Back in the day John Bolster was a familiar figure, with his luxuriant handlebar moustache and habitually clad in a loud tweed jacket with matching deerstalker. After hillclimbing his famous ʻBloody Maryʼ Specials in the 1930s, his racing career ended in a massive cartwheeling accident in an ERA in the 1949 British Grand Prix. As he recovered in hospital, his friend Gregor Grant persuaded him to be the technical editor of Grantʼs new magazine, Autosport – even though Bolster protested that heʼd never written a word in his life.
But he had a way with words. His stock of rude stories, voiced in strident upper-class tones, entertained many a well-oiled crowd in the Steering Wheel Club, and he wrote just like he told jokes. Photos in his road tests showed humdrum Standard Vanguards or Hillman Minxes being cornered on the understeering limit, tyres nearly bending off their rims. The PRs were horrified, but a good session in Bolsterʼs local when the car was collected usually guaranteed a flattering report.
He measured out a quarter of a mile on a country road, and at each end he stuck in a stout twig pulled from a nearby bush. In time both twigs took root and became healthy young trees. He would use this exact quarter-mile to calibrate a test carʼs speedo or rev counter, drawing on the dial with chalk. Then he would take acceleration figures, steering with one hand and wielding a stopwatch in the other.
He also invented the track test. He knew everyone, and because he was a competent racing driver he persuaded teams to lend him cars. No other magazine tested the latest F1 BRM or a works DB3S Aston. Brian Lister let him drive off in Archie Scott Brownʼs Lister-Jag: using his trees, he got 0-100mph in 11.2 secs.
Motor racing was often covered live on radio, and Bolster became the BBCʼs man in the pits, walking up and down with headphones, microphone and a hefty backpack strapped to his shoulders, dodging the cars as they rushed in and out. The technology was primitive, but Bolsterʼs inimitable tones would shout over the noise and added wonderfully to the atmosphere, whether he was intelligible or not. Sometimes his colourful expressions dismayed BBC management, such as the time he reported the reason for a driverʼs retirement: “He says, ʻPiston broke.ʼ I know exactly how he feels.”
