Might be worth a watch tonight if you’ve had enough of the football
Brits Who Made the Modern World Friday 20 June
7:30pm - 8:00pm
Five
1/6 - Formula One
Men of a certain age will remember how the name Lotus used to be charged with a sense of cool from its days as an icon of 60s motor racing. It’s those men this programme is aimed at, and with luck their kids may enjoy it, too. In it, Peter Snow tells the story of how, starting in the late 50s, Colin Chapman and his gang of amateur racing mechanics took on the might of the big European racing marques - Ferrari, Maserati and Mercedes. It’s a good story, and many of the oily-rag enthusiasts who helped steer Lotus to Formula One glory are here to help tell it. Shame then, that you never feel whoever made the programme loved the subject. It’s the first of a series about plucky Brits behind advances in modern technology and the good news is, they get better.