Game Changer is a vivid account of the 1968 Formula One season, tracing how Jim Clark’s loss, Graham Hill’s resolve, new technology, commercial sponsorship, and mounting danger transformed F1 into the modern sport we recognize today. What inspired you to write this book?

The basic bottom line, the core inspiration was the introduction of modern commercial involvement.  The Gold Leaf Team Lotus to me was the “Game Changer” from which everything sprang moving forward.  That was the core inspiration for the book. 

How did your experience as a sixteen-year-old spectator at Brands Hatch shape the emotional perspective of the book?

In a word, context.  I attended my first Grand Prix at Brands Hatch, a total neophyte to motorsports.  I was completely mesmerized by the excitement and spectacle of the event, yet totally unaware of the tragedies that had preceded it.  After Graham Hill retired from the race, I recall watching him watch the race by standing along pit row leaning against the pit wall.  He looked disappointed, relaxed, and watching the race in much the same way everyone did.  I was unaware that two weeks prior to this race, a driver had been horrifically killed in a fiery crash.  Yet Hill and all the drivers had the capacity to cast aside the growing dangers and willingly climb back into the cockpit of a race car. The scale of the risk was simply mind-boggling.   At the time, I had no idea of the level of risk involved, only two weeks removed from one of the most horrific accidents in F1 history.

Jim Clark’s death is presented as a profound rupture in the season. How difficult was it to write about that moment without sensationalizing it?

As I became more and more of a race fan, I quickly learned and became familiar with Jim Clark’s tragic accident.  In doing research for the book I learned much more, but I had been familiar with the basics of what happened.  Nearly every F1 race fan is familiar with it.    What I found far more difficult was writing about the three other fatal accidents of the 1968 season that I was not as familiar, particularly, the accident that claimed the life of Mike Spence.  He was killed barely one month after Jim Clark at the Indianapolis Speedway.  He was just emerging from the background and was positioned to become a lead driver in the F1 series before his Indianapolis accident.  His death as well as the other two drivers killed in a short period was very challenging writing.

What surprised you most while researching the rise of sponsorship, especially Lotus’s move from British racing green to Gold Leaf colors?​

Basically, the scale of the change.  Gold Leaf and Imperial Tobacco, along with Gunston brand of cigarettes from South America were the opening salvo.  Over the course of the next several years, the tobacco industry as a whole spent $4.5 billion sponsoring Formula One as well as other motorsport platforms. 

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