Droop Snoot Group AGM at the Heritage Motor Centre at Gaydon - 19th April
A lovely sunny day, some great Vauxhalls and a fantastic museum with some awesome cars on
display.
There was Colin Chapman's original MkVI Lotus (XML6), chassis 001 of the Metro 6R4s, the prototype
6R4 (A656AJO) and one of the oldest surviving Minis from 1959 (UHR850),
I was also asked to choose/judge
the Bill Blydenstein Trophy (BBB shield) winner and chose a lovely original Droop Snoot owned/driven by Steve Green;
even better that the guys had travelled all the way from just outside Gateshead!!
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| Lovely original Metro 6R4 |
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| Beautiful Aston Martin DB2 |
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| One of the oldest surviving Minis - 1959 |
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| Very early BMW |
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| JCB DieselMax |
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| Droop Snoot - The WBB trophy winner |
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| Lovely Droop Snoot |
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| Lotus 6 to Grand Prix Champions!! |
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| Steve Kirby's Firenza |
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| Very "original" HS2300 Chevette |
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| Chassis 001 - the most important Metro 6R4!! |
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| Mario Lindsay's Firenza |
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| Very rare Opel Evo |
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| Works Minis |
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| Edmund Lindsay's Firenza |
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| Nice Chevette Estate |
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23rd May - The Forenza (Ford Cosworth-powered
Firenza clever huh?!)
What have I done?? Whilst reading through all the Vauxhall
Firenzas on ebay I came across a half race-prepared one but a little different and somewhat in need of some TLC but it sounded
right up my street with cage, race seats, harness, flared arches and a 2.9 V6 24valve Cosworth engine – I had to have
it!! It was up in Telford but it had an MOT (no tax though) and as I had an up-coming wedding to go to
in Nottingham I thought let’s pay it a visit and see what it’s like.
The trip up to Telford was quite exciting
because I really didn’t know what to expect, it sounded like a bargain and with spares too and when I drew into the
industrial units where it was sitting outside I could see I was not going to be disappointed.
It’s a bit rough
round the edges and doesn’t help being white and then having flack from wings and a yellow bonnet but I can see the
potential in it. To get it on the circuit I think will take a full start again job but it’ll do for
some fun on the road and getting me to the Classic shows I’ve got coming up.
I chatted to the two guys (who
were both huge mini fans and had a couple of cracking Mk1s in their unit) selling it and unfortunately they didn’t know
a great deal about it but it went (and it stopped) so for the money I was having it. I paid for it there
and then and said I’d arrange collection of the Forenza during the week and off I pootled to Nottingham, now running
severely late for the wedding but it was definitely worth it.
N.B. had to apologise to Billy Hogan and Leanne Hogan for
being late to the wedding, I ended up going straight to the reception and it was only once I got there I found out the bride
was 45 minutes late and I would have actually made the wedding okay!!
6th June - Potten End Legends Game
I know
it’s not motor-racing related but it’s an annual event and as Dad used to come and watch us play sometimes it
warrants a mention, plus it’s worth it just for the pictures of all the old boys.
We’d been let down at short
notice for a pitch but I managed to find one at Verulamium Park in St.Albans and a plan came together – my friend Vanessa
has just starting running the Blue Anchor in St.Micheals village, so we could all meet there, play football and then go back
there for food and watch the England football match but unfortunately my plan was foiled by the fact A it had been left so
late to organise so the chef didn’t have time to prepare any food for us and B they don’t have any televisions
in the pub!!
Anyway, we all met up there, had a few drinks before the game, went off, ran round for a bit, fell over a
few times, laughed, watched Macca wave a football into the net and then back to the Blue Anchor for a few more drinks and
then a wander into St.Albans for more drinks, watch the England game and then a curry – other than no motor racing I’d
say that was a pretty good Saturday!!
Hope you enjoy the pictures below.
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| The "Legends" |
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| OUGH, have it!! |
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| Not sure what I'm doing; think I just needed a lie-down!! |
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| Mr Kindness showing composure on the ball |
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| Mac showing his goal-keeping skills |
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| The goal-posts weren't full-size, Chris just made them look it!! |
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14th June - Luton Festival of Transport
A good
event as ever, well organised, well supported and loads of people and good weather!!
