David Leslie (racing driver)

David Leslie
David Leslie
	Leslie in 2003
Nationality	British
Born	9 November 1953; Annan, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland
Died	30 March 2008 (aged 54); Farnborough, Orpington, UK
BTCC record
Teams	BMW, Vauxhall,; Mazda, Honda,; Nissan, Proton
Drivers'; championships	0
Wins	9
Podium finishes	35
Poles	16
Fastest laps	17
Debut season	1990
First win	1993
Best championship position	2nd (1999)
Final season (2003) position	11th (28 points)
24 Hours of Le Mans career
Years	1984 – 1991, 1993, 1995
Teams	Ecurie Ecosse, Mazdaspeed, Aston Martin, Silk Cut Jaguar, TWR Jaguar, Team Marcos
Best finish	8th (1987)
Class wins	0

David William Leslie (9 November 1953 – 30 March 2008) was a Scottish racing driver. He was most associated with the British Touring Car Championship, in which he was runner-up in 1999. He was particularly noted for his development skill, helping both Honda and Nissan become BTCC race winners. He was born in Dumfries, Scotland.

Career

Leslie was Scottish karting champion 5 times before switching to cars, winning the Formula Ford title in 1978. He later moved to the British Formula Three Championship from 1981 to 1984, becoming involved with the Ecurie Ecosse team. With Ecosse, he moved to the World Sportscar Championship, driving to multiple C2 class victories and helping the team earn the 1986 championship. Leslie himself would earn second place in the Drivers Championship in 1987 alongside teammate Ray Mallock.^[1] Leslie and the team also finished second in the C2 class and 8th overall in the 1987 24 Hours of Le Mans. Ecosse eventually took over the Aston Martin sports car program before Leslie departed in 1990 to become part of Tom Walkinshaw's Jaguar team. Leslie competed at the 24 Hours of Le Mans a total of 10 times, including driving the works Jaguar XJ220 in 1993 alongside Win Percy and Armin Hahne, only to retire with engine failure while in contention for the lead of the GT class.

Leslie maintained his links with Ecosse when the team moved to the British Touring Car Championship in 1990. He competed on a partial schedule for the first two seasons before becoming a full-time driver for Vauxhall in 1992. He took his first win a year later,^[1] and earned a total of six pole positions over those two years, both of which ended in top 10 championship placements.

1994 was an unsuccessful season in a Mazda, but for 1995 he joined Honda as they entered the series for the first time. The car was late getting onto the track in pre-season, and reliability was initially poor, however he finished 10th overall after a strong end to the season. 1996 started badly with several collisions, but a victory in the British Grand Prix support meeting kick-started a strong second half of the season, allowing him to snatch 4th overall at the final round of the season.

For the BTCC in 1997 James Thompson and Gabriele Tarquini raced the Hondas and Leslie switched to Nissan alongside Anthony Reid. Again the car was initially uncompetitive, and much of the credit for its eventual success is widely attributed to Leslie. In 1998, he achieved two victories and five podiums for Nissan, finishing seventh in the standings. He also did a one-off appearance in the British GT Championship that same year at the British Grand Prix supporting race, finishing third in a Porsche 911 GT1 shared with Matt Neal.^[2] In 1999, he finished a close runner up in the championship standings to teammate Laurent Aïello, with three race wins and 10 podiums.

The company pulled out after that, and Leslie did only occasional races in 2000. Notably for the works Honda team in one round of the 2000 European Super Touring Cup and three rounds of the 2000 British Touring Car Championship – one for the works Honda team and two in the private PRO Motorsport Nissan Primera. He competed at the Spa 24 Hours that same year, sharing a Honda Accord with James Kaye and Mark Lemmer, but retired with engine failure. He also drove for Marcos in the 2000 British GT Championship for a select number of rounds, finishing on the podium at Croft. He contested the Speedvision Challenge in the US during 2001 in addition to another outing in the British GT Championship (Knockhill), once again in a Marcos and finishing on the class podium.^[3]

He joined Proton in the BTCC for the 2002 and 2003 seasons, but the project was not a great success. He did, however, manage to secure two third-place results and was the best-placed Proton in both seasons. Thereafter Leslie provided commentary for Eurosport on the World Touring Car Championship series, although he continued to occasionally participate in the Britcar series.^[1]

For the past three years, he had been lecturing Motorsports Management, part-time at Swansea Metropolitan University.

