Dave Sims is a pitlane legend.
Starting at Team Lotus in 1965 at the age of 19 he initially worked on the Lotus Cortinas to be driven by Jim Clark and Pete Arundell in that years' British Saloon Car Championship.
Within Lotus he worked his way from saloon cars into Formula Two and then Formula One.
saw him working at the fledgling March F1 team then across to Hesketh Racing, (where he was Chief Mechanic for James Hunt).
He ran five cars in the BMW Procar series that supported Grands Prix in the late 70's then departed the U.K. for the U.S. and worked in Indycar and sportscars.
In his autobiography Beaky lets us into his world of motorsport; of working with the big names and high jinks with his fellow mechanics. Along the way he also won the occasional World Championship. He worked with and alongside Colin Chapman, another pitlane habitué Bob Dance (‘The Vicar’ — everyone had a nickname at Lotus!), designers Maurice Philippe and Harvey Postlethwaite and the owner of Hesketh Racing — The ‘Good Lord’ — Lord Alexander Hesketh.
He worked on cars like the Lotus 49 and 72 and indeed built Lotus 72 chassis R1. Working at Team Lotus in the late 60's and early 70's also involved working on the four wheel drive Lotus 63 and the turbine engined Lotus 56, variety was clearly the spice of life at Team Lotus!
From 2001 Beaky worked for the Ferrari sportscar team Risi Competitzione, based in Houston, Texas. This led to numerous championship and race wins at places like Mosport, Sebring, Road America, VIR and even Le Mans.
Just a short list of some of the drivers Beaky has worked with:
Spot the world champions!
The book will be accompanied by a plethora of previously unseen still images.
We hope to publish the book in time for Christmas 2025.
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Archive and stills from the Supercharged Collection.