I’d been round to Mike Davies’
the day before to talk cars, meet Spot and also Mike very kindly gave me a spare ticket for the Sunday so we arranged to meet
up in the laybay at the end of my road (nothing dodgy you know!!).
Just after 9:30am I met up with Mike (Vauxhall Viva GT) Spot
(Vauxhall Viva GT Convertible – one of only two made by Crayford I believe) and Stuart (Lotus Elise) and we went in
convoy, I won’t write it all but he is an excerpt from Mike’s excellent www.vivaheaven.co.uk website:-
“Sunday morning and Stuart arrived on time in his Lotus at half nine. Stuart has never been
to a show before so I said this would be a good one to start with because of the variety he can see. Impressed at seeing Spot
and I in our shorts he changed into his before we left. I’d left DHR outside last night and given the garage to Spot’s
convertible GT. Just my luck, it rained! After soaking some rainwater from the boot we set off in glorious sunshine to meet
Gregor in his new 2.9 Cosworth powered Firenza, in a lay-by on the outskirts of Hemel. He was there waiting for us and we
all got out and had a look before setting off for the show. Going under the tunnel of the M1, as all small boys do, we dropped
down a gear, with the windows down and revved the nuts off the cars to hear the sound. School boyish, but it has to be done.
I was leading the way with Gregor behind me, as I came off the M1 on to a small bit of duel-carriageway I put my foot down
in DHR. Gregor went passed me as if I was standing still. That's some engine!”
In my defence, I’d
just like to say that no speed limits were broken!!
Anyway, once at the show I set up with the Vauxhall Viva Drivers
Club and had a wander round the Auto-jumble with my friend Richard, who was there with his parents and their Chevrolet Camaro
(Richard had left his Ford Torino and his Dad had left his Plymouth Roadrunner at home) and met up with my old friend Robzilla
and his lovely family.
It was great to catch up with Rob and wander round the show with his family and talk cars; I’d
brought along some old Gerry Marshall racing stickers for his son these were well received – always good to keep the
young fans interested, children are the future!!
I didn’t take as many pictures as usual as I was busy reminiscing
but please see below for a few.
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| Lovely Frogeye Sprite |
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| Lovley Mini Clubman |
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| Mike & Spot - courtesy of Mike |
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| My Firenza - courtesy of Mike |
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| Jensen Interceptor |
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| Mike's lovely Viva GT |
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| Engine bay |
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| Nice 3.0S Capri |
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| A mellow Mustang |
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| Robzilla and I |
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| The Camaro |
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| A pair of SD1s |
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| A regular visitor to my pages |
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| The Viva Drivers Club stand |
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| The Viva Drivers Club stand |
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| The Viva Drivers Club stand |
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| The Viva Drivers Club stand |
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1st July - Classics in the Walled Garden
What
a scorcher!! This was a new event to the Classics calendar and was organised by Peter Madden, erstwhile
ITV-star and ex-Harpenden Classics on the Common organiser. With the co-operation of the current owners
of Luton Hoo Peter had arranged for them to open up their “Walled Garden” for 350 cars and then another 150ish
in a small paddock nearby.
The setting was fantastic, with a superb drive up to the house (I behaved and stuck to the speed limit
but they did used to have hillclimbs here and would be good to have them again) and the walled garden was a lovely setting,
with a fantastic bar selling organic ciders and beers and a superb brass band playing music.
Unfortunately, as I’d
got the new car a bit late, my entry was late so I wasn’t one of the chosen 350 but I got a good spot in the paddock
and had a wander round and introduced myself to Peter.
There were some lovely cars there (including a few familiar ones!!)
and it really was a fantastic event, helped by the weather – it may have been an evening event but I still got sunburnt!!
I
can’t wait for next years event now and I’ll make sure I get a spot in the garden!!
3rd July - Goodwood Festival of Speed
Is
Bognor Regis really so regal??
The trip to Goodwood was a bit of a last minute deal really, I had said to Stef last year when we
went that we should do it again in 2009 and then forgot about it until a week before and Stef rang and asked what time we
should leave on the Friday morning – Oh, thought I?!
With a bit of ringing around I managed to sort out two free
tickets for the Friday (the day we wanted) and I said to Stef if I could got a hotel close by and relatively cheap, then lets
go down on the Thursday afternoon and miss all the traffic – good idea but then I had to find a hotel!!
