pay Frank

as they say in the trade, on the drip

which was about, I think, a Cosworth rebuild then

was about 2000 quid.

So every week prior to the Grand Prix,

we were writing on a check for a Cosworth engine rebuild.

- In 1979, we didn't have either a motor home or a truck.

We used to go and get a rental truck

and just load all the flyway containers

because we had to have them to go to Flyaway races.

And Roy Reader from McLaren,

who's the McLaren Truckee used to get the cars off

when we got to the circuit

but because it took everyone in the factory

to lift the cars onto the truck.

So by the end of that season, we were winning races

and so we had an income, but Frank wasn't one

for spending a penny

on something he didn't need to back then, not a penny.

- You know, we'd have a 10 foot rental caravan

but people knew that William's team

has mugs of tea and a bun.

It wasn't much in the way of hospitality.

Frank could put his head on the pillow

and go to sleep for 10 hours, whatever the problem,

if the bailiffs were turning up at the door.

He had just unstoppable confidence in the future.

- Frank was wonderful.

He used to come and see me.

'Bernie could you do me a big favor?'

Yes, Frank.

'Is it possible you could lend me 2000'?

Which was a lot of money.

Sure.

Give him a check, and he said "I'll pay you next week'.

Okay, Frank. Thank you.

Next week, Frank would duly appear with a check for the 2000

talk about life in general.

And just before he leaves, 'Could you do me a big favor?

Could you lend me 2,500?'

- Mum really did play an instrumental part in Williams.

Those boys said if your mum wasn't around

Williams wouldn't exist

'cause even going back to the 70s

it was really mom's money that kept Frank going.

When he had none and the bailiffs kept knocking on the door

it was mom that would sell her car

or sold our flat or whatever.

But even away from the financial aspect

she was always there in the background.

The always say that, don't they?

Behind any successful man, there's always a strong woman.

She always said she was Williams's biggest fan.

She cared so deeply.

- He used to call this a circus.

I don't know whether they still call it a circus

but we were a bit like a traveling circus

'cause everybody knew everybody.

And I think that was a difference.

I think now, because of the numbers involved in Formula One

you don't know everybody, but when you're all the drivers...

- I think I would have liked very much to race cars

for Frank Williams.

I liked Frank Williams right from the very beginning.

If it hadn't been Ken Tittle,

then I think I would have done

and I think I would have stayed with him.

I think long-term relationships are absolutely essential.

- I joined as a machinist when he was

in this factory in Redding and then he lost the company

and he started again in Dicker

and I was the 11th employee going back to Dicker.

So, you swept before you drove a truck

and you did whatever was needed.

And that was fabulous for someone starting

in motor racing as I was.

You even knew when the bills weren't getting paid

'cause the bailiff would pop round.

That was the life and I wouldn't swap it for anything.

- He was absolutely dedicated.

And where the rest of us eventually left motor racing

and did other things with our lives,

there was no question that Frank was going to never give up.

- He was very competitive, Frank.

Frank was a guy that went to win.

- Well, the name of the game is winning

and it's what motivates everybody here.

To win provides a lot of morale, a lot of pride,

a lot of self satisfaction.

Being involved in racing is the backbone of it all.

The bonus is the winning.

- We haven't got any indication overnight

on what the problem might be.

If we get a major problem on full tanks tomorrow

like sort of solid staring or something

after the morning warmup, then we just have to take a pump

on putting it right

- Patrick, passionate he wants to win

and he passionately wants people to use his car properly.

They put a lot of time and effort

into engineering the best car and then they have to give it

to these odd ball and difficult characters sometimes

called racing drivers who have variables

and the kind of driver he loved was clearly

the Jonesy's and Rosberg's and the Mantles

who just got a car and just wrung

every little last drop out of it.

- If a driver was a real brute in a car

and just slam that car around the tracking, qualifying

and extracted the most out of it, Frank loved that.

- Well, it's a very difficult thing.

It's like a jockey trying to race

the grand national on a donkey.

He needs a good horse as well.

You need a good jockey and a good horse

the same as you need a good driver and a good car.

If you've got a bad driver and a good car

or vice versa, you won't win.

You've got to have a combination of two.

- Jonesy came in for that year

and then it just went very quickly.

It almost felt as if we hadn't had these 10 years

of having non-qualifying races

and borrowing engines from Ken Tirell.

That 10 years almost seemed not to have existed

because suddenly we were there.

It wasn't slow, it was going from there to there.

- I went to the Williams factory and I met Patrick

who was obviously unbelievably impressive

and later turned out to be probably

one of the best Formula One designers of all time.

And then they had a word on the car called Saudia.

