Frank Costin

A short attention span and a disdain for cars couldn't quell the leftfield output of this genius aerodynamacist

- Richard Heseltine

FRANK COSTIN FAMOUSLY didn't much care for cars. He certainly didn't consider their aesthetics to be of any great importance. It’s perhaps closer to the truth to say he thought looks irrelevant. All that mattered was that they cleaved the air efficiently. Attractive styling was a happy byproduct. Nevertheless, despite his proclaimed indifference to all things automotive, he penned some of the most remarkable vehicles ever to turn a wheel. These spanned everything from single-seaters to microcars, road-going GTs to would-be supercars. None made him rich.

Costin was first and foremost an aerodynamicist. He wasn’t the first to apply a mathematical approach to shaping cars, but he was one of the most unbending in his approach. He was also among the best-known, and with good reason. The irony is that his brother Mike - the ‘Cos’ of ‘Cosworth’ - was a rabid car enthusiast, and it was he who dragged his older sibling into the world of motor racing. Without his prompting, the narrative behind Lotus making the leap from specials-builder to global motorsport colossus would be worded differently, that’s for sure.