There are not many British motor racing drivers with such a distinguished career as James Weaver, and yet many of his achievements are overlooked by the UK motorsport enthusiasts.
That’s perhaps because most of Weaver’s latter career was spent chasing glory in America as part of the Dyson Racing sportscar lineup. There were title successes in the USA and a victory in the Daytona 24 Hours in 1997 for Dyson in a Riley & Scott shared with Elliott Forbes-Robinson, Rob Dyson, Andy Wallace, John Paul Jr, Butch Leitzinger and John Schneider.
Those are just two big trophies, but there is so much more to Weaver’s career. He was something of a trailblazer in the early 1980s when, amid spells in British and European Formula 3, he realised that his grand prix ambitions were unlikely to spark into life. From there, he focused his career on making a living in any motor racing car he could.
The word all-rounder seems like an insult to most racing drivers, but it was a position Weaver embraced and excelled at. He was a regular at Le Mans from 1983 until 1999, raced in Formula 3000, came within a whisker of winning the British Touring Car Championship in 1989, raced in IndyCar and his 20-year association with Dyson in the USA pitched him against the best in the sportscar business for two fruitful decades.
He is a humble man, a driver who has ploughed his own furrow and one who stepped away from the competitive steering wheel in 2006. But his is a fascinating journey and we are delighted he found time in his schedule to tackle the MN readers’ questions.
Question: Where did the interest in motorsport spark in you? Was it something your family was passionate about?
James Hilton
Via email
James Weaver: “My dad was working for the Southwell Oils in Kuwait and they had a Christmas raffle and we won. Our prize was a Scalextric set. Myself and my brother Tim thought it was just brilliant. That got the interest going.
“My dad was into his cars and we lived in the east end of London. There was a Formula 2 race at Crystal Palace and dad took me and my younger brother