And in those days in England, they were the flavor

of the month in terms of throwing Rolexes at people.

So I thought, okay, well it was push comes to shove

I'll get a Rolex or something.

That was the FWO6 which turned out to be a great little car.

It was probably just a little bit late.

It wasn't a ground effects car

but as a non ground effects car,

it was just a great car to drive

and we should have won one possibly two grand Prix

in that car.

So I thoroughly enjoyed that.

Then of course, the following year

Patrick developed the FW07

and after Long Beach on the Monday

I went up to Ontario motor Speedway to drive the 0 7

and then I hopped in it and I couldn't believe it.

After about four laps, I came in.

I said, now I know why bloody Andredi's

winning all these races.

You know, the amount of grip that it had going

in and out of the corner was fantastic.

And as it turned out, it turned out to be the car to have.

(engine revving)

- My motivation to keep going?

I just enjoy racing, I'm a racer

and lots of people are like me.

I've only ever done that motor racing in one form or another

either as a driver or as a mechanic and now as an entrant.

It's never difficult to keep

one's personal motivation there.

I just enjoy it so much I couldn't stop

and I don't want to stop.

- Tragically, the accident obviously affected

his life hugely

and must've really blunted some of his success.

- When the accident occurred with Frank, the road accident,

we'd been testing at Ricard

and Frank was doing a half marathon

on the Sunday of that weekend.

I had to get back as well.

So he said, 'Come on, we'll go together to the airport'.

And at one point we were breaking down into a tight corner

right-hander, and the back end jinked out

as he hit the brakes.

And I remember thinking he's going quite quickly

and the last thing I saw was we were heading

on the inside to what appeared to be a stone wall.

And we were gonna hit the Stonewall.

And my natural reaction was just to get

into the crash position and bury myself

as low down into the foot well area as I could,

waiting for this impact.

The car hit the end and went up in the air.

Just complete silence.

I remember just thinking what is going on,

there's no noise now.

And then (claps) massive impact

as we landed nose down and then roof down.

There was a bit of a smell of fuel but we were upside down.

The roof had caved in.

There was stuff everywhere, as you can imagine,

all our bags and briefcases and blood.

And so all I thought about was trying to get Frank out

through the back of the car,

trying to keep his neck as stable as possible.

But I did manage to eventually get him out

holding him and all the time he was saying

'I can't feel my legs, they feel as if they're floating'.

- Frank broke his neck and he was in a band

his spinal cord very high up.

And he was to all intents and purposes on his death bed

and it was only a courtesy of his wife, Ginny

that he didn't die.

His lungs filled with fluid and Jenny was being advised

let him go, let him go.

And she was sort of pumping his lungs out and screaming

at the doctors to keep him alive and whatever.

He owes the remainder of his life to Jenny.

He's sadly not with us anymore.

- And eventually he started to make progress

and he wasn't very interested in doing all the physio

that people who have his injuries

should be interested in doing.

He was much more interested in getting back to a race

and running the race team.

That's what got Frank going again.

(crowd cheering)

- I feel normal.

Maybe not quite as mobile as I would like to be

but I'm enjoying being here very, very much indeed.

And I'm glad that the team is going very well without me

because I do also at the same time feel a bit rusty.

Everything's happening a bit quickly for me.

- I do think that drivers fit into teams.

Nigel was very much part of the Williams family, I think.

I think he was one of the last drivers

who was closest to us in age

that once had a relationship with him.

When I think about Nigel, you just always had this feeling

that he was always going to give 100% or more.

- He's (foreign language) without doubt.

The most electrifying of all the drivers.

In my opinion none of the previous three

could get out of the car what he does

when he's on a qualifying lap.

(crowd cheering)

- He was hard to manage in some ways, but he was very quick.

He was very, very quick.

- They wanted to go out there and do their bit

and it was a very British ethos, you know?

So it's quite fun carrying that sense

that you were carrying the flag as well.

- You would not have thought that Damon could ever be

a world champion and I was totally wrong,

and I've expressed that.

Those day's it was the worst thing you could do,

but he was very, very quiet

Rarely, if ever complained about his car

he just got on and drove.

- When it came to '96, Michael had gone to another team

and wasn't really in the title fight.

So I got 100% support from Frank and Patrick.

We had a new guy, we had Jack in the team

so they weren't expecting him...

They were expecting him to take a year to settle in

which is sort of what happened.

And I got 100% support and became world champion,

thanks to Frank and Patrick and the whole team.

- I can remember when Frank had won 100 Grand Prix

and Alexander Huskies gave some sort of speech.

I don't know where it was.

And he said, winning one Grand Prix, is hard.

