People often say in terms of pure talent he was not the greatest. But when he
put his mind to it he was as fast as anyone. He had this famous saying,
which was that he would always try and win a race at the slowest possible
speed. That’s what won races but kept him alive.
Because he had such a brilliant mechanical understanding of the car, he could
adapt his driving style when he knew there was an issue. He chose to drive
in a particular way which saved him from having accidents but was fast
enough to win. He decided how to play the game, survived, and won three
championships. To my mind that is something greater than saying: ‘How much
natural talent did he have?’
It was a great shame that in the last six to nine months of his life, before
his death in May, his communication faded and I was not able to fully
explain to him how the project I have begun in his name was unfolding. As
all the headlines said the day after he died, my dad was a pioneer, an
innovator, an inspiration and an engineer. Project Brabham, my attempt to
continue his legacy by setting up a race team through crowdfunding, tries to
be true to those principles.
When I talked to my dad about it over the past 10 years or so, after I started
to think about how to use this amazing family name we have, he was always
very interested in it. He was someone who always looked ahead not behind.
The ultimate aim is to get the Brabham name back into Formula One, where it
belongs. My dad left his indelible mark on the sport with feats I cannot see
anyone matching again.