Gordon Murray was born in 1946 in Durban, South Africa, to Scottish immigrant parents, and studied mechanical engineering at Natal Technical College. He built and raced his own IGM Ford in 1967 and 1968. He moved to England in 1969 hoping to work for Lotus, but met Ron Tauranac and was offered a job at Brabham, becoming chief designer under Bernie Ecclestone. His Brabhams scored 22 Grand Prix wins between 1973 and 1985, including the BT46B “fan car”, and gave Nelson Piquet the 1981 and 1983 titles.
In 1987 he joined McLaren as technical director; the MP4/4 of 1988 won 15 of 16 races. From 1991 to 2004 he led McLaren Cars, and designed the McLaren F1 of 1992, whose Le Mans-winning LM version in 1995 was the last road-legal sports car to win the race outright.
He set up Gordon Murray Design in 2007 with the T.25 city car, and in 2017 Gordon Murray Automotive, which announced the T.50 (Cosworth V12, production from 2022) and the T.33. Earlier, in 1981, he helped improve Midas Cars, and he designed the Rocket roadster, built by Chris Craft at the Light Car Company.
