The Chariot Makers: The Definitive Text
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Narrated by:
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Steve Matchett
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By:
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Steve Matchett
About this listen
Along with three fellow motor racing enthusiasts, Steve Matchett - Formula 1 world champion mechanic; accomplished television broadcaster; and best-selling author - is trapped overnight in New York: a fogbound JFK airport. With no sign of the weather improving, talk between the stranded passengers inevitably turns to Formula 1. During the course of their cloistered night, with conversation fueled by regular trips to the departure lounge bar, our protagonists draw on Matchett's encyclopedic knowledge of grand prix engineering, his easy familiarity with F1 paddock life, to piece together the perfect dream-team Formula 1 race car. By use of his enviable signature talent, his ability to explain complex issues using straightforward, uncomplicated language, Steve Matchett shows us how the various F1 teams have arrived at their current state-of-the-art designs - lays out exactly how a championship winning grand prix car is assembled.
Originally published by Orion (of London) in 2004, The Chariot Makers is Steve Matchett's third book. Along with Life in the Fast Lane, and The Mechanic's Tale, this compelling, insightful story - its warm text reading as a novel - forms the final installment of the author's entertaining, timeless, and highly acclaimed Formula 1 trilogy.
©2004, 2018 Steve Matchett (P)2018 Steve MatchettListeners also enjoyed...
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‘It didn’t matter that they were now three miles beyond their target site, that communications were dropping out and that they were running low on fuel. All that mattered to Neil as he searched for a safe spot to land was that boulders littered the surface below. “Thirty seconds,” called mission control. In truth, the flight controllers were now no more than spectators, just like everybody else. No more needed to be said. It was down to Armstrong
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Wow.
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By: Dan Parry
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Let’s Ride
- Sonny Barger’s Guide to Motorcycling How to Ride the Right Way - for Life
- By: Sonny Barger, Darwin Holmstrom - contributor
- Narrated by: John McLain
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Hailed as the new essential resource for bikers, Let's Ride is today's most entertaining and authoritative guide to mastering the art of motorcycling. From choosing the right bike and keeping it finely maintained to sharpening riding techniques and achieving top performance, legendary biker icon Sonny Barger mines his lifetime of experience to provide advice, wisdom, wit, and never-before-told stories that will help fellow riders - new and veteran alike - survive the challenges of the road.
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Forrest Gump narrator
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Into the Black
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Using interviews, NASA oral histories, and recently declassified material, Into the Black pieces together the dramatic untold story of the Columbia mission and the brave people who dedicated themselves to help the United States succeed in the age of space exploration. On April 12, 1981, NASA's Space Shuttle Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral. It was the most advanced, state-of-the-art flying machine ever built, challenging the minds and imagination of America's top engineers and pilots.
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Great Story About a Flawed Spacecraft
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Seveneves
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A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.
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Odd narrator choice
- By Josh Mitchell on 05-30-15
By: Neal Stephenson
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Rust
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In Rust journalist Jonathan Waldman travels from Key West, Florida, to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, to meet the colorful and often reclusive people concerned with corrosion. He sneaks into an abandoned steelworks with a brave artist and nearly gets kicked out of Can School. Across the Arctic he follows a massive high-tech robot, hunting for rust in the Alaska pipeline.
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Almost too geeky for geeks
- By Norman B. Bernstein on 03-26-15
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The Limit
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Phil Hill, a lowly California mechanic who, defying all expectations, became the first American to win the Grand Prix championship. In the tradition of Seabiscuit and The Right Stuff, Cannell’s high-octane narrative evokes the lives of the daredevils who tempted fate each Sunday by driving well over 150 mph without benefit of seat belts or roll bars.
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Great Intro to F1 History
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The Department of Mad Scientists
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The first-ever inside look at DARPA - the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency - the maverick and controversial group whose futuristic work has had amazing civilian and military applications, from the Internet to GPS to driverless cars
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meh
- By Patrick on 12-22-09
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Faster
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As Nazi Germany launched its campaign of racial terror and pushed the world toward war, three misfits banded together to challenge Hitler’s dominance at the apex of motorsport: the Grand Prix. Their quest for redemption culminated in a remarkable race that is still talked about in racing circles to this day - but which, soon after it ended, Hitler attempted to completely erase from history.
