Matthew Franey

Mar 20, 2024 | motorsportmagazine.com | Denis Jenkinson |Tim Scott |David Malsher |Matthew Franey

The most beautiful racing circuit in the world — that was the standard boast. Subjective in the extreme, for sure, but standing atop the valley slopes that tumble to the shores of Lake Garda, which glints cool blue below, we can see that the Brescian sporting authorities had a case. From the cobbled streets of the picture-postcard villages to the scented lemon and olive groves set off cypress-lined country roads, the scene is a visual aria for Italy: the Garda of Eden.

Mar 20, 2024 | motorsportmagazine.com | Matthew Franey |Tim Scott |David Malsher |Gordon Cruickshank

Senna on a hot lap. Fangio steering with the throttle. Bellof lowering the Nordschleife’s lap record, from a standing start. An awakening Chevy stock-block. These are the motor-racing things that take your breath away, cause your heart to skip a beat. In contrast, distant memories of disused tacks evoke a slippers-by-the-fire glow. True, drive Dundrod, or Montjuich, or Chimay, or Solitude, and a sense of awe does rise from the pit of your stomach to lodge uncomfortably in the back of your throat.

Mar 20, 2024 | motorsportmagazine.com | Paul Fearnley |Matthew Franey |Andrew Frankel |Gordon Cruickshank

Just a 20-minute drive from San Francisco’s busy downtown heart lies an oasis: Golden Gate Park. At 50 blocks long (3.5 miles) and half a mile wide its 1013 acres make it bigger than Hyde Park. Surrounded on three sides by residential areas – its western edge sweeps down to the Pacific – it’s packed every weekend with joggers, cyclists, skaters, bladers, walkers and picnickers: 12 million visitors, most arriving by car.

Sep 8, 2023 | motorsportmagazine.com | Matthew Franey |James Elson

Lotus won its very first F1 title 60 years ago today at Monza when a victory for Jim Clark clinched both the drivers’ crown and the constructors’ award. As Clark took a victory lap, wearing his laurel wreath in the cockpit, a jubilant Colin Chapman perched on the bodywork of his Lotus 25, the first true single-monocoque car, conceived by his design genius.