Brooklands Museum Talks

For this unique event, Harry Sherrard is joined by former Concorde Pilot, John Tye and Chief Concorde Pilot, Mike Bannister. First we take a nostalgic look back at the technical marvel that was Concorde, and reflect on that incredible era of supersonic civil aviation. Then we look to the future. Mike Bannister is a director of Boom Aviation, a US based company currently developing the next generat...

Brooklands volunteer and bomber command researcher Ian Hunt talks with the author Michael Napier about the writing of the book in Barnes Wallis office at Brooklands Museum. The most famous and successful heavy bomber flown by the RAF during World War 2, the Avro Lancaster remains one of the most enduring symbols of RAF, and indeed British, history. This book presents a completely new and original...

Lella Lombardi is best remembered as the only woman (to date) to have finished in a point scoring position in a Formula 1 World Championship Grand Prix. But there was so much more to Lella than this groundbreaking, but career-defining statistic. A gutsy and gritty competitor, Lella won Italian National Championships in both single seaters and saloons, before going on to be a front runner in Formul...

Britain's 1st Grand Prix took place at Brooklands in August 1926. To mark the centenary, the Brooklands Museum Talks Team head Harry Sherrard collaborates with one of the world's leading motorsport journalists, Maurice Hamilton. The presentation covers the first century of British Grands Prix, including highlights such as Campbell v Seagrave at Brooklands, Moss v Fangio at Aintree, Hunt v Lauda at...

On 25th October 2016 Simon Taylor compered a Brooklands Members Talk in the Napier Room at Brooklands Museum on the motorsport life of James Hunt, in particular 1976. Simon talks with Maurice Hamilton, Tony Dron and Freddie Hunt about their memories of the great man.

As the final rung below Formula 1 on motor racing’s ladder to the top, the International Formula 3000 Championship ran from 1985 to 2004 and nurtured numerous drivers who went on to become future stars. Jean Alesi, Christian Fittipaldi, Juan Pablo Montoya and Nick Heidfeld all became International F3000 champions on the way to Formula 1. Brooklands Members president Damon Hill impressed in F3000 b...

Recorded in 2012 at Sir Stirling's Mayfair home by Phil Sampson/Albany Communications, this is a wonderful conversation between Murray Walker and Sir Stirling Moss. Both, in their own way, are national Treasures; Murray Walker, the voice of motorsport, and Sir Stirling Moss, Mr Motor Racing (as Murray eloquently puts it). When it comes to greatness, there is no test greater than that of time – and...

Matt talks candidly with Mark Jarman about his multifaceted career in F1 and writing the novel "The Boy Made the Difference".

A Reliability Engineer is one of those vital trackside roles, well understood within the confines of the F1 paddock, but perhaps its existence is lesser known outside of the travelling F1 circus. It’s always been a vital cog, linking trackside and factory operations, but the greater the calendar congestion, the more critical it becomes. Abbie Robison is one of McLaren's Reliability Engineers, spli...

Nadine Lewis is an experienced marshal and the first female Chair of the British Motorsport Marshals Club (BMMC). She talks with Mark Jarman about her involvement in BMMC and the importance of volunteers as marshals in all forms of motorsport.

Millie talks with Mark Jarman about her work as an aerodynamicist at Aston Martin and her progression through school and university that inspired her.

Doug McKiernan is a British Formula One and aerospace aerodynamics engineer. He is currently the chief technical officer at Zero Petroleum which he co-founded alongside Paddy Lowe and Nilay Shah focusing on the development of sustainable synthetic fuels for motorsport and wider transport applications.

James Dornor is the visionary Founder & CEO of Driven By Us,, a pioneering community-driven organisation dedicated to empowering aspiring leaders from ethnic minorities and underserved groups within automotive and motorsport industries. James talks with Mark Jarman about his life and career to date in motorsport and what has motivated him throughout his lived experience and instrustry insights to...

