Matt Bishop 🏳️‍🌈 🏁

Matt Bishop: 'Skill, courage and V10s: Albert Park's first GP showed what F1 used to be' Australia's Grand Prix moved to Albert Park 30 years ago when the sport seemed purer and simpler, writes Matt Bishop. But underneath modern wizardry, drivers in this weekend's season-opener will find ...

As the #F1 circus revs up for the 2026 #AusGP, my brand-new #MotorSport column looks back almost exactly 30 years to the very first F1 GP run on Melbourne’s Albert Park circuit, starring Damon Hill, Jacques Villeneuve & Martin Brundle. Click below.
www.motorsportmagazine.com/articles/sin...

Matt Bishop: 'Skill, courage and V10s: Albert Park's first GP showed what F1 used to be' Australia's Grand Prix moved to Albert Park 30 years ago when the sport seemed purer and simpler, writes Matt Bishop. But underneath modern wizardry, drivers in this weekend's season-opener will find plenty in common with the 'antique' grid of 1996

Almost 30 years ago, Albert Park erupted to the spine-tingling roar of V10 engines as it hosted the Australian GP for the first time. It almost feels like an antique era of #F1, says @thebishf1.bsky.social
go.motorsportmagazine.com/4s...

Sorry, my mistake, he’s 65! 😮‍💨

I haven’t posted a mega pic of Carlos Reutemann for far too long. So here’s Lole at his magnificent best, holding a Lotus 79 in a glorious drift en route to 5th at Kyalami #OnThisDay in ’79. Gilles Villeneuve won - a very successful debut #F1 GP for the Ferrari 312T4.

#AnorakFact: #OnThisDay in ’73, in South Africa, Ferrari started its 200th #F1 GP. In those 200 races Ferrari won 49 times & achieved 183 podium finishes, 60 pole positions, 57 fastest laps, & 6 drivers’ & 2 constructors’ world championships. Pic: Stewart won for Tyrrell.

#HappyBirthday Perry McCarthy, 63, quick but unlucky, a lovely guy, & a great mate. Pic: I’m the pretty one.

Remembering Otto Stuppacher, born #OnThisDay in ’47. Pic: a poignant screen-grab; you won’t be surprised to hear that I never met Otto Stuppacher, but Henry Hope-Frost was a good friend, a lovely guy, a born entertainer & a motorsport enthusiast of the first order.

In Bahrain #OnThisDay 2 years ago, after having taken the pole the day before, Max Verstappen led every lap of the race, drove fastest lap, & thereby scored his 5th #F1 grand chelem. Nice pic taken by Mark Thompson.

#HappyBirthday Gabriele Tarquini, 64. Tarquini started 38 #F1 GPs, always in mediocre cars, which is why he also DNQ’d for 40 more. He scored 1 point (Mexico ’89) then became one of the greatest touring car drivers of all time. Pic: battling the Fondmetal GR01 at Monaco in ’92.

Today I’ll mainly be watching the #WelshOpen #Snooker final on BBC2 Wales &/or BBC RB1. Barry Hawkins & Jack Lisowski are both fine players - &, having met them both, I can also say that they’re both lovely guys. Play starts at 1.00pm. May the best man win.

Dramatist, critic & Nobel Prize winner George Bernard Shaw (pic) wrote the following words in Man & Superman (1905): “Old men are dangerous: it doesn’t matter to them what is going to happen to the world.” His words were wise then & it’s very clear that they’re even wiser now.

Fab pic (taken by Tony Alves) of Nigel Mansell’s Williams FW14B, at Kyalami, #OnThisDay in ’92. Having taken the pole by a massive 0.74sec, Mansell led every lap of the race & took fastest lap to boot: a perfect grand chelem victory. #AnorakFact: it was his 2nd #F1 grand chelem.

#OnThisDay in ’80 Jean-Pierre Jabouille, who’d put his beautiful Renault RE20 on the pole the day before, led the #SouthAfricanGP until thwarted by a puncture on lap 62, leaving his Renault team-mate René Arnoux to take the win. Great pic by Nigel Snowdon.

Can it really be 51 years since local hero Jody Scheckter (Tyrrell) won the #SouthAfricanGP, just 3.74sec ahead of Carlos Reutemann (Brabham)? Yes, it happened #OnThisDay in ’75. Pic: pretty car, Scheckter’s Derek Gardner-designed Tyrrell 007.

