The Piranha Club: power and influence in Formula One
Timothy Collings
2001, 2004
Virgin Books Ltd

I have read several books about Formula One, its history and culture and have a thirst for the kind of knowledge that is difficult to find by just watching the ITV broadcasts or reading the F1 mags. The Piranha Club is such a book that offers the reader an insight into the power struggles of the men who have shaped the modern F1 from the beginnings of the sport to recent times.

The author Timothy Collings takes us on a journey through the paddock itself where team bosses and managers of the sport are brought into the light to reveal a very different F1 than most fans would be used to. Many of us, I am sure, have scratched our heads at major and minor changes to F1 racing seemingly driven by official bodies like the FIA, and FISA before it. It is interesting to see how many such changes were actually engineered by the team bosses themselves and other power players in the dynamic story of F1 racing.

Collings manages to remain fairly unbiased in his presentation of facts and historical occurrences (important to do in such a publication) though some bias seemed to infiltrate his version of events in some parts of the book. Regardless of a few biased rantings this book offers a comprehensive view of the “big” men behind F1 and includes quotes and interview excerpts from some very famous people. Names like Enzo Ferarri, John Cooper, Colin Chapman, Rob Walker, Max Mosely, Bernie Eccelstone, Ken Tyrrell, Ron Dennis, Eddie Jordan, Frank Williams, Jackie Stewart, just to name a few, contributed to F1 history and in some way or other were a part of the evolution of “The Piranha Club” (the name given to the core of giants that drive F1).

There is some great historical references in this book, stories of success and failure as the reader travels along the F1 timeline discovering the complex simplicity of the power plays that shape what is often referred to as the pinnacle of motorsport. To see how the sport evolved from a non-exclusive boy’s racing romp into an ultra-exclusive technological juggernaught is a real eye-opener, even to a self-proclaimed veteran like me. Although F1 politics may seem tedious on the surface, and perhaps even unnecessary, there is an underlying richness to the characters that have brought about change and how their lives were captured by the racing bug and how they fought their way into (and sometimes out of) F1 racing.

Fans of teams such as Ferarri, Lotus, Brabham, Cooper, McLaren, Williams, Tyrrell, March, and many, many more should enjoy reading about the people who made it all happen and how their unique personalities forged the world’s favourite motorsport.
You will find out why some technological changes have come about, why some rules needed to be changed and why some should have been left alone to this day. You may be shocked at the reasoning and events that lead to these changes.
First published in 2001, this book was updated in 2004 (I am unaware of any more recent updates) and so offers a fairly up to date account of things that remains relevant in today’s F1 climate. Collings predictions about the premature dissolution of the Concorde Agreement have more or less come true, and he offers other predictive morsels that are not hard to imagine in reality today.

If you love F1 and want to enrich your understanding of the big picture then I can highly recommend this book to you. At 328 pages it is a healthy read covering the entire F1 time line from the good old days of low-budget racing in uncultured jalopies to the modern days of fighter jets on wheels that we recognize as grand prix racing in the new millennium. Some faces remain, many have passed on or been trodden underfoot, but the modern era of big dollars injected by car manufacturers threatens to dissolve and dilute the Piranha Club and we are left to speculate on the fate of those who currently hold the power and influence of the sport watched by up to 300 million viewers world-wide.

Score: 8.5/10