The legendary, frenetic tones of Murray Walker will be lost to the world of grand prix racing at the end of the 2001 world championship season. The 77year-old with the wide-eyed enthusiasm of a first-year novice but who commentates like a man with his trousers on fire has decided to retire 51 years after making his first BBC radio broadcast from a hill-climb in 1949.
When Walker hangs up his microphone, it will mark the end of an era for this effervescent personality who was one of the pioneers of formula one as a televised sport. He will also go down as one of that rare breed of commentators whose individual style stamped his identity on the sport in much the same way as Peter O'Sullevan in horse racing, Bill McLaren in rugby union, Eddie Waring in rugby league and Brian Johnston in cricket.
"My love for the sport and my privileged place in it is undiminished," he said yesterday. "I don't actually want to stop but I've always said I will do so when I'm still ahead with the viewers, rather than wait until there's a general belief that I'm past it."
Walker's breathless style was the butt of many jokes in the formula one paddock and his on-the-air gaffes regularly made the Colemanballs column in Private Eye. Yet this carapace of apparently childish enthusiasm masked the mind of a measured professional with an intimate, deep-rooted knowledge of the sport. Until earlier this year, when he dislocated a hip in falling off a motor-cycle, he had not missed a grand prix in half a century.
British world champions Nigel Mansell and Damon Hill - both great favourites with Walker - were among the first to pay tribute to him. "A wonderful man and friend," said Mansell. "His retirement will be a great loss to the sport but I sincerely hope that he has a fabulous last year."
Hill added: "Murray has to be a big reason why so many people watch motor racing. He will definitely be missed and I send all my best wishes for his future."
Walker was born into a world of motorsport. "Cut me," he once said, "and I will bleed Castrol-R."
His father Graham, a despatch rider in the first World War, earned a good living as a motorcycle tuner before becoming competitions manager for both the Norton and Sunbeam motorcycle racing teams.
He was also a winner of the Tourist Trophy on the Isle of Man and captain of the British team in one of the prestigious international six-day trial endurance events immediately prior to the second World War. Still in his pram, Walker was taken around the race circuits of Europe. After active service in the second World War, Walker returned to civvy street to forge a successful career as an advertising executive. His early commentaries had been in conjunction with his father, but he continued on his own after his father's death in 1962 and finally became a full-timer on his retirement from the advertising business in 1982.
Since then he has been partnered by three retired grand prix drivers as key co-commentators: the late James Hunt, Jonathan Palmer and his current partner Martin Brundle.
Next year he will commentate on just 12 of the season's 17 races, allowing his successor an easy transition into the challenging front-line role.
Former motorsports journalist James Allen, currently ITV's pit lane reporter, is among the handful of hopefuls tipped to succeed him. But an ITV spokesman said: "The last time this vacancy came up, Clement Attlee was prime minister so we want to decide at our leisure."
