Aston Martin stalwart Andy Stevenson started his career in a Silverstone shed fending off Eddie Jordan’s barbs

Whatever happens at the Las Vegas Grand Prix this weekend, Aston Martin will be celebrating a remarkable achievement. It’s viva Las Vegas for Andy Stevenson, Aston’s sporting director who will mark his 600th grand prix here, a feat of longevity made all the more striking in that he has competed in every one of them at the same team he joined as a callow youth in 1987.

Such was his childhood ambition to work in F1 that he committed to it in writing. “My mother recently found the paperwork from my first visit to the careers office which said I wanted to work with fast cars and travel the world,” he says with a smile.