- Brian Hart - 1936-2014
Engine builder Brian Hart dies
Brian Hart, the former Formula One engineer who built engines for the likes of Jordan and Toleman, has died at the age of 77.
Hart founded his eponymous company in 1969 while he was still enjoying a successful career as a racer in Formula Two. However, as the engine company grew, Hart turned his attention to it full time and stopped racing in 1972. Originally he prepared Ford engines for F2 cars before developing his own engine for Toleman's F2 team.
Following a one-two in the 1980 European F2 championship, Toleman graduated - along with Hart - in to Formula One. With a small budget the opening seasons were a struggle, but by 1984 Hart was also supplying engines to Spirit and RAM and the engine secured its first podium finish when Ayrton Senna finished second for Toleman in the rain-shortened Monaco Grand Prix.
More podiums followed and 1985 saw Toleman's Teo Fabi take the first pole position for the pairing, but a year later Hart dropped out of Formula One in the face of the large budgets enjoyed by the likes of Renault and Honda.
The name returned in 1993 with a naturally-aspirated V10 supplied to Jordan, and a year later Rubens Barrichello took pole at Spa and third place at the Pacific Grand Prix. When Jordan opted for Peugeot engines, Hart supplied Footwork - which yielded a podium at Adelaide in 1995 - and then Minardi before being absorbed by Tom Walkinshaw Racing in 1997.
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