Allan McNish credited the start he, David Coulthard, and Dario Franchitti were given at the start of their careers as largely to Leslie and his late father David senior.^[4]

Death

Leslie died on 30 March 2008, when the private jet he was travelling in crashed into a housing estate in Farnborough. He was flying with fellow racing driver and team owner Richard Lloyd and data engineer Chris Allarton.^[5] They were travelling to the Nogaro Circuit in France to test for Lloyd's Apex Motorsport in preparation for the FIA GT3 European Championship.^[6]

The investigation into the crash found that a combination of incorrectly identified, non-critical system failures led to the in-flight shut-down of both engines, with the crew unable to restart them in time to avoid the impact.

Racing record

Complete British Formula One Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Entrant	Chassis	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	Pos.	Pts
1979	Graham Eden Racing	Chevron B41	Ford Cosworth DFV 3.0 V8	ZOL	OUL	BRH	MAL	SNE	THR	ZAN	DON 14	OUL 4	NOG	MAL DNS	BRH Ret	THR	SNE	SIL	=17th	3

Complete British Touring Car Championship results

(key) Races in bold indicate pole position (1 point awarded – 1996–2002 all races, 2003 just in first race) Races in italics indicate fastest lap (1 point awarded – 2000–2003 all races) * signifies that driver lead race for at least one lap (1 point awarded – 1998–2002 just for feature race, 2003 all races)

