Crashed & Byrned: The Greatest Racing Driver You Never Saw

By Mike Dalenberg

Get the internationally acclaimed book about the incredible story of Tommy Byrne; Crashed and Byrned: The Greatest Racing Driver You Never Saw

As quoted by F1 Fanatic, the Formula 1 Blog:”Without wishing to spoil too much of the story for those who aren’t familiar with Byrne’s career, it will come as no surprise to learn that he didn’t make it to the top, although he did make a few F1 starts for Theodore. But his experiences after F1 were just as incredible as those he had while starting out in Dundalk.

Crashed & Byrned: The Greatest Racing Driver You Never Saw

A surreal tale of a poverty stricken Dundalk kid’s rise to become the only racing driver the great Ayrton Senna ever feared-and how it all went wrong from there. For a brief moment, Tommy Byrnewas arguably the world’s greatest driver, the motor racing equivalent of George Best and Muhammad Ali rolled into one. A racer, a thief, a raconteur, This is the story of his improbable escape, his rapid rise and spectacular fall from grace. Peppered with dark humor and a cast of ridiculous characters, it is the antithesis of a fairytale-and it’s all true. Hold on tight, the tale of Tommy Byrne is quite a ride-from fending for himself as the runt of a big Catholic litter in the ’60s, to running the gauntlet of the sectarian violence of the ’70s, troubling Ayrton Senna and making it to F1 in the ’80s, resorting to drugs in the aftermath and driving for a deluded billionaire madman and then gun-toting Mexicans in the ’90s.
It’s raw, passionate, and-with Byrne’s ability to tell it like it is-not for the faint-hearted.
After a stint racing in America for a millionaire manic depressive who was convinced he was going to become president (no, I’m not making this up), Byrne moved on to Mexico. Having developed a drug habit, he wound up racing F3 cars for a gun-crazed alcoholic who celebrated Byrne’s victories by arranging orgies…

You get the idea. It’s a remarkable, colourful, at times scarcely believable tale which unravels at a breakneck pace……. And of course, you must buy this book.”