To win 100 is quite extraordinary.

But I don't think that the novelty ever wears off.

When you win a race its an incredible feeling.

- [Announcer] A new winner in Formula One

it's Pastor Maldonado and Donna Williams

with their first Grand Prix victory

since Juan Pablo Montoya in 2004.

They realize why they come racing

and why they love Formula One.

(crowd cheering)

- We'd gone there as a family.

Turns out it was the last race that our mom went to

which is deeply sad, but I'm so pleased that she did.

(crowd applauding)

- The team was his life.

It was maybe the only thing that he had apart from family

but I think it was maybe even more important sometimes.

Sometimes I was even talking to him, I said, 'Frank, for me

we need to buy everything from Mercedes'.

We need to buy the gearbox, we need to buy the suspension.

And Frank said, 'I cannot'.

I say why?

'Because I have all my people from the gearbox.

I cannot fire these people'.

The team is his life.

- Dad's two, I think, serious incidents in his life

that have deeply affected him probably

more than he would ever let on

would be Pier's death and Ayrton's death.

Piers was a great friend of dad.

He'd met his, I think his soulmate almost in Piers

and the same with Ayrton.

I know how much dad adored Ayrton and wanted for many years

to get him to drive for Williams

and it finally happened.

And then the unthinkable happened just a few months later.

That, for dad, I think it was heartbreaking.

- I regard Williams as a great Formula One team, definitely.

They've got the history, they've got the record.

They currently haven't got the (foreign language)

they should do.

- Frank is wholly unique

but every team prints it's place, don't they?

Ron was unique, they'll never be another Ron.

They'll never be another Colin Chapman.

- When you look at the results of Williams

compared to where they started, they were the factory team.

They didn't have a really big budget to start with.

It was purely because of Frank and Patrick's determination

and hard work that got them to where they were.

- Williams' legacy in Formula One,

I would say, should be

that people can still become involved in the sport

and people can still achieve great things in the sport

despite perhaps not starting out with the means to do so.

Dad's story is one of those fairytales

where he came from absolutely nothing

and he went on to achieve huge things in the sport

and dominate it.

As long as people like dad have been there

to prove that anything's possible in sport,

people will keep watching.

- I surprise people

by telling them actually I've never really liked cars.

And of course they don't believe me.

- Ron Dennis is one of the real Formula One trailblazers.

(engine revving)

(exciting music)

(crowd cheering)

- What I do love is, I love making things

and I am fiercely competitive.

So Formula One provided

the perfect opportunity

to be in an extremely competitive world

and make beautiful things.

Because whilst not every Grand Prix car

has been aesthetically beautiful

they are normally made very, very well.

- Ron is famous for attention to detail.

By the way a lot of senior people in motor racing are.

Jackie Stewart famously was, and is.

Bernie Ecclestone famously was, and is.

David Richards, Flavio Briatore.

All of these people like presentational perfection

otherwise known as OCD and none would admit that.

- I think in today's language, I am a compulsive obsessive

and I have always been that way,

but mine sits in my mind

where it won't stop analyzing, seeking perfection,

trying to find a better way to do things.

But at the same time

in an environment of phenomenal order.

If you open any cupboard in my home,

every can is completely aligned

and with the labels pointing to the front.

- It was attention to detail.

Everything had to be done just right.

I think he met Roger Penske actually

and saw the way Roger did things, ran his team.

And you could see that Ron was picking up on that

and saying that there's no excuse for failure.

(engine revving)

- I wouldn't be here without Roy Salvadori.

No question.

No question at all, for lots of reasons.

But you know, that was the guy that gave me the chance.

That was the guy that nurtured me.

That was the guy that explained things

and gave me a compass heading

that I've followed all my life.

- Well, I'd known Ron a long time

because he had come into Formula Two in '71

with an outstanding visual,

if you want to call it, operation.

Rondel racing.

A year but two, grab a BT 36

and they were the best prepared.

The scale of what Ron had created,

got backers who gave him the funds to do this.

- Rondel racing was unofficially

the Brabham Formula Two team.

Ron sat me down one day and said,

listen I'd like you to come

and look after sponsorship and that sort of stuff

and I'll pay you 10 pounds a week.

- I've got to be fair.

Without Ron Touranac agreeing to loan me two cars

and a few other things falling into place,

I would have never succeeded.

- At that point, McLaren, they were going

through a very dark phase.

In 1979, their ground effect car,

which should have been the dominant car

turned out to be a McLaren, which was an M 28.

It was probably one of the worst cars

that McLaren factory has ever produced.

Malboro who were the principal backers of the McLaren team

were concerned that McLaren had lost the plot, totally.

