The Wild Life of Tommy Byrne

There can't be many books on motor racing quite like "Crashed and Byrned - The Greatest Racing Driver You Never Saw". This is a ragged, raw and brutally honest(in some respects) account of the career of Tommy Byrne, the supremely talented Irish driver whose career promised much but then exploded in a self-destructive orgy of drink, drugs, hookers and occasional violence after his failure to make it in Formula One.

The premise of the book is that Byrne was as good as Ayrton Senna but that few, apart from him, understood this and that Formula One conspired to deny him the glories that were his destiny. Coming from an unstable and extremely poor background in Dundalk(he refers to himself, as he believed others saw him, as the "knacker from Dundalk"), he was ill-equipped to handle the inevitable ups and downs of a driving career and whenever things went against him, he resorted to self-destructive therapy.

By Byrne's own account - ably assisted here by Mark Hughes - his biggest weakness was his belief that the world owed him what he called "respect"(another word for a chance in the best car, and a multi-million pound salary) because he was fast. When he didn't get the respect he thought was his due, he went beserk. Byrne, in this account, exhibits an explosive cocktail in his personal make-up of extreme arrogance about his ability combined with a visceral inferiority complex about who he was and the combination destroyed his career.

The book dwells heavily on a critical test session Byrne drove for McLaren and alleges the team de-tuned the car, despite which Bryne drove it faster than anyone had until then. It also dwells on a fateful meeting before that test between Byrne and Ron at which the young Irishman believes he blew any chance he had of making it. Byrne has been haunted by that encounter and the test that followed it for the rest of his life.

Byrne's is a compelling if somewhat disjointed narrative with some colourful language, and you won't be able to put it down. It reads more like the hard-luck story of a journeyman boxer than a racing driver and if you've read Hunter S Thompson's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, there's quite a bit of that in it too, especially when Byrne ends up racing in Mexico,(the climax of his own "savage journey to the heart of the Formula One dream"). It is a pity there are not more photos - I for one would have relished some scrap book stuff, even if Byrne was the "driver you never saw".

Hopefully writing the book has been a therapeutic exercise for Byrne who has been to hell and back more than is advisable but has apparently found stability in a new life as a racing coach at the Mid Ohio circuit in the States.

"Crashed and Bynred - The Greatest Racing Driver You Never Saw" by Tommy Byrne and Mark Hughes is published by icon books www.iconbooks.co.uk price £10.99 

Comments

[D]

^
Ah, yes. "The premise of the book is that Byrne was as good as Ayrton Senna but that few, apart from him, understood this and that Formula One conspired to deny him the glories that were his destiny."

This is the tragedy from which so many of us here have spent a lifetime suffering... :-)

I guess Kimi Räikkönen's problems give it a topicality when viewed through the bottom of a glass of schnapps.

The moral of both stories is that many are born with the talent to drive a car exceptionally fast but whether they have the ability to use it to become a multi-time World Champion in Formula One instead of an embittered drunk depends upon the OTHER aspects of their psyche.

As even Chunda has finally grasped, what made Michael Schumacher so phenomenally successful is how well he was able to APPLY his capability to drive so fast. The additional strengths he has.

Quite possibly, both Kimi Räikkönen and Felipe Massa are wired in such a way that they have even greater raw speed than Michael Schumacher. But it's what else they're wired for that makes the difference.

Many chant the praises of Fernando Alonso but the reason he's driving an uncompetitive car and has many options closed to him is because of what else goes on inside his head.

It's always been sobering to contemplate the fact that quite possibly the man (or woman?) with the natural talent to drive a Formula One car faster than anyone else on the planet has never even seen a racing car and is starving to death in Africa.

Next time you see a young victim of a famine staring at you hopelessly, soon to die, on the same television as you watch Bernard Ecclestone's millionaires show, ask yourself whether he could have been quicker than Lewis Hyperbole in a McLaren, given the chance.

And then wonder whether, if given that chance, he, like Byrne and a good few others, would have wasted it.

[Pete]

Ed,

Interesting article about a book.

But, I fear there could be an even more interesting story about another book, the famous "RED MIST" by Nigel Stepney which has mysteriously been pulled from publication despite the website still saying it will be published from July 2008.

http://www.nigel-stepney.com/

This was rumoured to tell his side of the story of Stepney-gate, including where the so-called bodies were buried in the Ferrari outfit (supposedly/alledgedly etc).

Now it strikes me as odd that a book that is so eagerly anticipated, concerning a story that carried huge media interest and rocked F1 in 2007, would suddenly be dropped without explanation by its publisher.

It is time a journalist of your calibre did some digging as I wouldn't be suprised if there is a juicy story to be found.

Perhaps there is a legit reason why the publishers dropped this book, but perhaps there isn't?

[El Ponso]

Nice one D, nice one.

[Gary M]

D, perfect summarisation of the subject.

[Felipe Cuesta]

missed you D!!!! very good

[Paul]

to:Pete,

what's the situation with court case,I'm not sure but book must wait until decision is made by court. Any lawyer would say that one shouldn't comment on pending case.

Bravo, D! Brilliant!

[IDR]

Good to see D back here!

Maybe you have rearranged your computer setup and configuration, but your original, unique and superb stile remains intact!

Welcome back, and waiting for more.

[Anon]

Perfect, classic D. Well done. It's a thought I have regularly myself. (And then I think, what if I was a driving superstar myself? And then one day I'll have an accident while driving and there goes that =)).

[SKiD]

Ed,

In your review you say that Tommy "alleges" his car was 'de-tuned' for the crucial McLaren test. But this is verified as fact in the book by former McLaren mechanic Tony Vandungen who was working at the session in question!

Cheers!