Jack O'Ferrall
Former UKGPL Moderators
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« Reply #8 on: February 20, 2009, 07:43:33 PM +0000 » |
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REED, MARQUE, LEARN: THE JACK O’FERRALL STORY
...“Scribbling again, Jack?” Bell could move like a convict at times, must be all the oil. “What is that, looks like a shopping trolley, with a streetcleaning brush on the front?” The designer of the H-16 was suddenly into aesthetics?
“Just wanted to get some concepts down on paper, Bell, while we’re waiting for the season to start. Perhaps it's too radical for some.” Not enough lead weights around the crankshaft, maybe.
“Well make sure Loot doesn't catch you, He's already mentioned that some teams let their mechanics race, and that perhaps a few key team members exchanging roles might help. I don't want you ruining my tools, as well as my engines.”
“Is Loot back at Burley, then? Is it finally the end for the critically endangered black market rhino?” Though as Burley was rather more successful as a racing headquarters than in its previous incarnation as a shooting range, this didn't seem likely. At least the rhino hadn't got him, or we'd be looking for a new owner. Tom had always been too interested in the expression 'management buyout’ for comfort, and the only other money would have to come from some crazed hippie millionaire who wanted to put the P115 on a marijuana-themed pop album cover, where it belonged.
“How am I meant to develop a championship chassis with all my best mechanics competing to drive the medical truck on Loot's safaris? When I was a youth I spent all my spare time with engineering manuals, not learning to say ‘Excuse me miss, where is the nearest supply of Cuban cigars?’ in Swahili.” He wandered off in the general direction of the garages. As I watched him shamble away I wondered idly how he could be so blind to the need for a flat engine to have a low centre of gravity, since it was obviously of so much use in his normal means of locomotion.
At least I had the rest of a rare bright February day to myself- but no. Apparently plotting the public relations segment of the rise to fame of Reed's new talent wasn't enough to engage all of Tom's superior intellect, and parts of it were to be lent out to bother me with. “Hello Tom, pleasant day.” I had thrown my jacket over the writing pad, check. “You’ve come to tell me that you've managed to sell advertising space on my helmet, haven't you? Not to BSA, I trust?”
Tom dismissed this with an air of preoccupied contempt. “Apparently British firms have a distrust of drivers who not only fail to win any races, but can't be relied upon to wear shoes at the press conference, Jack. There was a proposal for a Watney’s Red Barrel campaign against drink-driving laws ‘Sober drivers crash too’, but irony doesn't often impress the British consumer- as you are almost certainly already aware from your romantic life. It was Jerry I wanted to talk to, where's he gone?”
“He’s filling out his annual membership form for the ‘vociferous anti-lightweight cars brigade’, it's what he usually does at this time of year, when he’s not gripped by panic and consuming the team's entry forms. Might I ask why?”
He looked slightly anguished, if it hadn't been Tom I’d have suspected that there was sympathy involved. “Jack, without Jerry there wouldn't be a Reed Racing. He took over the team management years ago when it was a laughing stock. Loot had demanded that either the team won races or he'd spend his gold on some more rewarding hobby, like the British space effort. We used to parade a V16 around the track every race to show off its engine noise, but it never ran. Jerry got all the pretension out of the outfit and got a few trophies into the cabinet, then he won a championship, and built us a V8 that would have won more if it wasn't for Lotus- and Bandini.” He paused. I needed a pause as well, it all seemed a touch sincere. “Of course, it took it out of him a little.”
“I suppose it can't have helped to be a Rolls-Royce-trained car designer up against Lotus, with their penchant for fragile suspensions and being arrested by the police,” I offered. “However, if Bell’s great achievement is supposed to be having rescued us from the international ridicule of having giant 16-cylinder engines that make too much racket then explode, then I confess to feeling slightly disappointed.”
“Engineering isn't my forte, Jack, you know that, I'm better with people. But it was Chapman who wanted a sixteen-cylinder three litre engine, he got Coventry to build one, then they mysteriously decided to pull out of Formula One, and he prevailed on Jerry to build them one instead. We get stuck with it and he has a Ford V8.” Even having to utter Chapman's name seemed to trouble him. “You tell me Jack- is our engine heavier than it needs to be?”
Now, if that very topic hadn't cropped up on dozens of our nights out last season, can't for the moment remember why, Tom had always been more interested by the popsies. It must have been one of those rare opportunities, when a soul normally closed to yours betrays an opening to light and reason. “I’m sure Bell knows his stuff, Tom.”
“Yeah, yeah you're probably right.” And off he went too, leaving me with my sketches and the February sunshine.
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