Archive for Items Categorized 'Biography/ Autobiography', only excerpts shown, click title for full entry.

Herbert Müller – “…alles zu langsam!”

by Födisch and Roßbach

If you followed racing in the hairy 1960–80 era you could not have failed to notice this Swiss driver. This biography is deep in the best sense. The reason it was written is to commemorate the saddest of occasions.

Betrayed: Secrecy, Lies, and Consequences

by Frederic H. Martini

Being a POW is hard enough. Not being believed afterwards, and even being denied disability benefits is worse. Having someone who knew of your plight but didn’t help be hailed as a hero is . . . well . . . this book will make you question who the good guys are.

Rick Mears—Thanks: The Story of Rick Mears and the Mears Gang

by Gordon Kirby

Few drivers have won the Indy 500 four times. Mears has—and more than once did he get within reach of another win. He spent his entire 15-year career with one team, and remained there longer than that after his retirement. What makes him so unusual?

I Kept No Diary

by F.R. (Rod) Banks

If your motor requires high octane fuel it probably has high compression. Banks is the man who championed this technology—and a thousand other things—which is probably why he had no time to keep a diary. He was 80 when he wrote this book, and still working!

Jacky Ickx: His Authorised Competition History

by Jon Saltinstall

The quiet and contemplative Belgian who thought he wanted to be a gardener discovered he was a versatile and successful racer on two and then four wheels. He contested over 570 races in a decades-spanning career, and here is a suitably big book for this big life.

Drawn Out, A Seriously Funny Memoir

by Tom Scott

Comic relief . . . you know you want it. Political commentator and cartoonist, satirist, scriptwriter, playwright, raconteur, provocateur, all-round funny man. He won New Zealand Cartoonist of the Year—seven times! (Ok, it’s a small country.)

The Story of Henry Ford, A Biography Book for New Readers

by Jenna Grodzicki

Before Henry Ford became a pioneer and then a titan of an entirely new industry he was a kid who liked to take things apart. This is the point of entry for a book targeted at young readers in a series aptly called “Stories About Dreamers Just Like You.”

Ed Swart – From Zandvoort to Daytona

by Ed Swart with Johnnie Tipler

Racing driver, team owner, clerk of the course, race-club founder . . . is there anything motorsports-related that Ed Swart has not done? A 200-page book seems hardly enough to cover it all.

Full Circle: A Hands-On Affair with the First Ferrari 250 GTO

by Larry Perkins & Petra Perkins

Not a scholarly treatise on a legendary car but a snapshot-style memoir of half a century of crossing paths with the first 250 GTO.

50 First Victories, NASCAR Drivers’ Breakthrough Wins

by Al Pearce and Mike Hembree

There are plenty of good drivers who have good cars and work with good teams yet they just don’t catch a break and win. This books samples almost 70 years of US motorsports activity to relive that elusive first competition win.

Shirley Shahan, The Drag-on Lady 

by Patrick Foster

Blame it on Dad. He let her help wrench on his drag racer. He let her borrow his pickup truck to go cruising—and she would beat the boys in the inevitable street races. She married a racer. And without really intending to, became one herself.

Isorivolta: The Men, the Machines

by Winston Scott Goodfellow

Curious minds want to know: why was a firm that produced competent and desirable cars not strong enough to survive? and if they were competent and desirable why did the cars fade from memory within a few short years? The author was one such curious mind and his answers are presented here..