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Almost perfect, but lousy sound cuts and splicing
- By F. on 06-08-20
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Run!
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In his follow-up to the best-selling Ultra-Marathon Man, world-renowned ultra marathoner Dean Karnazes chronicles his unbelievable exploits and explorations in gripping detail; Karnazes runs for days on end without rest, across some of the most exotic and inhospitable places on earth, including the Australian Outback, Antarctica, and the back alleys of New Jersey.
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Great stories. Horrible narrator.
- By Alberto Medellin on 08-20-15
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Chernobyl 01:23:40
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At 01:23:40 on April 26th 1986, Alexander Akimov pressed the emergency shutdown button at Chernobyl's fourth nuclear reactor. It was an act that forced the permanent evacuation of a city, killed thousands, and crippled the Soviet Union. The event spawned decades of conflicting, exaggerated, and inaccurate stories.
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Lost in his own navel
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What listeners say about The Chariot Makers: The Definitive Text
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Luis F.
- 07-17-21
An engineering master class
Steve Matchett is an amazing story teller. This audio book is a therapy and a master class all together. I am in my mid 40s, so I can remember most of 80s seasons of formula 1 and everything that came after that. I felt like traveling back in time while examining every detailed of the events, people, concepts, jokes and opinions of Mr. Matchett. Good job, mate! :)
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- Jorge
- 12-29-18
Amazing once again!!
Yet another masterful delivery by the great Steve Matchett!! This is a gem for any F1/Motorsport enthusiast who wants to understand how a race car works. The delightful delivery in a Steve’s own
voice brings this book to the next level. It feels like sitting with the chap having coffee and having a gran old time!!
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- Stephanie
- 03-19-19
A little more depth for the F1 fan
Well performed and well written. A story within a story with no shortage of information and substance.
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- Amazon Customer
- 03-07-19
Great Listen!!
Want to know how to build a Formula 1 car, then this is your book.
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- James Spellman
- 01-03-19
A fantastically written book for Formula One tech heads
I’ve always been fascinated about the technical aspects of Formula One and if your like me, then this is the book for you. Every component of the car is explained is wonderful detail with small bits of history thrown in for good measure.
Technical enough to make you feel like your learning something. But not so much that you need a degree to enjoy it.
Excellent Book 🏎🏁
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- Ed
- 04-16-19
just technical enough
Enough detail of the construction and inner workings of an F1 car, as well as the forces acting on it, to keep an engineer happy and interested. Written and spoken in a style that will (I think) appeal to noon-engineers who are curious about F1.
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- JJ Donohue
- 12-27-18
Another Spellbinding F1 Journey!
This is my third Steve Matchett audiobook reading and as was true of the others, I was sorry that we ran out of pages. Having previously read all three and enjoyed them immensely, his voice...and narration make the stories so much more meaningful. Just the right balance between the technical and the back stories and his honest emotional accounts of all that happens in the paddock, pits and wherever “Life in the Fast Lane” has taken the author.
What a literary talent Mr. Matchett is, in my humble opinion. In addition to the importance of what he has to say, his skill as a narrator is superb. I dare say that his delivery is better than any book narrator I have listened to...ever!
I greatly, if not impatiently, look forward to his next audiobook, hopefully “These Desired Things” in the near future. I recommend this book as well as his others to not only F1 enthusiasts, but also to those who appreciate an honest account of life told the way a sensitive scribe records his reality. Thank you, Mr. Matchett!
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- TJ347
- 11-02-21
Boring as all get out
Not at all what I was expecting from Steve... Not recommended to any F1 fans. It was dry, boring,.and just blah, blah, blah. As an F1 fan, this was an unexpected dud from a guy who certainly has many interesting tales he COULD HAVE told.
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- alyoregon
- 09-13-20
Takes more than a third of the book just to start
The author takes literally over tla third of the entire book just to meander around telling you about the frech house he bought, or the job he took, or the flight he had where he met friends and imagined designing the perfect car. As someone who bought the book to actually HEAR about the technical components of F1 design, i found myself shouting at my phone in frustration waiting for the author to get on with it. Eventually, I just kept skipping chapters until I finally heard and actual word about F1.
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1 person found this helpful