Job accomplished, less than 10 miles from Goodwood and only £70 including breakfast for a twin – this meant
we could have a night out in Bognor the night before too!!
I arranged to have Thursday afternoon and Stef’s sister
kindly invited her round to hers for lunch and to meet her new daughter and as she lived on the way to the M25 (not a slip
road!!) it all fll into plan nicely.
Come the 2nd of July I was all excited, as was Stef, even though he
had promised to drive as he has a diesel BMW which got run over the day before (yes, run over!! Some drunk
running down the street decided to run over his bonnet and roof and dented it all) he had a MINI Cooper S Clubman Diesel which
actually was a good weapon of choice for the journey, nice and frugal.
Lunch and baby-meeting was great (thanks Helga!!) and the
drive down to Bognor passed peacefully. We found the hotel, right on the sea-front and a lovely old Victorian
building, checked-in, un-packed and hit the beech for a walk and then grab a beer. Now, I don’t think
I’ve been to Bognor before and I must say the sea-front was lovely, the beech and promenade very clean and tidy but
the bars/pubs, well, they weren’t mine (or Stef’s) cup of tea and out of the ten in our local vicinity I’d
be surprised if we say more than six people – total!!
We managed to find a lovely pub a bit in-land for some dinner
but we ended up going to Chichester for a few drinks in the evening, nothing over the top though as we need to be alive for
the following day and Stef wasn’t feeling great, well, that was his excuse for driving!!
We slept well, breakfast
was good and I’d recommend the hotel and we set off to Goodwood, no traffic until about two miles away and it was solid,
but it didn’t take too long and it was definitely better coming form the South rather than from the North and plus no
M25 battle!!
As ever it was packed at Goodwood but the cars and noise were great, if a little bit too packed (did I say
that twice – you get the picture!!).
I met up with the TNF crowd, had a long chart with Mick Hill and his lovely wife
Leo and introduced myself to the esteemed DCN (Doug Nye). Doug very kindly chatted to me and after several
minutes chat took me to see Jim Clarks’ Indy 500 winning Lotus 38 that the Henry Ford Collection had brought over and
after that amazing experience he took me to see the Vanwall he was driving – stunning car.
What
happened next was a bit surreal, as Doug asked me to get in the Vanwall (a VW5/VW11), well, there was a look of horror on
my face and a feeling of dread as the last Formula One (or any other single-seater) Car I got in was a Jordan 191 at the British
Grand Prix in 1991 – when I was 13 – and it was quite possibly the most uncomfortable experience of my life (then
– read the Gliding story below for my newest one!!) and even though a modern F1 car is smaller than a ‘50s car
I’m also twice the size now!!
Well, Doug insisted I get in, so I let him talk me through how to get in as it’s
too high to step into and you can’t touch the sides or the front at the glass cockpit shield will break so you have
to stand on the rear wheel and then step onto the seat with one leg, followed by the other, minding not to catch the glass
with your foot and then once both fit in, place them either side of the steering wheel, with your arms on the petrol tank
behind you and lower yourself in – easy huh? Err, no, not at all when you’re 6 foot 4, sixteen
stone and a bit large around the legs (years of football, cycling and un-servo’d race cars I tell you!!), I managed
to lower myself in about fifty percent of the way and my bottom getting in the way is not an uncommon occurance in getting
into a car so I normally sit sideways and depress the accelerator (or clutch) but that only got me another five percent so
I had the bright idea of depressing both pedals – BAD mistake!!
I squeezed in as much as I could, depressed the clutch and
depressed the accelerator – mistake number one – the only thing stopping the car rolling down the hill was the
fact it was in gear so now we’re moving and I’m aimed at a crowd of around 30 people, all of who are watching
some oaf get into a priceless car and mistake number two – pressing the accelerator too, if I got up speed whilst rolling
in theory the car could be bump-started!!
Anyway, I managed to avoid running people over and destroying a priceless car
and had not got in about 85% of the way but I was pretty flustered by now and it was a shame I couldn’t quite squeeze
in as I think Mr Nye might have looked at it favourably!!
