James Hunt - Cheam's most famous son - is the subject of a new biography launched today that delves deeper into his life than ever before.

Tom Rubython's 800-page epic splits the racing driver's life into three parts, his racing - in which he won the Formula One championship and is considered one of the fastest drivers of all time; his love life - marrying twice and sleeping with an estimated 5,000 women; and his finances - going from rags to riches and back to rags again.

Having been born in a small house in Cheam, he spent 20 years growing up in Sutton and then Belmont before going off to make his fortunes on the grand prix circuit and then returning to live in Wimbledon where he died in 1993 at just 45 years of age having proposed to his girlfriend the night before.

"He's a great subject," enthuses Rubython, who will be signing copies of the book in Waterstone's in Kingston and Sutton on Thursday.

"I wrote a book about Ayrton Senna six years ago and that was boring compared to this.

"So much went on in his life, going from rags to riches, the women he had and the world championship he won in between when he was addicted to alcohol.

"It is undoubted that if he had not got up to all these things he would have won three or four world titles.

"He earned millions of pounds and then lost almost everything he had and at one point could not afford to get the MOT done on his car and had to ask an old mechanic friend from his racing days to do it.

"He even got a £5,000 loan from Bernie Ecclestone.

"He generally went from having no money to having loads and then back to none before gradually rebuilding his life.

"He did propose to his last girlfriend on the night before he died.

"I thought that was just folklore but we got it verified."

Amazingly, the book, which is the first to publish a full account of what happened between Hunt, his wife Suzy Miller and the man she left him for, actor Richard Burton, was put together in just six months from the point of starting research.

"We have a team of researches and we started on April 3 and finished three weeks ago so we did it quite quickly," said 55-year-old Rubython.

"I was looking for a book after Senna but had only looked back to the 1980s when somebody suggested Hunt and I thought of course - a lot of people will want to read about him."

Shunt: The Story of James Hunt is published on Sunday and Rubython will be signing copies at Waterstones in Bentalls, Kingston from 11am to 1pm and in Sutton from 2pm to 4pm on October 7.