1971 Elden MK 8 Single Seater

Lot details
Registration No: N/A
Chassis No: 001
Mot Expiry: N/A

Tony Brise's Formula Ford Championship winning car

Founded in 1961 by John Thompson and the brothers Peter and Brian Hampsheir, Elden was a successful builder of Formula Fords in the category's heyday. The Mk8 (a.k.a. the PRH8) was the company's first volume model, forty-eight being produced between 1970 and 1972. The initial four chassis were made by Brian Hampsheir, the next sixteen by Nichols of Bideford and the remainder by Arch Motors. In 1970, Hampsheir met stock car champion John Brise, who was looking for a Formula Ford for his seventeen-year old son Tony, the 1969 British national kart champion. The prototype Mk8, chassis 001, was duly assembled complete with a Rowland engine and transported to Brands Hatch for Tony to test. Although, Brise had little basis for evaluation Formula Ford ace Derek Lawrence is said to have been testing his Titan there that day and after a spell behind the wheel declared the rapid new Elden to be `OK'! A deal was struck with the Brises and development continued through the winter in readiness for 1971. History relates that young Brise took the Formula by storm - winning some twenty-three races and both the Townsend Thoresen and Champion of Brands series; not to mention reputedly taking lap records at Brands Hatch, Lydden, Crystal Palace, Oulton Park and Silverstone. Thereafter he rose swiftly through the single-seater ranks winning two of the three British F3 Championships in 1973 before making his F1 debut with Williams two years later. Tempted away from the Grove outfit after just one race by double world champion turned team owner Graham Hill, he was among the victims of the latter's awful plane crash at Arkley golf course on 29th November 1975.

The vendor is adamant that the Elden on offer is the very one Tony Brise drove to so many victories during 1971 and which was subsequently briefly campaigned by his brother, Tim Brise, before apparently being shipped to Ireland in 1972. Its fate there is not recorded, but it is understood to have returned to the mainland in a derelict state in 1988, following which a lengthy restoration was undertaken. Summing the car up as a "piece of history", he further informs us that it not only graced the front cover of a contemporaneous Autosport issue but also merited a double-page spread in David Tremayne's book `The Lost Generation: The brilliant but tragic lives of rising British F1 stars Roger Williamson, Tony Brise and Tom Pryce'. Potentially eligible for the HSCC Grandstand Motorsports Historic Formula Ford Championship, this appealing Elden comes complete with an expired FIA Historic Vehicle Identity Form and assorted spares.