Year	Team	Car	Class	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	24	25	26	Overall Pos	Pts	Class Pos
1987	John Maguire Racing	Rover Vitesse	A	SIL	OUL	THR	THR	SIL	SIL	BRH	SNE	DON	OUL NC‡	DON	SIL															NC	0	NC
1989	Brooklyn Motorsport	Ford Sierra RS500	A	OUL	SIL	THR	DON DNQ‡	THR	SIL	SIL	BRH	SNE	BRH	BIR	DON	SIL														NC	0	NC
1990	Pyramid Motorsport	BMW M3	B	OUL	DON 7‡	THR	SIL	OUL	SIL	BRH 6/NC‡	SNE	BRH	BIR	DON	THR 15	SIL														38th	1	26th
1991	Auto Trader Techspeed Team	BMW M3		SIL	SNE	DON	THR	SIL	BRH	SIL 9	DON 1	DON 2	OUL	BRH 1	BRH 2	DON	THR													16th	12
1991	Pyramid Motorsport	BMW M3																SIL 4												16th	12
1992	Ecurie Ecosse Vauxhall	Vauxhall Cavalier		SIL 7	THR 7	OUL 5	SNE 5	BRH 5	DON 1 6	DON 2 5	SIL 7	KNO 1 Ret	KNO 2 DNS	PEM 7	BRH 1 6	BRH 2 6	DON 10	SIL 3												7th	66
1993	Ecurie Ecosse Vauxhall	Vauxhall Cavalier		SIL Ret	DON Ret	SNE 3	DON 8	OUL Ret	BRH 1 18	BRH 2 6	PEM Ret	SIL 5	KNO 1 9	KNO 2 7	OUL 7	BRH 13	THR 1	DON 1 4	DON 2 8	SIL 4										8th	72
1994	Team Mazda	Mazda Xedos 6		THR 8	BRH 1 8	BRH 2 11	SNE 17	SIL 1 16	SIL 2 11	OUL Ret	DON 1 Ret	DON 2 DNS	BRH 1 Ret	BRH 2 19	SIL 11	KNO 1	KNO 2	OUL	BRH 1	BRH 2	SIL 1	SIL 2	DON 1	DON 2						20th	6
1995	Honda Team MSD	Honda Accord		DON 1 Ret	DON 2 Ret	BRH 1 17	BRH 2 17	THR 1 8	THR 2 12	SIL 1 9	SIL 2 8	OUL 1 DNS	OUL 2 DNS	BRH 1 12	BRH 2 18	DON 1 7	DON 2 9	SIL 12	KNO 1 11	KNO 2 7	BRH 1 17	BRH 2 10	SNE 1 8	SNE 2 8	OUL 1 6	OUL 2 3	SIL 1 5	SIL 2 4		11th	61
1996	Honda Team MSD	Honda Accord		DON 1 Ret	DON 2 Ret	BRH 1 10	BRH 2 Ret	THR 1 8	THR 2 5	SIL 1 3	SIL 2 9	OUL 1 8	OUL 2 7	SNE 1 9	SNE 2 Ret	BRH 1 5	BRH 2 7	SIL 1 4	SIL 2 1	KNO 1 6	KNO 2 7	OUL 1 3	OUL 2 2	THR 1 1	THR 2 8	DON 1 2	DON 2 1	BRH 1 3	BRH 2 5	4th	159
1997	Vodafone Nissan Racing	Nissan Primera GT		DON 1 4	DON 2 11	SIL 1 3	SIL 2 Ret	THR 1 7	THR 2 11	BRH 1 4	BRH 2 3	OUL 1 10	OUL 2 6	DON 1 9	DON 2 Ret	CRO 1 Ret	CRO 2 3	KNO 1 11	KNO 2 Ret	SNE 1 9	SNE 2 6	THR 1 8	THR 2 10	BRH 1 6	BRH 2 8	SIL 1 6	SIL 2 6			8th	87
1998	Vodafone Nissan Racing	Nissan Primera GT		THR 1 7	THR 2 12	SIL 1 1	SIL 2 Ret	DON 1 Ret	DON 2 1*	BRH 1 Ret	BRH 2 6	OUL 1 3	OUL 2 Ret	DON 1 Ret	DON 2 2*	CRO 1 Ret	CRO 2 2*	SNE 1 6	SNE 2 4	THR 1 5	THR 2 2*	KNO 1 5	KNO 2 9	BRH 1 4	BRH 2 Ret	OUL 1 4	OUL 2 Ret	SIL 1 13	SIL 2 2*	6th	148
1999	Vodafone Nissan Racing	Nissan Primera GT		DON 1 4	DON 2 Ret	SIL 1 2	SIL 2 7	THR 1 11	THR 2 Ret	BRH 1 6	BRH 2 2	OUL 1 2	OUL 2 8*	DON 1 2	DON 2 1*	CRO 1 2	CRO 2 4	SNE 1 1	SNE 2 2*	THR 1 4	THR 2 1*	KNO 1 9	KNO 2 3	BRH 1 4	BRH 2 2*	OUL 1 2	OUL 2 4*	SIL 1 11	SIL 2 2*	2nd	228
2000	Redstone Team Honda	Honda Accord	S	BRH 1	BRH 2	DON 1	DON 2	THR 1 6	THR 2 Ret	KNO 1	KNO 2	OUL 1	OUL 2	SIL 1	SIL 2	CRO 1	CRO 2	SNE 1	SNE 2											12th	15
2000	PRO Motorsport	Nissan Primera GT '00	S																	DON 1 7	DON 2 10	BRH 1	BRH 2	OUL 1	OUL 2	SIL 1 6	SIL 2 Ret			12th	15
2002	Petronas Syntium Proton	Proton Impian	T	BRH 1 Ret	BRH 2 Ret	OUL 1 8	OUL 2 3	THR 1 9	THR 2 9	SIL 1 3	SIL 2 9	MON 1 3	MON 2 11	CRO 1 2	CRO 2 7	SNE 1 5	SNE 2 Ret	KNO 1 9	KNO 2 8*	BRH 1 9	BRH 2 Ret	DON 1 6	DON 2 6							7th	79
2003	Petronas Syntium Proton	Proton Impian	T	MON 1 5	MON 2 9	BRH 1 9	BRH 2 6	THR 1 17	THR 2 8	SIL 1 Ret	SIL 2 10	ROC 1 11	ROC 2 Ret	CRO 1 9	CRO 2 19	SNE 1 Ret	SNE 2 9	BRH 1 9	BRH 2 8	DON 1 Ret	DON 2 Ret	OUL 1 Ret	OUL 2 DNS							11th	28

‡ Endurance driver (Ineligible for points in 1990)

Complete Swedish Touring Car Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Team	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	DC	Pts
2000	PRO Motorsport	Nissan Primera GT	KAR 1	KAR 2	KNU 1	KNU 2	MAN 1	MAN 2	FAL 1	FAL 2	AND 1	AND 2	ARC 1	ARC 2	KAR 1	KAR 2	MAN 1 Ret	MAN 2 Ret	NC	0

Complete European Touring Car Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Team	Car	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	DC	Pts
2000	JAS Engineering	Honda Accord	MUG 1	MUG 2	PER 1	PER 2	A1R 1	A1R 2	MNZ 1	MNZ 2	HUN 1	HUN 2	IMO 1	IMO 2	MIS 1	MIS 2	BRN 1	BRN 2	VAL 1	VAL 2	MOB 1 10	MOB 2 5	18th	9

