| I cut my teeth on images of Bruce McLaren and Dennny Hulme in their 7
litre orange CanAm cars cleaning up the series year after year. The
"Bruce and Denny Show" was my introduction to motorsport. Maybe things
were different back then but Bruce and Denny were great friends and
fellow countrymen and designed some great cars without ever seeming to
develop superstar-sized egos.
Denny ("The Bear") Hulme could be a gruff person at times - John Hagan
the Marlboro racing boss recalled Hulme recently "Hulme was the last GP
driver to give me a hard time. It was the 1973 Brazilian GP. He said to
me, 'Your're in charge of sponsorship - go and get the f****ing
sandwiches!'. However when I met him while doing a photo shoot during a
saloon race here in NZ, he was great - very understated and deadpan
and absolutely hooked on racing...
He actually won a CanAm race at Elkhart Lake in front of 25,000 fans a
couple of months ago in a restored McLaren M20, although he complained
that it was 8 seconds slower than in the old days because they couldn't
run the same rubber...
He was at Monaco this year, 25 years after winning the GP there to
see the unveling of the McLaren road car which had been one of Bruce's
dreams (the McLaren M6BGT road car) sadly cut short with Bruce's
untimely death testing at Goodwood in 1970.
That day and last Sunday are days I'll not forget...
-Dave.
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