When Bruce McLaren died in a testing accident at Goodwood in 1970 at the young age of 32, he had already established a rich heritage which he was to leave to the world of motor racing. His team had been phenomenally successful in various forms of racing, he had been successful as a driver, and he had been much admired as a person and greatly loved in the sport.

That heritage has survived throughout the years. Teddy Mayer ran the team for a decade after McLaren's death, Ron Dennis then took it over in 1980 andsince then, McLaren International, now known as McLaren Racing, has enjoyed incredible success, run with an attention to detail that the founder would have appreciated.

McLaren's early links with Ford, for instance, are mirrored by those currently with Mercedes-Benz. To move into Grand Prix racing, Bruce established his team under the flight path at Colnbrook, near Heathrow. The McLaren Technology Centre, where the formula One team is now based, on the outskirts of Woking in Surrey sees the team remain in the same area.

But it all began on the other side of the world. Bruce McLaren was born in Auckland, New Zealand on August 30, 1937. His father, Leslie, ran a garage and having raced motorcycles, moved to racing cars after the war.

Bruce McLaren himself had an extraordinary childhood; aged nine, he contracted Perthe's disease which affects the hip. After a month in hospital, he spent three years in a home for crippled children, his legs in plaster casts, lying in traction, immobile for months on end. Later he would be allowed a wheelchair but at one time there were fears that he would never walk again. He did so, of course, but with a limp; his left leg was 1 1/2 inches shorter than his right. All this time, however, he studied and was able to graduate to an engineering course at Seddon Memorial Technical College. But he was already intrigued by motor sport. His father bought an 750 cc Austin Ulster Seven but it scared him rigid. Bruce, however, persuaded his father that he should race it and an early rival was one Phil Kerr, who was to become a mainstay in the McLaren team.

When the Austin was sold (it is now at the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking) Bruce raced his father's Austin Healey 100 in 1956/7, but when this expired, McLaren managed to buy a bob tailed centre seat Cooper, previously raced by Sir Jack Brabham.

All this time, Bruce was still a student but managed a kind of correspondence course with Brabham in England to sort out the car. Brabham then suggested bringing a pair of Formula Two Coopers to New Zealand for the winter and that Bruce would drive one of them. There was a fair amount of success, and Bruce went on to become New Zealand's first 'Driver to Europe' in 1958.

Bruce sold his own car and instead bought a new Cooper when he arrived in England. It was the start of his international career, and he learned about European racing as he trailed the little Formula Two car from race to race. But it was finishing fifth overall and first in Formula Two in the German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring that really established him. He took a 1960cc Formula Two car home to New Zealand and won his national championship that winter.

For 1959, Bruce was signed as a Cooper Formula One driver which he would remain for the next six years. His teammate was Jack Brabham and in that first year, he won the final Grand Prix of the year at Sebring. He was the youngest ever winner of a Grand Prix at 22, and his teammate won the World Championship.

Bruce became engaged to Patty Broad that winter, and would marry her the following year. On his return to Europe, he was Brabham's teammate again, and once again, the New Zealander won the World Championship. Bruce actually led the championship for a race and won in Argentina. He was second to Brabham in the championship.

Brabham now left the team, leaving McLaren as team leader, but new engine regulations cost the team dearly in 1961. It was better in 1962 when Bruce was allowed some say in the design process and he won at Monaco, finishing third in the championship. The following year, however, was very difficult. Patty McLaren was injured in a water skiing accident, John Cooper was badly injured in a road accident, Bruce himself was thrown out of his uncompetitive car at the Nürburgring and was knocked out, he then began to look for alternatives.

As usual, McLaren wanted to take a car down to New Zealand to race in the Tasman series, but his suggestion to slim down a pair of Coopers for himself and American Timmy Mayer, fell on deaf ears at Cooper. So late in 1963, Bruce and Mayer's brother Teddy registered the name Bruce McLaren Motor Racing Ltd. The series was a success in that Bruce won the championship, but tragic because Mayer was killed. It had sewn the seeds, however. Bruce would say that there was nothing like designing, building, running and racing your own cars. It was full circle. Bruce would continue as a Cooper Formula One driver for another two seasons scoring 13pts in 1964 and 10 the following year, while his own company was being established.

While Formula One remained the major series, sports cars were also fashionable on either side of the Atlantic. Bruce, via Mayer, bought the ex Mecom/Penske Zerez Special and raced it in Europe. That spawned the idea of their own car, the McLaren M1, and that was put into production by Peter Agg's Lambretta Trojan Group in Rye, Sussex. They would make and sell 200 McLarens during the next ten years. Bruce was also involved in the development of Ford's GT cars.

McLaren was still Cooper's number one driver in 1965, but Charles Cooper died and son John sold the team to the Chipstead Motor Group. Bruce, helped by a former Concorde senior scientific officer called Robin Herd, began to seek other areas than sports cars and looked to the new three litre Formula One in 1966.