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1984	Ecurie Ecosse	David Duffield Mike Wilds	Ecosse C284-Ford Cosworth	C2	36	DNF	DNF
1985	Ecurie Ecosse	Ray Mallock Mike Wilds	Ecosse C285-Ford Cosworth	C2	45	DNF	DNF
1986	Ecurie Ecosse	Ray Mallock Mike Wilds	Ecosse C286-Austin-Rover	C2	181	DSQ	DSQ
1987	Ecurie Ecosse	Marc Duez Ray Mallock	Ecosse C286-Ford Cosworth	C2	308	8th	2nd
1988	Mazdaspeed Co. Ltd.	Marc Duez Yoshimi Katayama	Mazda 767	GTP	330	17th	2nd
1989	Aston Martin Ecurie Ecosse	Ray Mallock David Sears	Aston Martin AMR1	C1	153	DNF	DNF
1990	Silk Cut Jaguar Tom Walkinshaw Racing	Martin Brundle Alain Ferté	Jaguar XJR-12	C1	220	DNF	DNF
1991	TWR Suntec Jaguar	Jeff Krosnoff Mauro Martini	Jaguar XJR-12	C2	183	DNF	DNF
1993	TWR Jaguar Racing	Armin Hahne Win Percy	Jaguar XJ220	GT	6	DNF	DNF
1995	Team Marcos	Chris Marsh François Migault	Marcos LM600	LMGT2	184	NC	NC

24 Hours of Spa results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
1993	Ecurie Ecosse Vauxhall	Philippe Adams Bernard de Dryver	Vauxhall Cavalier GSi	Pro 2L	101/engine	DNF	DNF
1998	Belgacom Nissan T.U.R.B.O Team	Dirk Schoysman Grégoire de Mévius	Nissan Primera	SP	471	7th	7th
2000	ELR & Barwell Motorsport	James Kaye Mark Lemmer	Honda Accord	SP	?/engine	DNF	DNF

Complete British GT Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Team	Car	Class	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	Pos	Points
2000	NCK Motorsport	Marcos LM600	GT	THR 1	CRO 1 3	OUL 1 2	DON 1 7	SIL 1 Ret	BRH 1 Ret	DON 1 7	CRO 1	SIL 1	SNE 1 8	SPA 1	SIL 1	14th	39

Britcar 24 Hour results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Car No.	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2007	GTS Motorsport	Joe Macari Rob Wilson Stuart Wright	BMW M3 E46 GTR	26	GTC	553	6th	3rd

References

^ ^a ^b ^c "David Leslie, 1953–2008". Autosport. 30 March 2008. Retrieved 1 April 2008.
^ "British GT Silverstone 1998 - Race Results - Racing Sports Cars".
^ "British GT Championship Knockhill 2001 - Race Results - Racing Sports Cars". Retrieved 10 September 2020.
^ "Allan McNish part 2". Archived from the original on 23 March 2010. Retrieved 2011-12-10. Allan McNish interview part 2 on qosfc.com
^ "Two Victims Of Private Jet Crash Named". Sky News. Archived from the original on 16 May 2008. Retrieved 10 September 2020.
^ "David Leslie and Richard Lloyd killed in plane accident". Planetlemans. 30 March 2008. Archived from the original on 1 April 2008. Retrieved 30 March 2008.

External links

BTCC pages profile
David Leslie Online Memorial Archived 24 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine

[Autosport-1] "David Leslie, 1953–2008". Autosport. 30 March 2008. Retrieved 1 April 2008.

[2] "British GT Silverstone 1998 - Race Results - Racing Sports Cars".

[3] "British GT Championship Knockhill 2001 - Race Results - Racing Sports Cars". Retrieved 10 September 2020.

[4] "Allan McNish part 2". Archived from the original on 23 March 2010. Retrieved 2011-12-10. Allan McNish interview part 2 on qosfc.com

[5] "Two Victims Of Private Jet Crash Named". Sky News. Archived from the original on 16 May 2008. Retrieved 10 September 2020.

[6] "David Leslie and Richard Lloyd killed in plane accident". Planetlemans. 30 March 2008. Archived from the original on 1 April 2008. Retrieved 30 March 2008.

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Authority control databases
International	VIAF
National	United States