Dallara was there to receive the trophy which was presented to him by Patrick Head – Director of Williams F1 team, in front of the great and the good from the world of motor sport  who were gathered in the Great Room of the Grosvenor House for the annual Autosport gala dinner.  This prestigious award, which is named after John Bolster who was the technical editor of Autosport magazine for many years, is a great honour and has been won in the past by outstanding talents such as Adrian Newey, Ross Brawn and Patrick Head.

Dallara who has been involved at the forefront of racing and automotive design since 1959, started his career working for the esteemed Italian car companies Ferrari, Maserati, Lamborghini (where he was responsible for the Miura and Espada) and finally DeTomaso before founding his own company –Dallara Automobili in 1972. The company, which celebrates its 40th anniversary next year, has gone on to become the leading customer racing car constructor in the world, designing and manufacturing cars exclusively for Indy Car, Indy Lights, GP2, GP3, World Series Renault and dominating world-wide in Formula 3 all this in addition to becoming a world renowned automotive consultant to the leading car manufacturers. Today the company employs over 200 people with ‘state of the art’ facilities in Italy and also now in a brand new facility in Indianapolis USA.

Dallara said of winning the award: “It is such an honour and pleasure to receive this award and I am proud of this recognition of my work and that of my company. On behalf of all at Dallara who work so hard and tirelessly, I would like to thank the motor racing world for recognising the strong desire we all share to live up to our company slogan ‘The Pursuit of Excellence’ and I hope that we will continue for many years to come in providing the safest, fastest racing cars in the world. I would also like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the fact that all of our work is for our customers and that without their continued and often very loyal support none of our achievements would have been possible. So to all of them a very big thank you.”

During his acceptance speech he also paid tribute to Dan Wheldon, whom the new IndyCar chassis is named after. "We had the opportunity to work with Dan in the simulator, the opportunity to know him better - because in the past we were staying outside from the racing track," he explained. "We realised how fantastic a person he was - not only very fast, but a person with a precise understanding of how to develop the car. It was unbelievable how nice staying with him after a day of work was."