Gordon Coppuck is a British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 racing car designer who was chief designer for McLaren

McLaren

McLaren Racing Limited, trading as Vodafone McLaren Mercedes, is a British Formula One team based in Woking, Surrey, United Kingdom. McLaren is best known as a Formula One constructor but has also competed and won in the Indianapolis 500 and Canadian-American Challenge Cup...

 and later worked for March

March Engineering

March Engineering was a Formula One constructor and manufacturer of customer racing cars from the United Kingdom. Although only moderately successful in Grand Prix competition, March racing cars enjoyed much better achievement in other categories of competition including Formula Two, Formula Three,...

 and co-founded Spirit.

Born in December 1936, he attended Queen Mary's School for Boys

Queen Mary's School for Boys, Basingstoke

Queen Mary's School for Boys was a maintained grammar school in Basingstoke, Hampshire, England for boys aged 11–18. The school existed between 1556 and 1970 and was latterly funded by the Hampshire County Council Education Authority....

 before becoming an apprentice at the National Gas Turbine Establishment

National Gas Turbine Establishment

The National Gas Turbine Establishment in Fleet, part of the Royal Aircraft Establishment , UK was the prime site in the UK for design and development of gas turbine and jet engines. It was created by merging the design teams of Frank Whittle's Power Jets and the RAE turbine development team run...

 (NGTE). In 1965 he followed his ex NGTE colleague Robin Herd

Robin Herd

Robin Herd is an English engineer, designer and businessman.Herd graduated from St Peter's College, Oxford with a double first in physics and engineering, before joining the Royal Aircraft Establishment in 1961 as a design engineer on the Concorde supersonic aircraft project...

 to McLaren, working as his assistant.
In 1971 he became chief designer at McLaren, responsible for various models including the Indianapolis 500

Indianapolis 500

The Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, also known as the Indianapolis 500, the 500 Miles at Indianapolis, the Indy 500 or The 500, is an American automobile race, held annually, typically on the last weekend in May at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana...

 M16 and world championship winning M23

McLaren M23

The McLaren M23 was a Formula One racing car designed by Gordon Coppuck, with input from John Barnard, and built by the McLaren team. It was a development of the McLaren M16 Indianapolis 500 car. A Ford Cosworth DFV engine was used, which was prepared by specialist tuning company Nicholson Engines...

. When McLaren merged with Ron Dennis

Ron Dennis

Ronald "Ron" Dennis CBE is the executive chairman of McLaren Automotive and McLaren Group, and is also a significant shareholder in both companies...

's Project Four in 1980, Coppuck departed, rejoining Herd at March. The following year he founded Spirit with March's Formula Two

Formula Two

Formula Two, abbreviated to F2, is a type of open wheel formula racing. It was replaced by Formula 3000 in 1985, but the FIA announced in 2008 that Formula Two would return for 2009 in the form of the FIA Formula Two Championship...

 team manager John Wickham. Sprit raced in Formula Two and then Formula One

Formula One

Formula One, also known as Formula 1 or F1 and referred to officially as the FIA Formula One World Championship, is the highest class of single seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile . The "formula" designation in the name refers to a set of rules with which...

 before Coppuck returned to March. Coppuck's son Frank Coppuck

Frank Coppuck

Frank Coppuck is a British engineer and racing car designer, who helped design the Pacific PR01 and PR02 Formula One cars.The son of Formula One engineer Gordon Coppuck, Frank was born before his father began working in motor racing...

is also a racing car designer.