THE BRAIN OF FORMULA ONE
Colin Chapman: A Personal Description
>All our power however lies in the intellectuality and in the body: The intellectuality we use for ruling, the body more for serving.< Gaius Sallustius Cripius 86 - 34 BC
We
finally have to get rid of this absurd prejudice, that this Colin
Chapman had been a technological gambler. A person, all human
qualities had been strange for, that he had not a minimum respect
for life. A dictator who had exploited his employees like being
his slaves. Everything, that had been written concerning that,
and surely, it 
had been not a little, had been, to express it
cautiously, pure nonsense to be put into the waste paper basket.
Prejudices do not become more true by repeating them permanently.
The 16th September, 1982, had been a bitter cold day in winter with snow and a lot more ice. It had been the day, when Colin Chapman had suffered under a cardiac infarction deep in the night. The employees of Team Lotus based in the castle of Ketteringham Hall had already gone, Chapman had been alone in his private rooms for several hours. He had died like his great rival Enzo Ferrari some years later: Very, very lonely. A genius has got no friends, admirers at best. But more enemies on the other side, at Enzo Ferrari that had been the same, but the Italian had been blessed with an age of 90 years and that under stable health conditions nearly to his end. Colin Chapman had died young, at only 54 years, and a lot of them he had been confronted with agonizing stomach pains.
On the summit of highest performance the air is very, very thin. There the crash is nearly scheduled. The genius is surrounded by demagogues, opportunists and self-degrading recipients of orders. This entourage is the same time bizarre and frightening. There is room for conspiracy all around, but not a minimum of space for confidence. Therefore the genius needs hardness, icy-cold estimation and above all permanent watchfullness. The danger of becoming crazy by that, is extraordinary great. It is a scenario, that had been good for the Archpelago of Gulag. You can take part in this dirty game or you can do it not, but in the last case, you will destroy yourself.
Colin Chapman was a
generalist, who preferred great, historic solutions. The love for
details like Ron Dennis he had not got, and for this reason he
was not so petit bourgeois. Chapman was a qualified engineer, not
a mechanic. From his birth the son of a hotel manager had
belonged to the middle-class. In the Anglo-American region the
term of elite had not got any negative touch. Who is
belonging to this class had not to work with tools anymore, but
at the same time he can afford again to wear sponsor jackets
instead of Gucci suits. Colin Chapman was an elegant person
through and through, also wearing sporting clothes. Sometimes he
was, for instance at an airport, he was mixed up with US-American
movie star David Niven, and the similarity to him is really
striking. Chapman was generous and in most cases charming, but he
also was extrovert like a Southern European. Exactly that was the
reason why to be seriously worried about him in the time of Spain
being governed by Franco, and also at other opportunities there
had been, let us say, discussions between him and the police.
Chapman was, always open, always direct, sometimes antagonizing,
neither a diplomat nor a politician. Exactly therefore F.I.S.A.
president Jean Marie Balestre had wanted to see him replace
Bernie Ecclestone at the top of the Formula One Constructors
Association at the beginnig of the eighties. As a
strategist Chapman had no lack of ruses of war, as a partner he
was influenced by a loyalty no one had expected at him.
Chapman, the gentleman at
the limit, was an individualist, who needed a lot of creative
room to move. Creative characters never are simple and a simple
structure of personality is not neccessarily a compliment, except
someone only is exclusively surrounded by civil servant
mentalities. Visions you cannot administer, you have to live them
and that costs an enormous amount of substance. Colin Chapmanīs
designer Maurice Phillippe had not been able to cope with that,
many years after he had left Team Lotus. Then he put an end to
his life, in his garden and at an apple tree. Some employees of
Chapman had grown by him, like Emerson Fittipaldi, Herbie Blash,
later Mario Andretti and Nigel Mansell. Others had destroyed
theirselves at him like Dave Walker, John Miles or Eddie Dennis.
Adjutant Peter Warr had been able to stand toughest pressure, he
lead the team as a legacy from 1983 inspite the company being
owned by Colins widow Hazel completely alone. When the sponsors
have left the scene, the television cameras are put off, Grand
Prix teams often behave like at a building site or in the army,
we should not deny that. You must not, and that had often been
discussed, be crazy to be involved in Grand Prix Racing, 
but it gives you
ernormous support. Colin Chapman was in motorsport, because he
loved the competition. On the track as well as in the factory or
the design office. Chapman wanted wins, no points. Concerning
this fact he was very different to his more rustic rival Ken
Tyrrell, but above all to Bruce McLaren, who had been driver and
constructor in personal union. Today only a few people know, that
Chapman once had driven his cars himself. That had been his
first, ultra-flat Lotus sportscars, he also took part in the 24
Hours of Le Mans. In a Grand Prix cockpit he only had climbed in
once. At the 1956 French Grand Prix at Reims he had been team
mate of the 
later world champion Mike Hawthorn (1958 in a
Ferrari). Colin had qualified for a fine fifth position on the
grid. But a little later in practice both Vanwalls collided and
Chapmanīs car had not been able to be repaired at the location.
