Constructors

JBW Cars

A decorated merchant navy officer, Mancunian Brian Naylor went into the car trade after the Second World War and began racing in 1954 - at the age of 31. He became a semi-professional racing driver. He was unusual amongst the British drivers of the era as he regularly raced abroad and made a point of having unusual car and engine combinations in order to attract start money to help him pay for his racing. He enjoyed some good showings in his JBW sportscar, built by mechanic Fred Wilkinson and in 1957 tried his hand with a Formula 2 Cooper. In 1959 Wilkinson produced the JBW F1 car - a Cooper copy - and this appeared (but failed to qualify) for the Oulton Park Gold Cup in September that year. It was not seen again until the start of the 1960 season when Naylor ran it in the International Trophy at Silverstone. He failed to qualify at Monaco a fortnight later and did not reappear until the British GP in July. The car continued to appear in races (even going to the United States GP at Riverside in November) but was never competitive.The following season the car was raced in occasional F1 and Intercontinental Formula races but in the midseason Naylor and Wilkinson decided to switch from the Maserati engine to a Coventry Climax. This resulted in Naylor scoring his best result (ninth) in the Gold Cup at Oulton Park. At the end of the year Naylor retired from the sport because of ill-health. He died in Spain in 1989 at the age of 66.