RICHARD DEAN FROM THE COCKPIT TO SUCCESS ON THE PITWALL
The competitive instinct is what has driven all of Richard Dean’s life. The racer-turned-team boss admits as much. From his tentative steps up the single-seater path – which took him from Formula Ford 1600 in 1985 to Formula 3000 and an international foray in Japan – Dean’s career path seemed set to follow many of his adversaries who had dropped off the motorsport radar after a valiant but under-funded attempt to scale its heights.
But he grabbed his chances behind the scenes to take over the already successful Team JLR junior single-seater squad and quickly rose to become team owner, while all the time taking any race opportunities that came his way.
Aliaison with Lawrence Tomlinson took him to the top step in class at Le Mans in 2006 and he was instrumental in much of the success that Tomlinson’s Ginetta Cars firm enjoys today. But the competitive itch needed scratching after so long looking after other people’s racing ambitions.
Along withAmerican Zak Brown, now team principal at McLaren F1, Dean and his friend created UnitedAutosports in 2010. The initial plan was to have some fun for both of the founders, but United Autosports is now a sportscar powerhouse with multiple titles to its name. The bandwagon keeps on rolling and, so long as Dean keeps masterminding ways of earning silverware, his competitive urges remain sated.
He kindly took time out of his schedule to tackle the Motorsport News readers’ questions, and his answers are fascinating.
Question: Where did the motorsport passion come from? Jack Crowther Via email
MN: Your dad, Tony Dean, was a highly successful driver in his own right in Formula 5000, Can-Am and non-championship Formula 1 races, wasn’t he?
Richard Dean: “I was just very lucky that my dad was into racing because otherwise I probably would not have got involved. My earliest memories are of always being at a race track. We would head off to Croft and Rufforth and places like that.
“I wasn’t particularly old enough to be interested in the racing at that point: I was just doing what kids do when they are let off the parental guidance leash at that age. I was just running around everywhere and we had one of those old traditional converted coaches to haul the car around in and we would sleep in that. It was a proper adventure.
“I was fortunate that, because dad was into it, he gave me that initial step into karting. I had a kart from the age of about 10, but at that point you couldn’t race them until you were 12. I went through all the same karting classes as drivers who would go on to have a good career: people like Johnny Herbert and Derek Higgins.”
“I wasn’t keen on Formula Ford 1600 when I tried it” Richard Dean
MN: When you started karting, was it just a hobby or did you know it was something you wanted to do passionately?
RD: “Honestly I was just a kid having fun. Dad wanted to take me karting, and that was fantastic, but I was having as much fun playing football. I was playing for my local team and I loved it.
“Then I got increasingly into my karting and I started to get competitive. There is something at that age which clicks when
