How to Win a Grand Prix by Bernie Collins
Written by Ashley Kelmore, Posted in Reviews
Three Stars
Best for:
New fans of Formula 1 who are interested in learning about the specifics of a race season and a race weekend.
In a nutshell:
Former F1 strategist for Aston Martin Bernie Collins shares her experience in F1 and gives a detailed behind-the-scenes look a Formula 1.
Worth quoting:
N/A – lots of interesting items but nothing I would choose to revisit.
Why I chose it:
My partner and I have recently started watching F1 and he spotting this book in an airport bookshop. We’ve enjoyed the author’s commentary on Sky F1 coverage so thought the book would be an interesting read.
Review:
A few years back I started watching Drive to Survive on Netflix. Never before did I think I would be interested in cars driving around for a few hours – I didn’t get why it would be interesting, or really understand any of it. I now find myself building weekend activities around when qualifying and races start. I check in on the F1 sub-reddit regularly. Part of my TikTok algorithm is F1 news. And over time I’ve learned things about how F1 works, but not to the level where I understand the choices or the work going on behind the scenes.
This book provides a detailed look at how Formula 1 works. Bernie Collins went to university for engineering and ended up working in F1 for the first part of career in various roles, ending up as a strategist before moving over to the broadcast side. She worked primarily for teams that weren’t vying for championships, but as I learned from Drive to Survive, it’s not just about coming in first – there’s a lot going on throughout the grid.
The first part of the book focuses on Bernie’s background and then moves to looking at F1 overall. I found this section a bit tough to get through as the writing was detailed but felt more like technical writing than a book. The second half was more what I was looking for – each chapter follows each part of the weekend, from free practice one through to debriefing and ending the race weekend.
Overall I think the book could have benefited from a bit more beefing up of the descriptions as it is quite technical, but I did learn a lot I didn’t know before, so on that front it definitely got the job done.
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