Jackie Stewart

Your son Paul wanted to be a racing driver. What was your attitude toward that?

I sort of discouraged it. It w it was a period of an unhealthy interest as I saw it. Uh it's selfish of me to say that from what the sport has given me. But on the other hand, I've seen the other side of the coin. And never mind the accidents, the sport has left a lot of carnage around of people's lives because it takes them on a magic carpet, as many sports does, and then deposits these people when they don't have anything else to do. And they have been intoxicated by the lifestyle, by the jet planes and the sunshines and the beaches of the places that we go as sports people go to participate. And then they're left for the rest of their life as wrecks because they don't want to fit into society. … So I was reluctant for Paul to go in, and it was he, my elder son, who was now twenty that wanted to do it. If he had really wanted that badly to do it, Michael, he would have done it. I didn't see that. I refused him the opportunity of doing it. But I wasn't going to help him at that stage. … So really I discouraged it because I love them so much, both of my sons.

What was the most frightening moment you had [as a racing driver]?

Fear is a peculiar thing. While driving or while racing you don't often have it. But I I was frightened from time to time. But I remember once it was the French Grand Prix at Rouen and I was driving in the rain and my car was unsuitable on that particular day. The tars didn't marry to the road very well and I finished third in the race, but there were so many times in that race that I truly was frightened. I couldn't see for spray and the tars the car weren't going where I wanted them to go and I nearly hit a couple of people in the middle of the spray in the mist that comes out from behind those cars in great plumes. And that I remember is the only occasion where I can remember being frightened for a prolonged period. And that's one of the only times that I would have said I had any courage, because bravery is different than courage in my book. And I I I completed the race and I finished third, controlling my fear, which I think amounts to courage.

Why did you stop [racing] when you did, at the height of your career?

I was burned out. I had put into what I think was tunnel vision an enormous part of my life, burned out such a lot of energy trying to succeed. … I think I had just lived with blinkers on for too long. I was now at the end of my career getting more aggravation from the activity than I was satisfaction. And that was the one thing that had stimulated me all my time, was this great feeling of high and this marriage between man and machine and doing to the limit what I could best do. And at the end I was travelling too much, I was doing too many appearances, I was doing too much testing. Whatever I did I was expected to be the best at, not so much by everybody else but myself. And that, I think, was more demanding than anything. I had lost the competitive instincts quite a long time before I retired. I was no longer interested in competing with people, because I think that's hopelessly immature. I had started very much competing against myself to eliminate those errors that we spoke of earlier and to try and clean my act up to be, if you like, the perfect race driver. And that wasn't going to happen, I didn't think. But I was just so tired I had to get out.

You seem unstoppable in your retirement. I don't think you're ever going to really retire ever, are you?

I hope not. I think people decline in retirement. I think they their minds stop. And in most cases, as people mature in years, they become more expansive mentally because they've accumulated all this enormous experience and those lessons that they've learned, those mistakes that they've made. This must surely be one of the the most important times of someone's life if they continue to forge ahead. And I think that's the important thing. That's what I want to do. I want to die standing up.