Since the 1959 Monaco Grand Prix Chapman himself was the boss of
a team with Graham Hill and Cliff Allison driving, who scored an
excellent sixth place already at Team Lotusī debut. From that
time on Chapman stood on the other side of the armco barrier. In
most cases he was the boss, rarely the father figure, never the
comrade.
In fact Colin Chapman was
that minimalist, he ever had been described being. "I will
never take too much of anything," he once had said. Light
weight construction was his philosophy, not his ideology. In the
Middle Ages philosophy and mathematics had not been separated
from each other and the sixties of the last century had been the
Middle Ages of racing car construction. No question, Lotus cars
had suffered under much more chassis defects, much more broken
material, than the cars of other teams competing. But Lotus cars
also were the fastest at all. Light weight construction is not
per se dangerous, but in the sixties a lot of things even had not
been explored. Colin Chapman worked, in contrast to many
constructors of that time, using scientific methods, theirīs
correctness had been proved. "The best racing car is that
one, that will collapse after the finish line," Professor
Ferdinand Porsche, also a genius, also condemned, once had said.
Chapman might have got a certain kind of responsibility for the
death of six of his drivers, like a democraticly authorized
member of the government has got the political responsibility for
a certain measure. But he had not not a minimum of personal
culpability. The accidents of Alan Stacey, Ricardo Rodriguez and
Mike Spence had been an act of God or fate, that depends on the
opinion of the observer. Jim Clark died of a puncture, Jochen
Rindt because of a mistake made by a supplier, Ronnie Peterson,
because first another competitor, then the doctors 
treating
him, had made big mistakes. The often quoted Lotus defects were
inventions of the sensational press, things created by blood
journalists, who cannot stop to put constantly new fuel into the
fire. When Lotus cars collapsed, that had been the result of
production mistakes, not of design failures. To convert
Chapmanīs plans into products, was extremely difficult for the
man at the workbench. And many of Chapmanīs employees or
partners, like the Costin brothers Frank and Mike or Keith
Duckworth, later went their own ways, not rarely after a big
quarrell. Finally for this reason the world success of Cosworth
had never happened without Colin Chapman.
The
list of Colin Chapmanīs inventions is unbelievably long. It
reaches from the monocoque, of being the engine a part of the
carīs structure up to the wing car. Chapman, the airman, was an
enthusiastic aerodynamicist. He was the man drawing out the big
lines to delegate routine jobs, but he was a pedant controlling
them. He adopted many of methods or systems already existing, he
made them perfect and introduced them into the construction of
racing cars. Also Colin Chapman could not invent the wheel newly,
but he was able to find new definitions very quickly. The
monocoque had come from aeroplane construction and the active
ride suspension originally had got the purpose to give ambulance
vehicles a softer way of going to allow the patientīs medical
treatment during transportation. Ruthless analysis in connection
with consequent transformation also belonged to Colin Chapman as
the will to 
power. When he had overtaken Ferrari concerning
the number of victories, he had become the most powerful man in
international motorsport in spite having got no official post.
Chapman had got authority qua professional competence, but also
by personal integrity. For his about 800 employees he went
through fire and water. Group Lotus really had been a
small combine during the sixties and seventies.
Also
in business affairs he was a pioneer in. When national colours
for international motorsport events had been set free in 1968, he
was the first one presenting a racing car completely in the
livery of a commercial sponsor. Many of the purists got very,
very angry about him suddenly taking away British Racing
Green. But he really was a traditionalist and the same time
a patriot. Chapman created traditions himself and did not spend
his time on 
conserving old things. John Player Special was
the most popular brand ever advertised for in Grand Prix Racing
also in the year 2002. Money only was a problem for Colin
Chapman, when nothing was available of it anymore, and also that
had happened, there are no illusions about. The selling of road
cars, their production economically was independent from Team
Lotus Ltd., several times went into deep crisis. And not
always sponsors paid, as they should have done. Some of them
enjoyed the glory of Grand Prix Racing to diappear very quickly.
There had been some business partners for Colin Chapman, for
those the term of untrustworthy would have been a
compliment. Where great sums of money are involved, covetousness
and sometimes also corruption is growing. Which part the collapse
of the De Lorean project in Northern Ireland (and itīs
US-American creator) had played, that stood at the end of
Chapmanīs pretty short life, must remain open. The correctly
working observer is any speculation about strictly forbidden by
clear reasons.
For Enzo Ferrari the engine always stood in the centre of racing car development. For Colin Chapman that was the chassis, therefore the ideal Grand Prix car would have been a Lotus Ferrari. In Jim Clark Chapman had found his genius completion in the cockpit. Chapman called the Scot his very best friend, but if it is had been the other way round, I am not sure about. The German mass paper Bild Zeitung, Europeīs biggest selling daily newspaper, called Chapman The Brain of Formula One full of respect shortly after his death. But this tabloit publication is not known for having any respect for the most powerful people in the world. It would be good to know, if there is any possibility for the generations of the third millennium, to create further personalities like Colin Chapman. But also concerning this, I have got my doubts. Colin Chapmanīs life gave a lot of answers. His death asks us a lot of questions.
Klaus Ewald
Graphics: project * 2000
Đ 2002 by researchracing
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