Luckily the rest of the day went without incident and we
decided to leave around 3pm to miss the traffic and the hordes but unfortunately it took as a good thirty minutes to find
that darned MINI and by now Stef’s enthusiasm level had dropped so I drove but it took us three hours to get up the
A3 (a lorry turned over at the Wooden Bridge in Guildford) and then another three hours on the M25, so we made it back in
time for a pint in the pub and then home!!
29th July - Classics on the Common
This
was the 16th running of the Classics on the Common event, a now traditional Classic car and Harpenden event.
It attracted around 1,200 vehicles and crowds of enthusiasts from gate opening time at 4pm until it got dark and all
this was despite the steady rain.
I
left around 9:30pm as I was too busy gassing as usual and it had poured it down at various stages but getting there was easy
- for once!!
Luckily, the Vauxhall contact I had met
at Classics in the Walled Garden asked me to meet him and few others at the Heritage Centre (Vauxhall's museum) in Luton
for 3pm and then we left as a convoy, about 30 cars, and went down the Lower Luton Road to Harpenden and we were all parked
together which is normally a big no no at Harpenden, plus it meant little queuing.
It was a great night, even my
Mum came along (the infamous super-charged Ford Anglia racer), my mate Simon (with his Renault GTA that he sprints), Denis
Bissell (ex-BTCC Magnum racer - just his Volvo S80 - we're still working on Rivers Fletcher's Buckler!!), David Northey
(W.O.'s Grandson) in his 1923 Rolls Royce 20, Peter Deverell in his TR6 (one of the founding member of SODS), John Hazard
in his recently finished Aston Martin DB4 GT Zagato (probably the most beautiful car there and for sale!!), Trevor and Graham
(Skid) Scarborough in a convertible MGB and an MG Midget Sprint car, my best mate Simon (PC Pratt of the Met) in his SD1 Rover
and that's before I talk about any of the other cars!!
Unfortunately I did
get very bogged down talking to people and what with the rain I have to apologise for not taking any pictures but my fellow TNFer Richard
Hinton has very kindly allowed me to use the below pictures taken by him and his lovely wife – enjoy!!
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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| Courtesy Richard Hinton |
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7th August – Gliding
What
a great experience, wow!! Some of you might now I am a “sleeping” club member of the Herts
County Auto and Aero club and they had arranged to have an evenings gliding at the London Gliding Club in Dunstable.
Now
I’ve never really had any great inkling to go in a Glider but when I saw this in the newsletter it reminded me that
one of Dad’s ambitions before he passed away was to go up in a Glider but he never did, so I thought about it and ten
thought about where it would be flying over and it all seem a bit like destiny as it was all over where Dad lived and where
he would have gone up, so I thought why not?!
After reading the finer details like when and how much I then checked the height
and weight limit, maximum height was 6”4 (phew, just) and maximum weight was 16 stone, now, I hadn’t weighed myself
for some time but the last time I had was when I’d just finished building the racing car and I was 16 and a half stone
so I thought, well, I’m not doing as much heavy lifting etc so I’ll watch what I eat for a fortnight and should
be fine – I weighed myself on the day and I was 15 stone, so no problem.
The location of the London Gliding Club is
beautiful and all the buildings have a very aerodrome (funny that!!) and avant garde feel to them. It was
a beautiful evening but not much wind but still, it should be fun and the views would be great.
We were being propelled
into the air by guide ropes, about three quarters of a mile away sat an engine and when started it winched in the rope attached
to the nose of the Gliders, 0-60mph in 2.5 seconds for about 100 metres on the ground and then it looked and felt like an
almost vertical lift off to about 800 metres when the rope was released, wow, what an andrenalin rush!!
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| Waiting for take-off |
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| Once up in the air |
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| Aim AT the ground to land |
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| A glider in the distance |
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| Graham "Skid" Scarborough |
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| Edlesborough, Tring & Pitstone |
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| The London Gliding Club |
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| Edlesborough church in the distance |
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| In the cockpit ready for take off |
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| Whipsnade Zoo chalk lion |
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| A view from above |
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| The £100,000 Glider |
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| Waiting for take-off |
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| The town of Luton in the distance |
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| The London Gliding Club |
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| The Club Bar |
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Bentley Driver's Club 60th Anniversary Meeting
Silverstone - 9th August 2009
BTCC Rockingham - 20th September
Spa 6 Hour Classic - 25th to 27th September
BTCC Brands Hatch - 4th October
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