The story of the size, shape & configuration of wings has been an #F1 odyssey for a generation - & here’s an example of one of its most lurid chapters. #OnThisDay in ’69 Jackie Stewart raced this Matra MS10 to #SouthAfricanGP victory. High wings were banned a couple of GPs later.

Steve Nichols returns: The N1A and the DNA of McLaren’s golden era The street-legal N1A is inspired by McLaren’s 1960s Can-Am racing cars. Adam Towler takes to the track – with its F1-famed designer Steve Nichols playing race engineer

Taking the N1A on track 🏁

Check out the MotorSport Magazine feature below - placed by Diagonal on behalf of Nichols Cars - in which they take the breathtaking Nichols Cars N1A for a spin, overseen by its founder and legendary F1 designer Steve Nichols ⬇️
www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/arti...

You know you’re a legend when an #F1 team names a car after you. #HappyBirthday Mario Andretti, 86 today, after whom the brand-new Cadillac MAC-26 has been named (MAC stands for Mario Andretti Cadillac). Here’s Checo Pérez testing the car in Bahrain.

Remembering Élie Bayol, born #OnThisDay in 1914. He started 7 GPs, from ’52 to ’56, his best results 5th in Buenos Aires in ’54 in a Gordini Type 16 &, in his final GP, 6th at Monaco in ’56 in a Gordini Type 32 (pic by Bernard Cahier).

Remembering Albert Scherrer, born #OnThisDay in 1908. He entered the ’53 #SwissGP in a 3rd works HWM-Alta (pic); 18th in qualifying, he spun in the race before finishing a distant 8th. #AnorakFact: it was the only major single-seater race of his career.

This, from Ian Byrne MP (Labour), is spot-on. I’m 63, I’ve been Labour all my life, but when Keir Starmer said, “If you don’t like the changes we’ve made, I say the door is open, & you can leave,” well, we did as he asked us, 1000s of us, & we saw the result in Gorton & Denton.

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Many thanks - & yes I agree with you that Zak’s remarkable career is an example of exactly what you describe.

Remembering Peter Revson, quick & suave, born #OnThisDay in ’39, a winner in #CanAm, #IndyCar (or #USAC) & #F1, killed testing a Shadow at Kyalami in March ’74. Pic (taken by Bernard Cahier): hefty dab of oppo, en route to 4th, Montjuïc, ’73, his first race in a McLaren M23.

Gorton & Denton will go down in history as a lesson to the 2 parties that have dominated UK politics all our lives that the people - the voters - have the power to sink dreadful governments. The Tories are finished. Labour may yet survive, but only with fundamental change. (3/3)

I’m 63, I’ve been Labour all my life, & I hope this byelection humiliation will persuade whoever takes over from Keir Starmer to arrest Labour’s grubby effort to outReform Reform, not only because it’s a betrayal of Labour values but also because it clearly isn’t working. (2/3)

A SHORT THREAD: I welcome Hannah Spencer’s historic byelection victory for many reasons, including that she’ll serve the people of Gorton & Denton well; that I like Zack Polanski personally; & that I admire what he’s doing with the Green Party, which I’ve recently joined. (1/3)

Wow! Mark Williams has just made a century break with an excellent shot on the blue, an outrageous fluke on the pink, & a one-handed pot on the black. #WelshOpen #Snooker

Also, if Reform win today’s byelection, Labour might be encouraged to continue its ugly lurch to the right, in an effort to outReform Reform. But if the Greens win, Keir Starmer might consider halting that lurch, frightened to lose more liberal-left support to the Greens. (2/2)

I’m a Green Party member, I like Zack Polanski personally, & there are many good reasons to vote Green in today’s Gorton & Denton byelection, not least to stop Reform winning it. It’s crucial that Labour supporters vote Green therefore, tactically, to prevent a Reform win. (1/2)

Remembering Danny Ongais, who died #OnThisDay 4 years ago, aged 79. Nicknamed “the flyin’ Hawaiian” or “On-gas”, he won one #IndyCar  (#USAC) race in ’77, & 5 in ’78, in a Parnelli VPJ6B. Here he is in the car at Indy in ’77 (pic taken by Bob Harmeyer). He also drove 4 #F1 GPs.