BRITISH GP SPECIAL
Although it’s 25 years since the television coverage of world championship grand prix races in Britain was purloined by a commercial network, many of the sport’s long-time fans will still fondly remember the previous BBC era with the distinctively strident voice of commentating stalwart Murray Walker, intermittently larded by the refined tones of his celebrity side-kick James Hunt. On summer Sunday afternoons, their banter would be the favoured soundtrack of households across the land.
The BBC’s guaranteed coverage of every race, previously a haphazard affair, cemented motor racing into the nation's consciousness, alongside the classic bat and ball sports. The Beeb’s hegemony had begun in 1980, continuing for 18 full seasons, and though Hunt would fall victim to a heart attack at the age of just 45, Walker’s hold on the Formula 1 microphone endured well into the commercial era. For the entire BBC period I sat alongside him as his lap charter and spotter, until electronic technology
