Formula 1 moves in to a period seen as the one of the brightest spots in its history as safety for drivers improves.

I left Brabham because I fell out with Bernie, which was inevitable. He ran the team by fear and everybody in the team had to be frightened of him and I was the only person that wasn’t frightened and he didn’t like that.

In 1981 I very briefly went to work with a team called ATS. A guy called Slim Borgudd drove the car and Abba was the sponsor. ATS was not an English firm, it was a German firm that made wheels. The guy made a fortune and he used to run his own race team. When I left Brabham I went off to work for him for a season. I didn’t enjoy it so I decided to stop motor racing and start my own firm.

I was becoming disillusioned with Formula 1 racing. I was sick of staying in hotels and flying all the time. Everybody thinks it’s terribly glamorous, well it’s isn’t; it’s the opposite, it’s the pits. Ask anybody who travels for a living; even the best is bad enough.

I was still working for eccentric millionaires and I’d worked for them all my life. I worked for Mayer who was an eccentric millionaire and then I worked for Bernie who was a strange millionaire. And by then I was working for ATS and another odd millionaire. So I thought I need to become an eccentric millionaire myself instead of working for one.

• 1943 Alastair's early years
• 1955 Licence to drive
• 1957 Alastair's High School years
• 1959 Evading the police
• 1960 Becoming a mechanic
• 1966 The Tasman series
• 1966 Leaving New Zealand
• 1967 Joining McLaren
• 1967 CanAm Door Catches
• 1967 Monza
• 1968 South Africa
• 1968 CanAm
• 1969 Driving the Formula 1 Cars
• 1973 Fittipaldi joins McLaren
• 1973 McLaren Team manager
• 1974 Montezemolo
• 1975 Hunt replaces Fittipaldi
• 1975 Hunt gets paid little
• 1976 Inventing the Air-Starter
• 1976 Six-speed Gear Boxes
• 1976 Misbehaving in Canada
• 1976 Japan
• 1977 Adidas Uniforms
• 1977 Changing Tyres
• 1977 Leaving McLaren
• 1979 Nelson Piquet
• 1980 Skirts on Formula 1 Cars
• 1981 Leaving Formula 1
• 1981 Making Lists
• 1981 Signing on
• 1981 Creating Space Station
• 1991 Highland Fling
• 1991 Classic Marathon
• 1992 Getting the Austin A35
• 1992 El Salvador
• 1993 Carerra Panamerica
• 1993 Centre of attention
• 1993 Nicest car in rally
• 1993 LeJog
• 2000 London to Sydney
• 2000 Porsche Racing
• 2000 Porsche Crashing
• 2001 Ferrari
• 2001 Inca Trail
• 2004 Berlin - Moscow - Berlin
• 2005 World Cup Rally
• 2007 Norway
• 2008 Liège-Brescia-Liège
• 2008 An Icelandic Odyssey
• 2008 North & West Africa
• 2009 West Coast America
• 2009 London to Casablanca
• 2010 New Zealand Festival of motor racing