8 replies to this topic

[RTH]

Dave Brodie gave us  3 hrs of fascinating talk on his life and motor racing times on Saturday.

 

He has a question he very much hopes some of you out there can help with here is part of his letter :-

 

" Right enough of me, Richard I was astonished that quite a few of your audience had actually even heard of my early 60’s hero, the mercurial ‘Chris Airey’, so I was wondering, and as I would so like to know more of him,is it possible for your guys to relate what they know, ie, where they saw him race, and what dates? did they ever speak to him, yes what do they remember?, yeah that sort of stuff, you see I knew so little about him, and in my book I list to me what are the great unknown drivers that I saw racing saloons back then, like Chris Airey, Chris Craft, Bolly Pittard, yes all quite exceptional talents, that only had WIN in their minds,yeah these were and still are my first hero’s, so it quite threw me that your guys even as much remembered ‘Airey', and its been on my mind since driving home last Saturday, silly maybe, but that’s me, I have my hero’s too, and those three were my first hero’s, hey its just a thought?"

DB

 

So can you help - we know he was a fine driver  at Brands mostly in an Austin A40 (same sort of car Frank Williams was driving at the time).

In May 1963 he ran out of road at bottom bend  partly thrown out  and his car rolled on top of him and he was killed.

 

So have you any other fragments of information about him ?

[Tim Murray]

He's mentioned in several earlier threads, including this from Doug:
 

Chris Airey in his well-prepared Austin A40 had been the sensation of the late 1962/early-1963 club saloon car racing scene and he was particularly formidable at Brands Hatch, where he was fatally injured after clipping the exit verge out of Bottom Bend, rolling along the Bottom Straight behind the pits. My contemporary colleague Darryl Reach was press officer at that race meeting and he had the awful task of informing Chris's father who came to the pressbox under the grandstand seeking information...
DCN

His entry on the Motorsport Memorial site was compiled after discussing the accident in an earlier thread. Here it is:
 

Chris J. Airey was a young British mechanic who worked for the Formula 3 star Jonathan Williams.

In the early 1960s Airey bought from Frank Williams a very quick Austin A40 and turned out to became a hugely talented racing driver. He competed in club events with considerable success. One of his best known victories came on the first of the three Molyslip Saloon Car Championship held at Brands Hatch on 15 April 1963. That event was part of the programme of the Easter Monday Closed Meeting organized by the British Racing & Sports Car Club. Airey drove his noisy Austin A40 excellently, beating the whole field in which the magazine Motor Sport called "undoubtedly one of the most entertaining races" of the day.

A month and a half later, on 19 May, Airey and his A40 would return to Brands Hatch for another round of the Molyslip Saloon Car Championship. During one of the laps for the tenth event of that series Chris's Austin ran wide at the exit of the Bottom Bend and came onto the grass at the right side of the track. In his haste to get back onto the circuit, Airey steered too sharply to the left; the tyres dried out whilst the car was still at an angle of about 45 degrees to the race direction, and this resulted in a high-speed roll. The 1098 cm3 Austin A40 somersaulted three or four times along the Bottom Straight before crashing into an embankment on the side of the track. During the rolls the seat mountings collapsed and Chris was partially thrown out through the door, still attached with the four-point seat belt. He was killed at the spot.

According to the magazine Autosport Ailey's Austin A40 may have slid off the circuit after skidding over an oil patch. The section of the track in which the accident occurred has been reprofiled a few times since 1975; Bottom Bend is now known as Graham Hill Bend, and the Bottom Straight is called Cooper Straight.

Contrary to what was reported by contemporary newspaper articles, Airey was not married and had no children.

[RTH]

Great stuff Tim - thanks  Dave is now watching this .

[Tim Murray]

Dave has a photo of Chris on his website - fifth row down, on the left:

http://davidbrodie.co.uk/gallery/

There are some other great photos on there, including some of his 1973 British GP accident.

[2F-001]

Sadly, Chris Airey was lost to us before my father had introduced me to watching motorsport 'live' so I didn't have the opportunity to see him race those his is name I'd seen mention and heard spoken of.

 

With regard to the aforementioned Boley Pittard, there was two-page appreciation of him by Paul Fearnley in MotorSport Nov 2009, along with a full-page pic of him aboard his Anglia at Crystal Palace. A very interesting fellow, Boley, and an entertaining tale.

[Tim Murray]

Here are a few more bits of info on Chris. In this thread on the A40 Farina forum:

http://www.a40farina...c.php?f=2&t=660

there’s a post from the son of Jonny Dumbell, who he says was Chris Airey’s business partner, and also one from David Lewis, who has obviously been researching Chris and is in contact with Chris’s brother Bill.

On Ten Tenths there's this thread on racing A40s which contains this post from someone who says he was told by Chris's business partner (Jonny Dumbell again,maybe?) that Chris died not from his injuries but from an asthma attack.

[pete53]

I have a Brands programme from 2 May 1965 in which a T.A.Airey is entered in an Austin A40. A relative or, pure co-incidence?

[OldFart]

If there is any need for correct information About Chris, I can be of help. Chris was a close friend, a business partner and the reason that I left England permanently in 1964.

[Doug Nye]

Welcome to TNF - fellow OF.  I followed Chris's exploits in the A40 and as earlier in this thread when I started work at Brands Hatch in November 1963 my immediate superior told me about his role immediately after the accident...

 

Please do share some correct information on him.  He is not forgotten, even now - closing on 58 years later.

 

DCN