From Lincolnshire shed to world champions – Britain’s first F1 team BRM

Some of the sport’s most well-known figures have been reflecting on the humble beginnings of Britain’s first team as the season’s dramatic climax approaches. Over the course of the next 80 years, BRM won the world title at the bottom of a garden in the small town of Bourne, Lincolnshire.

It’s an incredible story, isn’t it? former F1 champion and broadcaster Damon Hill says. They “set out to conquer the world.”

Hill, the 1996 world champion, has a close relationship with BRM. Graham, his father, and the team won the team’s only championship in 1962.

“Hill recalls,” “One of the places that really made it possible for him to show what he had.” Essentially, he based his career on his success at BRM.

But that success was not quick.

In the Bourne market town of 1945, Raymond Mays, an ambitious racer and entrepreneur, founded BRM, or British Racing Motors as it was known today.

Raymond Mays has always wanted to compete in Grand Prix racing, according to Anthony Delaine-Smith, the owner of a bus company based in Spalding Road, where the former BRM factory once stood.

The idea was to combine industries with the construction of a British Grand Prix car after the war.

After World War Two, motor racing was recovering, and in 1950, a new Formula 1 World Championship was introduced.

For the project, Mays gathered about 40 British businesses.

Some of the top industrialists in the UK, including Sir Alfred Owen, who later purchased the team from Mays, helped him gain the support of him.

The Type 15 is “arguably Britain’s most significant Formula 1 car,” according to BRM today.

The green BRM soon competed alongside renowned marques like Ferrari and Maserati at Silverstone, despite not having the capacity to host the first Formula 1 World Championship race until 1950.

The leading driver of his day, Juan Manuel Fangio, accepted to drive the car in 1952, giving the business a new lease of life.

Former racing correspondent for BBC Radio 5 Live and The Observer Maurice Hamilton said: “To get Juan Manuel Fangio into your car was quite something.

Sir Jackie Stewart, a three-time world champion in motor racing, made his debut in Formula One while competing for BRM.

He claimed that the team was the “first to take on enormous responsibility” alongside top-tier drivers.

Juan Manuel Fangio was the best racing driver who had ever lived, having only driven once at BRM. Stewart, who joined the team in 1965, said, “I saw all of that.

Really, getting a ride with BRM was a very important part of my life. That was a significant event in my life.

He claimed that BRM’s success opened the door for Britain’s sizable motor racing sector, which, according to F1, is now worth £12 billion annually.

Stewart continued, “BRM started it off strongly, and we are now the world’s capital.”

Bis 1974, BRM won 17 grands prix, securing 63 podium finishes, and winning the 1962 drivers’ and constructors’ championships.

In 1952, Mays purchased the business, which was then sold to Sir Alfred Owen and his engineering firm Rubery Owen, but Mays continued to serve as team manager.

The BRM name is currently owned by brother Paul, cousin Simon, and uncle John, who is also known as Nick Owen, the grandson of Sir Alfred.

He referred to Bourne as the place where “everything happened,” from car and engine designs to tests at nearby Folkingham, which became “important to the BRM history” there.

McLaren, Williams, and Lotus became the first British teams to benefit from their success.