- I tried to convince them to drop

the sponsorship of McLaren and sponsor my team.

Paul came back and said no,

it's not gonna happen.

I phoned up John Hogan and I said, look, I have an idea.

Why don't I buy McLaren?

And he said, 'what do you mean?'

'How are you going to buy the McLaren?'

I said, 'If you told them that

you weren't gonna sponsor them unless they sold to me

and let's say they sell half to me,

then maybe they would be faced with no other alternative'.

- So once Ron became a part of the team

and John Bonard came with a technical sort of knowledge

there's going to be a commitment to a construction method

which had never, ever been used in Formula One previously.

- Because of the ground effect one way of improving it

was to make your ground fit wings wider, bigger.

So you got more surface area, more down force.

To get that, I had to narrow the chassis

and by narrowing the chassis as much as I did,

I would've lost torsional stiffness

and general bending stiffness of the chassis.

So I thought, how can I put that back?

I need another material.

I thought about, maybe instead of an aluminum skin monocoque

I'll make a steel skin monocoque.

Well then, weight was an issue and so on.

And then I got a phone call from Steve Nichols

who I knew from my indie car time.

- He told me he was developing a new car

for project four.

Wanted a stiff narrow monocoque for the ground effect

type of cars that were in existence then,

and he said he was wanted to use an innovative new material

to add stiffness and they couldn't get anybody in England

to build it for him.

And so I said, well, I guess you're talking

about carbon fiber then

and I might be able to help you

because I used to work at Hercules

and we used carbon fiber in the rocket motors

for the Trident missile system.

- Ooh, Julie arrived at Hercules aerospace and

with a sort of smoke and mirrors performance

convinced them that on the basis that no one in the world

ever had heard the company,

because everything they did was top secret,

that this would be a project

that they could proudly be associated with

and they would get some reflected benefit.

And so we forged an amazing relationship

and the early examples of the chassis

weren't particularly cosmetically pleasing

but they were unbelievably, torsionally strong, so stiff.

And that just became the catalyst

to the entire success of McLaren.

- The design was the car that then became McLaren MP 401.

It became in effect the template

for what Formula One would go on to do.

- I needed to choose someone when I considered Nikki

and I phoned him out of the blue

and said, 'Nikki, why don't you come back'?

Nikki didn't say yes or no. He just said, 'Okay'.

Now of course it was very quickly on the posts

and so the rest is history, as they say.

(engine revving)

- He was the toughest guy to beat, as far as I know.

The toughest guy.

So therefore this championship

is the most important one for me.

(crowd cheering)

- Portuguese Grand Prix, 1984 was memorable

to say the least.

Prost was unbelievably positive in defeat.

We had one unbelievable party that evening.

And of course ironically the world championship was decided

by half a point because of the race in Monte Carlo.

(crowd cheering)

- I think Ron is the most visionary person I've worked with.

He's a guy that you can have a conversation with

and leave the room and feel truly motivated to go.

Most of us, if we're lucky, we look like that

but things too often, we look down there.

Ron looks he's right up there.

- When I first started with Ron at McLaren

I came up to be a manager of small teams like ATS,

other racing and shadow.

I was always balancing the money.

So when I got to McLaren and Ron said

if you want something that's going

to make the car faster, buy it.

Don't care how much it costs.

Don't you ever worry about money.

I worry about money, you get the best for the team.

Wow, that was just like a breath of fresh air.

(somber music)

(indistinct chattering)

- I look back on that race in Adelaide,

it wasn't bad luck.

It was a bad decision.

They didn't stop for tires

and the tire failure was not

the result of a puncture, it was worn out.

And they just took the wrong decision

about how they manage their tires and when they changed.

So I think that they lost the world championship

but at the same time we won it,

not because of their bad luck

but because of our better decisions.

(crowd cheering)

Looking back on it, of course it was

that moment of vindication

for John and for myself

for taking that really adventurous step

into the world of carbon fiber.

And of course now not only every Formula One car

but most competitive cars,

you are much better heavily strapped into a survival cell

than any other type of accident.

(engine revving)

The best thing about, Oisin was intelligence and rationality

so, much as he had the odd Brazilian flare up

you could have amazingly deep conversations with him.

And I think I understood him better than anybody else,

everyone on the planet,

because I was in a period of his life

which was the most intense period of his life,

all the success of his life.

And I saw him wrestle with things

that never came to the surface

because they weren't things

that were directly taking place within Grand Prix racing.

It was very much things that happened in his private life

that I managed to help him with both as a friend,

but also as someone that I felt mentored him well.

So some of the crisis is in his life.

