"Up there with the best drivers" – the other side of Tom Walkinshaw

Rugged and chunky, he looked better suited to clattering fly-halfs or ‘working to the body’ – he loved his rugby and could box a bit – than finessing a flyweight racer. Indeed, he once threatened Motoring News correspondent Alan Henry with violence in response to a less than complimentary assessment of his skill set. (They would become good friends subsequently.)

No one could ever doubt Walkinshaw’s competitiveness and fierce ambition, but perhaps some of his anger that day at Mallory Park stemmed from a suspicion that AH was right.

Walkinshaw had won the 1969 Scottish Formula Ford title in a Hawke and landed a works Formula 3 March for the latter half of 1970 – only to find himself in the wrong car at the wrong time. A distant fourth place at Oulton Park – behind the works Lotuses of Dave Walker and Bev Bond and the privateer version of Carlos Pace – was his best result.

The misery was completed by an accident at Brands Hatch, that broke his ankles.

This hard-working risk-tasker was not easily dissuaded. Strong early performances – fourth at Brands Hatch and second at Cadwell Park – perhaps should have signaled a season of consolidation in 1971. Instead he stepped up to Formula 2 with the original Ecurie Ecosse.

It was a disaster, his March running on a shoestring and unreliable as a result. A road crash didn’t help either.

Then came a clue to a better future: a class-winning third place in a Ford Escort RS1600 at Silverstone’s RAC Tourist Trophy of 1972.

Walkinshaw didn’t ignore it – he would win his class by finishing fourth overall in the 1974 British Saloon Car Championship in a works-backed 3-litre Capri  – but his single-seater dream lingered for a few years yet.

He drove GRD, Tui, Modus and Lola in sporadic outings in Formulae 2, Atlantic and 5000. His Atlantic Modus beat the works version of Tony Brise in finishing third at Oulton Park in May 1974, but there was little else to shout about – and more untimely and expensive accidents to endure.

The switch was flicked in 1976: Walkinshaw not only created an eponymous team but also scored an unexpected World Championship for Makes victory at Silverstone. The latter was achieved in a Group 5 BMW CSL co-driven by John Fitzpatrick, a man of impeccable saloon and GT credentials.

“That was Tom’s deal,” says ‘Fitz’. “It was an ex-IMSA car that he and I had shared in the Daytona 24 Hours. Tom brought it back and had ex-Alan Mann/Broadspeed guy Tivvy Shenton – scruffy, long hair, but really switched on – prepare and run it. Tom did everything else.

“I had known him since the early 1970s when I was driving for Broadspeed and the Ford factory team and he appeared occasionally on the scene. When he put together a Ford deal with Hermetite sponsorship, I co-drove his Capri in the Spa 24 Hours of 1974 and ’75.

“I was little bit quicker perhaps – not a lot – but in those sort of races that didn’t matter because you didn’t drive at 100 per cent. Basically we were very evenly matched.

“His real skill was sorting the car. He was a bit over the top, if anything. Very picky. He never let anything go. Everything had to be perfect.

“He knew how to motivate, too, paid well and employed good people. Yet he didn’t come over as being the boss at a track. He wasn’t there to be in charge of everybody; each had their own job to do and he let them get on with it. He was there to race.

“We weren’t expected to win at Silverstone. Ours was the fastest of the normal CSLs – Ronnie Peterson was there with that ridiculous turbocharged version that never lasted – and we were consistent.

“But the Porsche 935s were quicker; Kremer’s was catching towards the end and probably would have passed me given another lap.

“But Tom had already gone by then. He’d done about an hour [of six] in the middle of the race before flying to Thruxton [to drive a Capri]. He was a human dynamo. Always had a lot on the go.”

Walkinshaw’s win that day at Thruxton – after a battle with Andy Rouse’s Triumph Dolomite Sprint – was one of four that helped him finish fifth overall and second in class in that season’s BSCC.

His next few years were spent developing a relationship with BMW that included preparing all the cars for the panel-beater’s delight that was the one-make County Challenge: step forward Messrs Brundle, Needell and Mansell, among others.

This in turn limited Walkinshaw the driver to a single BSCC victory – the concluding round of 1980 – in the heavyweight 53Oi – but allowed him the opportunity to win the 1977 RAC TT alongside Dieter Quester in an Alpina-run CSL, as well as three ETCC rounds – Brands Hatch, Jarama and Estoril – as co-driver in Luigi Racing’s CSL to eventual 1978 champion Umberto Grano.

A switch to Mazda – manufacturers found it difficult to resist this force of nature’s charm offensive – saw him finish runner-up in the 1979 BSCC, his RX-7 beaten to the title by Richard Longman’s Mini despite nine class wins, one of which was an outright victory at Donington Park.

RX-7s also brought him wins in the Spa 24 Hours (the first of two) and RAC TT (the second of four) of 1981, co-driven by Pierre Dieudonné and Chuck Nicholson respectively. Both involved the hunting down of a slowing leading BMW. Strongman Walkinshaw was relentless.

At the old Nürburgring’s ETCC round of 1982 he drove for five of the six hours in the Jaguar XJS – no power steering, no braking servo – with which he truly carved his name. He could be hard on his machinery and built it strong as a consequence. He won four times that season, co-driven by Nicholson, as increasing reliability was bolted to the Big Cat’s speed, and finished third in the final standings.

‘Fitz’ drove that car in 1983: “The team was really switched on by then. I just turned up and drove. It was a very nice car. Its geometry was good. It was big but easy to drive. Martin Brundle was about half the size of me – but we won at Donington Park.”

That year Walkinshaw finished runner-up in the ETCC thanks to wins – shared with Nicholson and Brundle – at Enna, the mighty Brno road circuit (where he always shone), Österreichring and Salzburgring. His V8 Rovers, meanwhile, were winning every round of the BSCC – on the road at least.

He became ETCC champion at last in 1984, winning at Monza, Brno, Österreichring (co-driven by Hans Heyer) and Spa (where Win Percy made it three men in a Jag.)

He kicked off 1985, this time in a Rover, with three wins – Monza, Vallelunga and Donington Park – and would win thrice more – Silverstone, Nogaro and Jarama – but he and co-driver Percy could do no better than joint third in the championship.

This storied pair won twice more in 1986 – Monza and Donington Park – but again Walkinshaw finished third in the reckoning. Percy meanwhile was crowned champion. Briefly.

A burgeoning Group C programme with Jaguar – among many other things – was beginning to eat into Walkinshaw’s seat time. He turned up unannounced to win a Brands Hatch round of the 1985 BSCC, and couldn’t resist bringing the XJS out of retirement to tackle that year’s James Hardie 1000 at Bathurst: his muscular pole lap is still talked about, but an oil leak cost him victory.

Three years later he was running second at Bathurst when his Holden Special Vehicles’ Commodore – its build contracted to co-driver Larry Perkins’s team – lunched its engine after 137 (of 161) laps. It was subsequently disqualified in any case because of an illegal steering rack...

Controversy chased Walkinshaw – he had an insatiable yen for spotting loopholes and knocking-through – throughout, up to and including Formula 1 with Benetton and Arrows in the 1990s. And that F1 dream would eventually trigger the collapse of TWR’s Kidlington empire in 2002.

That this clouds his exploits as a touring car driver is a shame, because he was up there with the best of them.

Photography courtesy of Motorsport Images