Total Competition

Total Competition is the most compelling, comprehensive and revealing insight into what it takes to get to the top in Formula One that has ever been published. Across four decades, Ross Brawn was one of the most innovative and successful technical directors and then team principals in Formula One. Leading Benetton, Ferrari, Honda, Brawn and Mercedes, he worked with drivers such as Michael Schumacher, Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton to make them world champions. Now, in this fascinating book written with Adam Parr (who was CEO and then chairman of Williams for five years), he looks back over his career and methods to assess how he did it, and where occasionally he got things wrong. 

Total Competition is a definitive portrait of modern motorsport. In the book, Brawn and Parr explore the unique pressures of Formula One, their battles with Bernie Ecclestone, and the cut-throat world they inhabited, where coming second is never good enough. Just as Sir Alex Ferguson used his experiences as a football manager to write Leading, this book will appeal not only to the millions of Formula One fans who want to understand how Brawn operated, it will also provide many lessons in how to achieve your business goals.

The Sunday Express writes, “Even if you have no prior knowledge of or interest in Formula One, Total Competition still offers valuable lessons on how to succeed in pressurised environments and forge working relationships with difficult colleagues. And for those in love with the sport, it is a must-have insight into the awe-inspiring career of a true motor racing great.”

F1 Fanatic describes Total Competition as “undoubtedly an absorbing and revealing read. A few years from now we may reflect on this as one of the most important books on Formula One to appear for a long time.”

The Art of War

The Art of War – Five Years in Formula is Adam Parr’s manga-style account of the turbulent years of Formula One between 2006 and 2012.

F1 Fanatic writes “The Art of War: Five Years in Formula One” reveals the inner workings of F1’s ‘Piranha Club’ and how they reacted to the escalating financial crisis from the end of 2007. This runs side-by-side with Parr’s arrival at Williams, and he also tells the story of his efforts to put the team on a more solid footing for the future. In what is probably a first for an F1 book of this type, Parr’s tale is told as a graphic novel ... The insight into the competing factions vying for control over F1’s future is fascinating."

“This is a most unusual book in that it comes in comic book form and features a foreword by Max Mosley. This is instructional in itself and makes the point that F1 is “a strange culture indeed in which people take legal action to avoid saving £10 million a year” … The drawing style is dark, with occasional red being the only non black and white element. It makes for a most unusual insight into the sport. I recommend it highly.” — Joe Saward on F1, 30.11.12.