NZ Sporting History: Bruce McLaren

Born in Tamaki Makaurau Auckland, Bruce McLaren won the New Zealand Grand Prix in 1958 before flying overseas to join the ranks of the greatest Formula 1 drivers in the world.

In 1963 he established the McLaren Racing and began producing his own F1 cars.

McLaren died in 1970 at the age of 32 while testing a new design.

His daughter, Amanda McLaren, now a McLaren Automotive brand ambassador, was too young to know her father, she tells Jesse Mulligan.

“Unfortunately, I have no memory of my father, which may be a better thing for a young child to lose a parent. He was not at home a lot, because obviously running the team, racing, testing, working for various companies in the UK and Europe and overseas, I didn't actually see a lot of him.”

When he didn’t come home the night he died, it wasn’t unusual, she says.

“My mother very much shielded me from the trauma that she was experiencing. So, it was a gradual realisation as I grew up, that yes, my father had died. But it wasn't a major trauma for me, for which I'm quite thankful.”

She also didn’t realise that the many visitors to the family home were famous, she says.

“My mother had a bookshelf of books with their names on the spine, either written by them, or about them and I was unaware.

“All my mum's girlfriends were the wives, and girlfriends of these famous racing drivers.”

But in 1976, the penny dropped when she mixed in rarified motorsport circles.

"It really wasn't until 1976, when a certain James Hunt was driving for McLaren.

"And James Hunt was everybody's pin-up boy, and I was no exception. He was on my bedroom wall. And I thought he was just absolutely gorgeous.”

She got to meet him at the British Grand Prix she was attending with her mother, she says.

“I go back to school the following morning and I'm surrounded by my 11-year-old classmates. And we're doing the ‘what did you do at the weekend’ sort of thing as you usually do. And so I said, ‘Oh, well, actually, I got to meet James Hunt’.

“And all of a sudden, there was this kind of pregnant pause, and everyone looked at me. And their eyes came out on stalks, and I went from zero to hero in a nanosecond.”

It was at that moment she realised what an extraordinary man her father was, she says.

“I realised that I knew nothing about what it was my father had done.

“So, I went back home, started reading the books and the magazines, and asking these people that used to come around to our house fairly regularly, what my father had done.

“So, it's really a ‘thank you James’ for that light bulb moment, as well as everything else.”

McLaren was a top driver, a designer and a team owner, she says.   

“It still absolutely blows me away, how much he did achieve in a very, very short time and so young. We've had a lot of good drivers or good designers or good constructors, or good team managers, but he was everything.”

At his factory outside of London, he inspired fierce loyalty, she says.

“Howden Ganley, another New Zealander who became a mechanic and then a very good family friend, said that if Bruce had said, ‘right, we're going out to the desert today to build a brick wall'. They all would have done it without question.”

His New Zealand upbringing gave him certain advantages, she says.

“New Zealand boys especially access cars at a very early age, they were able to drive on their or relatives’ farm or get access to some open land to drive it.

“And then there were the gravel roads, and being able to learn to handle a car while it is drifting. And to put it exactly where you want. We didn't have traction control and all the downforce that they have today, back in those days.

“And so, I think growing up in New Zealand gave my father an advantage in that sense and look at the young New Zealanders back then, Chris Amon, Denny Hulme, and even the young New Zealanders today doing so very, very well in motorsport. I think being a New Zealander certainly gave them an advantage.”

A spirit of innovation can also be traced back to post war New Zealand, she says.

“Back then you didn't have eBay and Amazon, you couldn't just get a new part for your car or order something to fix it, you had to create the means of fixing things yourself.

“So, it made you very, very innovative. And I think my father had a very enquiring mind in that sense.”

Using materials from the aviation industry in his cars being one such example, she says.

“The first Formula 1 car with a mallite chassis, a sandwich of aluminium and balsa wood, came from the aerospace industry, he and his designer Robin Herd created a car made of that, made it much more rigid, but much lighter than some of the other Formula 1 cars.

“Now it was very difficult to machine mallite back in those days to curve it and mold it so it was given away.

“But fast forward to today. And we're making all the cars out of carbon fibre, a very light rigid material from the aerospace industry, same sort of thing my father was doing.”

It was unusual for a driver to be so hands-on in the manufacture of cars, she says.

“There have been some great designers, and there have been some great team managers. And there have been some great drivers. But my father somehow managed to do all of it.

“And I think that makes him quite unique.”

Although he made his name overseas, he remained a proud New Zealander, she says.

“If you look at the original Bruce McLaren motor racing symbol that shield design, it has a kiwi right in the middle of it, he was a very proud New Zealander.

“And there was apparently a saying at the Bruce McLaren motor racing factory, if you knocked on the door and said you were from New Zealand, they would find you a job.”

Over five decades since his death, the McLaren name remains a major force in motorsport, but Amanda says Kiwis tend to overlook New Zealand achievements in the sport.  

“I do believe that New Zealand as a country doesn't acknowledge its motor racing, or its motorsport heroes very well.

“If you play rugby, or you sail, then you are the bee's knees in New Zealand. But if you look around, what sort of accolades really have we given to our motorsport heroes throughout the years, even today we've got so many overseas doing a fantastic job. And they get very little recognition for that.”

McLaren is the second oldest Formula 1 team in the history of the sport, she says.

“That is absolutely incredible and not just in Formula 1, now we're back in Indy, we're in sports cars and of course in eSports and doing all the things my father was doing and or planning to do during his time.

“I think it's a fantastic tribute to his legacy, and what he achieved.”