Beyond the Limit
RRP £7.99
Paperback, 226 pages
Buy NEW for £4.80
Reviews
(Rated 4 out of 5)
I loved this - although you would need to be a F1 and interested in health and safety otherwise it could be a tough read.
For those that are really into all the technical stuff it is great and I have to admire Sid Watkins even more after reading it, he really had to fight the system and politics of F1 to drag driver safety into such a high profile and high priority status as it is now.
Technical detail also interspersed with anecdotes of evetns during his F1 career - a great sense of humour is evident.
(Rated 1 out of 5)
Prof Sid should be worth a read. He has seen more of the action and characters of F1, closer up, than anyone - even Murray Walker or B. Ecclestone. ...
The book consists of a hotchpotch of anecdotes presumably assembled from the ones left on his editor's floor from the previous book, many of which are banal, weak and lacking any connection with F1. This last point would not matter if the stories were pithy, witty and interesting: few are.
A pointless, skimpy and garbled re-hash of the 2000 season is trotted out to fill out the mid-section and the book ends with appendices of tables of extremely erudite but arcane statistics on injuries, construction materials, design specs and other matters vital to the FIA Medical and Technical Committees but of no interest to anyone else - not even Grand Prix drivers, I suspect - least of all Eddie Irvine ...
Prof Sid is a self-deprecating fellow. The result of the modesty of his narrative is that on many occasions you feel he's apologising for being present at the events and with the characters involved: consequently, descriptions are thin, lack colour and tend either to drift to vague, aimless conclusions or just stop dead, leaving the reader suspended, waiting for a point that will never be made.
By all means buy this book for a journey, swallow it whole at one sitting for the occasional insight or humorous anecdote expressed by an evidently charming man, then leave it on the plane without a second thought, as I did. One day we will have the full autobiography of Prof Sid, hopefully guided by a writer such as Alan Henry, Nigel Roebuck or David Tremayne. Unlike this one, that book will be worth keeping.
(Rated 3 out of 5)
I bought this book on the d/w recommendation that Prof. Watkins was "...infinitely more interesting than most of the drivers". If that's so then drivers' accounts must be absolutely excrutiating. True, there are a few engaging anecdotes, but all too often I found myself eagerly moving to the next paragraph for the killer punchline, only to be unceremoniously dumped into a completely new topic.
Much of the race-by-race detail would already be known to regular followers of F1 while, like the previous reviewer, I felt the book had a cobbled-together feel about it, with the later sections acting merely as space-filler.
So yes, by all means read it, but don't expect a treasure-trove of enlightenment.
(Rated 3 out of 5)
Professor Sid Watkins ......... everyone in F1 knows the name, he is synonomous with motorsport at every level, who better to give an insight into the dangerous world of this fast moving and often dangerous sport?
I found the book riveting from the start, couldn't put it down ...... unfortunately, that lasted only for the first quater of the book. I feel that it may have been rushed, as many of the factors were remarkably similar in content. I loved, that danger and insider information was available throughout, but for me,it lacked direction and a satisfactory use of that information. Each incident was described without depth and the story moved away rapidly to the next section leaving me to wonder..... !!!
I feel that the drivers positional information at the end of most sections was sometimes unecessary and somewhat rapidly executed. The technical information at the latter part of the book, in my opinion, was a waste of space and this section could've been used in a more significant way to sum up what promised to be a true sequel.
Buy it if you're a true F1 fan ...... but, don't look for an inspirational read here, that which looks like gold, isn't necessarily so!
Sorry Prof! ..... but I'll still buy the next one !!
(Rated 3 out of 5)
If you have read the author's (excelent and highly recommended) previous book "Life at the limit" then this book might disapoint you.
It's not that bad, but for sure it does not contain so many interesting stories and anecdotes as his previous work, and it seems a little bit short and uninspired. I strongly advise you to wait for the paperback edition which is more reasonably priced.