Racing driver, stunt driver and all round good bloke Neil Cunningham has passed away aged just 52 years old.
The DSC team received the news of Neil Cunningham’s passing as we neared the Nurburgring for the weekend’s 24 Hour race and there was a difficult moment later in the day when Peter May and the DSC Ed remembered a very happy day here with Neil giving us passenger rides in a roadgoing 1970s BMW CSL ‘Batmobile’ owned by his then team boss Jonathan France.
There are so many happy memories of the seemingly ever smiling Kiwi we’ll be saving some of that for a piece in the coming days.
For now though let’s just briefly reflect on an all too short life well lived with single seater success followed by Championship winning form in the Eurocar series and appearances in the DTM and the ARCA stock car series in the USA too.
GT success came later, with race winning performances in a variety of cars ranging from Vipers, through Corvettes, Morgans and Porsches.
Appearances came at Le Mans too in both the Morgan Aero 8 and the Courage C65 before Neil switched to historic racing, again with much success.
In parallel with that part of his racing career Neil also took on precision driving duties in film and TV with a cv that included Top Gear and James Bond.
Many will know that at the way too young age of 47 Neil was diagnosed with Motor Neurone disease.
He battled it with bravery and huge good humour, including a massive effort to engage with the racing world in launching the Racing4MND Charity to raise funds for research into this awful and debilitating disease.
As with his racing career he batted hard to ensure that it never beat him – his character always shone through despite the challenges.
Our profound condolences to his family, and to his countless friends in the motorsport world. We share your sadness today at the loss of a real friend.
If you didn’t know Neil, please take a moment or two to read this piece from the DSC archive – we think it gives at least a little insight into the way our friend lived his life – to the full – Goodnight mate.
