dotdotdotcomma.com: f1 news...,

Bruce McLaren takes his team's first Grand Prix victory, Belgium 1968.

Founded by the Kiwi Bruce McLaren in 1963, Bruce McLaren Motor Racing merged in 1981 with the Project 4 team, which was being run by the barn owl Ron Dennis. The team is now part of McLaren Racing, a member of the McLaren Group, under the umbrella of McLaren Holdings, a subsidiary of McLaren PLC, which is wholly owned by McLaren (World Domination) Ltd.

Bruce McLaren is currently the only driver to have won a Formula One world championship race in a car bearing his own name as a constructor*, although the dotdotdotcomma-sponsored driver Panasonic Toyota, currently racing a borrowed Caterham with limited success, is optimistic of one day becoming the second.

The team has rapidly become one of the most successful in F1 history and is widely regarded as technologically top-notch, if sometimes a little fragile operationally. They are constantly trying to persuade everyone that they may be stiff and corporate but they still know how to have a good time. It's not terribly convincing.

They're far from unemotional, however, and Ron Dennis can often be glimpsed furtively wiping away a tear or two of joy. In fact, when one of his favoured drivers has won against seemingly insuperable odds during a troubled time for the team, it can sometimes be hard to hear the national anthems over the sound of Ron's blubbing.

*Other than, we've just realised, Jack Brabham. Who also won the world championship. Arse. Rest assured, our research team will be hung, drawn and quartered. Or should that be "hanged"?

F1: McLap'em reveal striking 2006 livery	by Virgil Ellipse 13th Feb 2006

The MP4-21: Chrome sweet chrome McLap'em have revealed their definitive, seminal and no doubt ultimate 2006 car livery, with the most arresting feature being its highly reflective chrome surface. "A lot of research and months of work have gone into creating this unique chrome finish," explained McLap'em Marketing Managing Director Ekrem Sami. Or it might have been Sami Ekrem, Director (Managing Marketing), McLap'em. There really were lots of mirrors around. "We are always looking at ways of helping to differentiate our sponsors' brands from the competition," continued whoever it was, "and this unique livery is designed to be extremely photogenic, although that obviously depends largely on how photogenic the photographer is." Which, in the experience of the dotdotdotcomma editors, is not very. In fact, motorsport photographers are usually the third least attractive group you're likely to encounter at a circuit, with the second least attractive being the marshals, most of whom orange definitely does not suit. The least attractive of all groups remains, of course, the Schumacher clan. While the marketing advantages are being touted publicly as the reason for the livery change, a leaked internal document that dotdotdotcomma hasn't seen reveals a rather different picture, with three stated objectives of using the new colour scheme: to help protect the driver from excessive temperatures by reflecting the heat from the flames of his undoubtedly burning engine to provide a mirror-like surface that will give engineers an "all-round" view of flying engine parts during replays of the spectacular power-unit explosions that the team's testing form has led us all to expect to use the cunningly sculpted bodywork to distort reflections in the same way as those crazy mirrors you get at fun fairs, with the sole aim of making the pit babes' tits look bigger

Currently 0.00/5 1 2 3 4 5 Why not rate this news item? You'd be the first person to give it a happy Murray score. send to a friend print this article

RELATED NEWS ITEMS:
F1	San Miguel: I'm proud to be at McLap'em	2nd Feb 2012
F1	Jet-on to get first run in new McLap'em	17th Jan 2012
F1	Lowcost reactive ride height declared legal	12th Jan 2012
F1	Lollo Rosso strengthens technical team	2nd Dec 2011
F1	Bunsen Jet-On ready and waiting for new McLap'em deal	30th Aug 2011

AROUND THIS TIME LAST YEAR:
F1	Hamilton: Extra Buttons not a worry	7th Feb 2011
F1	Comebacker tipped to deliver in 2011	2nd Feb 2011
F1	Ford suing Ferrarsi over F150 name	10th Feb 2011
F1	Piquet: F1 teams will restrict drivers	11th Feb 2011

KEY TO SERIES NAMES (hovering over the abbreviations in the table above also shows the full series name)
F1	Formula 1 The world's most prominent, most expensive and frequently most tedious single-seater series.