He received his formal education at Eton College and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, before joining his father's firm and pursuing a successful career as the managing director of a number of companies in the trade, the personal financial resources from which he used to fund a passion for large capacity motor high speed racing.

In 1928 he privately purchased a 10.5-litre Delage which was imported to England from the factory in Paris, which he raced at Brooklands from 1929 to 1933, breaking the flying start outer lap Record three times in these years, and being clocked at a top speed of 138.88 miles per hour on 2 July 1932.

In the 1934 RAC Tourist Trophy race on the Ards Circuit near Belfast the Lagondas of Cobb and the Hon Brian Lewis competed in the class for larger sports cars against Eddie Hall in a Bentley.

[3] Driving the piston-engined, wheel-driven Railton Special, he broke the World Land Speed Record at Bonneville salt flats on 15 September 1938 by achieving 350 miles per hour.

Cobb's body, which had been thrown 50 yards (46 m) beyond the wreckage, was recovered from the loch, and subsequently conveyed back to his home county of Surrey, where it was buried in the graveyard of Christ Church, Esher.

In 2002 the remains of the jet engine speedboat Crusader were located on the bed of Loch Ness at a depth of 200 metres (656 ft) and the site was designated as a scheduled monument in 2005.

[13][14] In 2017 a Blue plaque was unveiled by Richard Noble to Cobb's memory at the newly re-built Cranmere Primary School which partially occupies the site of the former Grove House estate.