- The most important thing to all of us

is to keep the good moments.

And I had a tremendous time.

The records speak for themselves, the results

the championships, and I leave friends behind.

And I think that's the best way to do.

Leaving friends behind, winning last race,

coping in an extremely difficult season

with the technical reasons that we all know

and winning five races.

It is tremendous.

- Ron's vision meant that he could see somebody

like Lewis as a teenager going so well in karting.

And who knows where Lewis' career would have gone

if Ron hadn't have picked him up and helped him

through those stages into what was then

a winning Formula One car.

- I met Ron in 1995.

My dad was like, that's the guy that built the cars

that Ayrton used to race, the McLaren's.

And I'd been such a fan watching Ayrton race them

and that was my dream.

Probably that the MP 404 was like my dream car.

And so I was like, okay, this is the guy

I need to go and speak to.

- He asked for my autograph.

Two years later he came back, asked for my autograph again

and there was a brightness and determination on his face.

Now, at that time I was a bit bored.

It's the truth.

I sort of said, okay, I've been thinking about it.

Here's the deal.

I will sponsor your future seasons

but you have to understand,

you've got to do everything I say.

And then to his disappointment, I said, well first thing is,

you're going back to school.

- Initially, when I got signed

I didn't feel any pressure,

but as I come to realize the opportunity that I had

over the next couple of years

it felt like a lot of pressure.

- It wasn't so much about forcing him into education.

It was more keeping him in a normal life.

- He created an opportunity for me that no one else

had the kindness in their heart to do.

We spoke to so many people.

It's interesting today.

I see people who, who now support me,

who back then when we tried to sell them

the dream of being the first black Formula One driver

or black family in the sport,

and they didn't support us back then,

or they thought it was impossible or they laughed.

Now they're supporters.

But Ron was the only one that saw something in me

that no one else did

but I feel forever indebted to him

and I forever have a huge amount of love for Ron.

- Lewis Hamilton. Lewis, you won the GPG race.

Do you think you might be standing here

next year on the grid?

- Hopefully.

It's a fantastic feeling to be here.

I just hope I can sit there next year.

- Okay, and do you think you'll be ready for it,

fully ready for it?

- I think so.

- I went to Fernando and I said, Fernando, by the way

I've decided to put Lewis in the car.

And he thought for a moment, and he said

'Does he want to win the constructors'?

Meaning that he didn't feel that Lewis

was going to be much of a threat

or much of a points scorer,

which I look back on and smile about now

because, how wrong he was.

(siren blaring)

(indistinct chattering)

- My memory of the race is vivid.

(crowd cheering)

It was a calculated risk.

We knew that we had to be

in a good position on tires at the end of the race.

(engine revving)

And it nearly went wrong, but it didn't go wrong.

(engine revving)

(crowd cheering)

Yes, it was two corners for me

and when Lewis got past, yes, people were slow

to realize what was happening

and certainly Ferrari was slow

to realize what was happening.

(crowd cheering)

But, we won.

We knew where we had to finish and that's what we did.

(crowd cheering)

Uncharacteristically of McLaren

we started on the basis of let's win the world championship

and don't worry about winning the race.

The world championship is won over the whole season.

(indistinct chattering)

There are very few people

who really understand what it takes

to win consistently in Formula One.

- Congratulations on the constructor's.

(indistinct chattering)

- There are many people who believe that they do

but that only makes winning a little bit easier.

That particular weekend, that particular last lap

had its share of emotion,

but I didn't feel at all lucky coming out of that race win.

- [Team] Hip Hip! - [Team] Hooray!

- Ron, as team Principal won more races

and more world championships than anyone,

including Enzo Ferrari, including Colin Chapman.

That's Ron's place in Formula One history.

You can't say better than that.

- Ron's achievements at McLaren.

I mean, unreal.

From where he took that team from

and what he built it into.

- And the warmth within McLaren under Ron,

impossible to discern from outside, was very real.

- He's achieved a lot in his long career in Formula One

and you've got to remember that also Formula One

from the 80s to the 90s to now, it's changed so much,

but he's always been there fighting.

- The whole team performed very well.

That's from the guys back in the factory,

the race team has put a big effort in

to do a 7 second pit stop.

After working that hard, it's a credit to all of them

and it's good to be part of it.

Throughout my history with McLaren

I would often say to people that McLaren,

if it was a book, I would be merely chapter in the book.

The best moment for me

was the day I drove away on the 1st June, 2017,

because it was the full stop on my chapter.

It wasn't a negative

and it was just the point at which

I felt it was complete.

Next day, I got up and completely focused

on all the other things I want to do in my life.