Ron Dennis was born

Ron Dennis was born on 1 June 1947, which is a very tidy date for a man who spent decades trying to make Formula 1 look tidier than it naturally is.

He came up through the practical side of the sport, from mechanic to team owner, then into the McLaren takeover that fused the old Bruce McLaren outfit with Project Four. Under Dennis, McLaren became less a racing team than a controlled environment: carbon fibre precision, corporate language, ruthless driver management and some of the fastest cars of the modern era.

The roll call is not subtle: Lauda, Prost, Senna, Hakkinen and Hamilton all won drivers’ titles in his McLaren orbit. The story also came with politics, frost, legal fights and the sort of internal tension that happens when perfection is treated as a workplace policy.

For better and sometimes for exhausting, Dennis made McLaren feel like McLaren: polished floor, sharp edges, no visible fingerprints.