VotW – The Standard Triumph Story

Our video of the week this time is a preview of an amazing new DVD set, The Standard Triumph Story, that I was given the honor of reviewing. This is two DVD set with over 230 minutes of footage on the history of Standard Triumph from the early days to the very end.

Yup, it’s almost four hours in total so it’s a rather extensive look at one of Britain’s most beloved producers of cars. It is crammed full of great interviews with the men who were responsible for the cars in the factory, on the racetrack, and just about everywhere else in between.

This history was produced by John Clancy, long time Triumph devotee and occasional contributor to this site, and he has this to say about the production…

It’s actually ten years since I started work on what was to become the first installment in ‘The Triumph Series’. That was intended to be a one-off but after that proved to be a minor success and following requests from other Triumph enthusiasts I took on a second project. It then became obvious that if I didn’t get all this documented asap while the engineers, designers, stylists, racers and rallyists were still alive then very soon it would be too late. So here we are ten years later with another rather massive production and this time the legendary motoring author and former Triumph Competitions Secretary, Graham Robson, is the lead presenter. Despite the long hours it’s actually been a rather exciting process.

Appearing in the main feature are:

• Tony Lee – Standard-Triumph High Speed Development Engineer
• Ralph Wigginton – Herald Project Engineer (Chassis)
• Norman Rose – Herald Project Engineer (Body) & Spitfire Project Engineer (Body)
• Mike Dale CBE – British Leyland Vice-President of Sales & Marketing
• George Spence – Executive Engineer TR8 UK
• Peter Wilson – TR7 Resident Engineer (Speke, Canley & Solihull)
• John Ashford – Triumph Stylist (styled the MkIV Spitfire and MkIII GT6 with Les Moore)
• Dave Keepax – Triumph Stylist (styled the Toledo and Dolomite range with Giovanni Michelotti)
• R.W. ‘Kas’ Kastner – US Competitions Manager
• Phil Homer – Standard Motor Club Historian
• Chad Brown – Mayflower Club Vice-Chairman & Rally Secretary
• Gordon Birtwistle – Standard-Triumph High Speed Development Engineer & Deputy Competitions Supervisor
• Ray Bates – Standard-Triumph Technical Engineer
• Bruce Jones – Triumph Dolomite Club
• Plus Wayne Scott, the TR Register Editor, who does a fabulous job of interviewing participants in the show ring and narrating the history behind the Standard-Triumph cars and the Standard-Triumph company.
• Graham Robson is the lead presenter in this production (with assistance from John Clancy) and his knowledge of Standard-Triumph is legendary having written so many great books on the marque among the 160+ titles he has penned. Graham was also the Competitions Secretary at Standard-Triumph reporting directly to Director of Engineering, Harry Webster, so it is an honour to have his talents available to help tell this in-depth story on camera.

This is a fantastic movie (show? production?). I learned more about the cars and the history of the cars than I could have imagined. The added benefit of hearing the stories directly from the mouths of the participants instead of recounted through a dry history cannot be overstated.  Anyone interested in Triumphs, or for that matter just the rise and fall of the British automotive industry as a whole, should consider this a must-watch.

Hopefully, you will be able to buy this DVD set soon from The Roadster Factory, but in the meantime, you can order it direct from TriumphDVD in the England.

Michael Carnell

Editor at Just British

Michael Carnell is the editor and founder of the Just British Online Motoring Magazine. As a lifelong British car enthusiast, he has owned or driven British cars of all ages from Austins and MGs to Jaguars and Triumphs. He currently owns a 1966 Vanden Plas Princess 1100 and a 1977 MGB. But there is always room for more - no matter what his wife says.