Robert John "Robin" Herd CBE (23 March 1939 – 4 June 2019[1]) was an English engineer, designer and businessman.[2]
Herd studied at St Peter's College, Oxford, having turned down an offer to play cricket for Worcestershire at the age of 18. He initially entered Oxford with a scholarship to study mathematics, however he switched subjects and graduated with a double firstinphysics and engineering,[3][4] before joining the Royal Aircraft Establishment in 1961 as a design engineer on the Concorde supersonic aircraft project, focussing on computational fluid dynamics.[4] He worked on the Concorde project for four years and was eventually promoted to senior scientific officer at the age of 24.[3]
He was recruited by McLaren in 1965, having been alerted to an engineering vacancy with the constructor by former school friend and racing driver Alan Rees,[4] and worked on cars, such as the Mallite-bodied M2A test car for the Firestone tire company. The M2A subsequently evolved into the Formula One M2B car. Herd stayed with McLaren until 1968 — during which time he designed their M4B, M5A and M7 Formula One cars, as well as the successful M6A Can-Am car[4] — before moving to Cosworth to design a four-wheel drive F1 car. He also carried out work for Frank Williams in late 1969, modifying Williams' Brabham BT26 to take a Ford Cosworth DFV to enter Piers Courage in Formula One.[4] He co-founded March Engineering with Max Mosley, Alan Rees and Graham Coaker in 1969.[5] The team completed 207 Formula One Grand Prix races between 1970 and 1992,[6] winning three with four pole positions. In addition they enjoyed a great deal of success in Formula Two, and in the 1980s they made a successful foray into Indy car racing, with March cars winning the Indianapolis 500 for five successive years from 1983 to 1987.[4]
Herd was appointed a CBE in the 1986 New Year Honours, as managing director of March.[7]