A very entertaining Derek Daly talks with Harry about his life in motorsport. Derek graduated all the way from Irish Formula Ford to Formula One on pure merit. His rise through the junior formulae was meteoric, winning the Formula Ford Festival ahead of Derek Warwick in 1976, then taking the British Formula 3 spoils the following year. He made his Grand Prix debut the next year, less than two year...

Tom Crean was the unsung hero of Antarctic exploration, whose incredible exploits with Captain Scott and Ernest Shackleton were overlooked for 80 years. Crean, who ran away from home as a teenager, served on three expeditions to the Antarctic, and spent longer on the ice than either Scott or Shackleton. He was among the last to see Scott alive near the South Pole in 1912 and returned to the ice to...

David talks about his father Jack Brabham and the evolution of the Brabham F1 team, through David's multi discipline motorsport successes to the development of the current radical technical Formula One era.

Peter Grimsdale talks with the author Midge Gillies about her passion in writing this book and the stories of six female aviators from the early days of aviation. This is the astounding story of the six female aviators who battled to become the first woman to cross the Atlantic Ocean by plane. In the early 20th century, the dream of crossing the Atlantic by air was as potent as putting a man on th...

The powerful true story of the first flight across the Atlantic and the ordinary heroes who risked their lives in pursuit of progress. In 1919, in Newfoundland, four teams of aviators came from Britain to compete in “the Big Hop”: an audacious race to be the first to fly, non-stop, across the Atlantic Ocean. One pair of competitors was forced to abandon the journey halfway, and two pairs never mad...

The author Russell Hayes talks with Brooklands.tv's Gareth Tarr about the book's compilation. Aston Martin is the Great British survivor among car manufacturers. Created as Bamford & Martin in 1913, Aston Martin’s subsequent century-long existence has seen the company go bust seven times, win the Le Mans 24 Hours and become indispensable transport for a certain movie spy. This comprehensive and ti...

Recorded in Michael's studio at his home in 2024, he talks with Mark Jarman of Brooklands.tv about his life painting aircraft and how by flying in them he was able to produce the desired results!

When Hazel Hill was just 13 years old, her father came home with a challenge for her. As a scientific officer at the Air Ministry in 1934, Captain Fred Hill felt that Spitfires and Hurricanes should be armed with eight guns, instead of the four they were initially designed with. However, there were concerns that aircraft would be unable to fly with the added weight. Hazel was a talented mathematic...

Matthew Field and Ajay Chowdhury, authors of Spy Octane: The Vehicles of James Bond, Volume 1, reveal the extraordinary detective work that unearthed new and ground-breaking secrets behind some of 007’s most iconic vehicles and the machines that propelled Sean Connery and George Lazenby through the first seven Bond adventures. The authors share fascinating stories about the customised Toyota 2000...

The author Suzanne Schartel talks with Brooklands Martin Gegg about the writing of the book... Hilde & Tommy - this is the authentic love story between Hilde, the youngest daughter of Fritz Gehr, director of the world-famous German NSU vehicle factory, and the legendary English motorcycle racer Tom "Tommy" Bullus. The book provides a unique insight into the eventful history of the company up to th...

Gareth Tarr talks with the author Peter Grimsdale about the writing of the book. Silverstone, 1950 – the first post-war Grand Prix and the birth of Formula One. The king and queen, alongside 150,000 spectators, watch in dismay as Italy’s Alfa Romeos scream past to claim the first three places. British cars are hopelessly outclassed by Alfa Romeos and Maseratis. How can it be, they all wonder, that...

The prototype Hawker Hurricane K5083 performed its maiden flight at Brooklands on 6 November 1935, and we mark the 90th anniversary by welcoming to Brooklands Dilip Sarkar MBE. Dilip is a globally acknowledged expert on all aspects of the Battle of Britain and, during his long career, he enjoyed a privileged relationship with many of Churchill's Few. He has written over 60 books, including the def...