Formula One Fanatic Bloomsbury ( 02 February, 2004 ) Book Our Price : £ 6.39 List Price : £ 7.99 You save £1.6 (20% off) Prices subject to change. usually dispatched within 24 hours.

What makes the F1 fan tick

This is a very interesting book in which the author gives personal accounts of the track battles hes seen over the years,and is a personal attempt to convey the passion and feeling that Formula 1 creates in people.Worth owning.

Amateurish and irritating

This is essentially a couple of hundred page essay on "why I am an F1 fan". As such, its not going to tell the dedicated F1 fan anything they dont know already, and as history its too subjective, too fragmentary and too personal to be at all interesting. I dont know whether the book was written in English as a second language, or whether its been translated, but it reads oddly and the proofreading and fact-checking are both very shaky. File with Fever Pitch as something to read on the train as an alternative to falling asleep.

A timely reminder of why some people like Formula 1

Formula 1 is lucky to have Koen Vergeer as a fan. As described in this book, his formative experience was the 1973 Dutch Grand Prix - the scene of one of the most horrendous accidents in motor racing history. Roger Williamson asphyxiated in an overturned burning car while another driver, David Purley, engaged in a lone, desperate bid to save him. A lot of people left F1 in disgust, but not Koen Vergeer. Vergeer evocatively describes his life as a teenage F1 fan in the mid-1970s - getting the stickers and model cars; writing up his own race reports in a scrapbook; listening to his peers asking him why he likes watching someone burn to death in his car (something still told to F1 fans today, or at least before the soporific 2002 season). He ticks off the list of fatalities in the sport during this period - Cevert, Revson, Donahue, Koinigg, Pryce. But none stop him watching, until he sees Ronnie Peterson dragged, legs smashed, from his burning Lotus in the 1978 Italian GP. Only then does he seek real life thrills. It may come as a surprise to British viewers, but Nigel Mansell was regarded as exciting on the continent. His hard-charging performances for Lotus, Williams and Ferrari earned him the nickname Il Leone (The Lion) from Italian fans. Vergeer was drawn back to F1 in the 80s by Mansells combination of breathtaking racing and comical blunders. The story picks up from there, detailing the depressing politics and feuds in 1980s F1, which continue to plague it today. Along with the history, the book is peppered with charming anecdotes from Vergeers life - his sole attempt at karting; staying up all night to watch Damon Hill robbed of the 1994 championship but having to be deadly quiet since its 3am; the experience of watching the much-loved but underacheiving Jos Verstappen trying to break the Zandvoort lap record in a 2001 Arrows (!). F1 Fans will nod as they see themselves in the authors life. But most of all, this should be read by those who have an F1 fan in their life, but dont understand the attraction to the sport.