Peter Agg 1929-2012

Vodafone McLaren Mercedes is sorry to note the passing of Peter Agg, whose energy and drive played an instrumental role in the McLaren marque’s early successes on the international racing stage.

Peter, who has died aged 82, bought and revitalised the moribund pre-war Trojan automotive brand in the early 1960s, along with the sports car manufacturer Elva Cars. In November 1964 he signed an agreement with Bruce McLaren to manufacture the McLaren M1 sports racing car under licence at the Elva works in Rye.

Outsourcing production enabled our young team to focus on refining and developing our designs, and on racing and winning. As owners of the Elva-built McLarens also achieved success, the quality and competitiveness of the cars led to increased demand: production ultimately relocated to Trojan’s larger premises in Croydon, servicing customers in Can-Am, Formula 5000 and Formula B.

As we began to shift focus exclusively to Formula 1 during the 1970s, using our own production capacity, the partnership naturally ended, but Trojan briefly became a constructor in its own right, entering eight grands prix in 1974.