Opinion: Never meet your heroes? Maybe just choose your moments

Lewis Hamilton sits opposite me in the Wing complex at Silverstone, head down. I think he’s scrolling through Instagram. He nods an appreciative acknowledgement that I’m leaving him to his own devices and not badgering him for a selfie or trying to engage him in vacuous conversation. I feel a moment of guilt that, as a journalist, I should be angling for an exclusive, but that’s probably why I don’t work for a tabloid.

I’m often surprised at just how personable many big names remain. Please excuse the clangy name-drops but Ian Callum chatted about car design for an hour while waiting for a man to mend his washing machine. Sir Stirling Moss drove me up the hill at Goodwood in a Maserati Birdcage back when I was a rookie journalist, then took me for lunch and gave me an invaluable lesson in how to ask a decent interview question. The notoriously volcanic Michele Mouton was charm personified. Harm Lagaay drew me a sketch of a 996 Turbo which I then gifted as a birthday present to a Porsche-owning friend, a moment of generosity I’m now beginning to regret.

Not everyone’s been a ray of light though. I was once summoned for a dressing down at TVR by then-boss Peter Wheeler, who was incensed that I’d contacted owners on a web forum about reliability, a hot-button topic for TVR. With hindsight, some of the comments were pretty ripe.

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“I have amassed 2000 miles on dealer visits alone,” said one. “Thank God for the warranty is all I can say,” claimed another. The most pertinent quote came from one frustrated owner who, when asked what he most wanted in his Cerbera, replied “a spare car in the boot.”

TVR’s flustered PR man phoned me to claim that all of the posts on the web forum, which had over 2000 members, were aliases of one disgruntled and hysterical owner who was given to camping in TVR’s reception and refusing to leave unless his grievances were addressed.

I knew this not to be true. I wasn’t about to trek to Blackpool like a naughty schoolboy to get the hairdryer treatment for reporting genuine issues. When I wouldn’t play ball and take the quotes down, he made vague threats of legal action, which predictably came to nothing.

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Keen to extend my first-hand experience of the brand, I later arranged a drive of one of their later coupes. It suffered an electrical fire on the way to being delivered and I’ve never driven a TVR since. I’m sure the late Mr Wheeler was an engaging character and fiercely loyal to his company, but all we ever shared was some pretty industrial language over the phone. That was disappointing.

Jeremy Clarkson was similarly disappointed when he finally got to interview his childhood idol, test pilot and first man to break the sound barrier, Chuck Yeager. Perhaps Jeremy’s a little less empathetic, but he’s certainly not short of an opinion on being let down by Yeager. “When I finally got around to meeting him, I found he was the biggest wanker,” said Clarkson.

Never meet your heroes? I don’t subscribe to that.

Maybe just choose your moments.