John Taylor

A protégé of Bob Gerard, Taylor raced extensively in Formula Junior during 1962-63 with the Midlander’s Cooper-Ford, gaining quite a bit of success, mainly at club level, and also took part in the British non-championship Formula 1 races of the period. In 1964 John was fifth in the Aintree 200 with a four-cylinder car and seventh in the Mediterranean GP at Enna in Gerard’s Cooper-Climax V8, which he drove in three more non-championship races in 1965.

Having finished sixth in the 1966 International Trophy, Taylor took David Bridges’ Brabham-BRM to the French GP and, despite his limited experience, scored a priceless point. However, in the German GP, he spun on the first lap and was involved in a collision with Ickx’s F2 Matra. His car crashed off the track and burst into flames, leaving the poor driver badly burned. Though he seemed to be making a slow recovery, he died in hospital a few weeks later.