A couple of weeks ago I popped along to help out the Bristol Motor Club marshall there annual freeze fest better known as The Great Western Sprint at Castle Combe, mercifully it was a dry sunny day but as ever the persistent freezing wind out at Bobbies where I was stationed meant that humour had a very tough fight on it’s hands.
My responsibilities precluded taking any photo’s of the action so here are a selection of arbitrary shots taken in the paddock shown in running order, first up from Abergavenny Martyn Davies’s Ford Fiesta with which he won the A1 Roadgoing class for cars with motors up to 1400 cc / 85.4 cui.
Phil Tuckers 1989 Suzuki Swift, which finished second in class behind Martyn, caught my attention because the model was also sold as a Subaru Justy like the one Robert Solarski drove on the recent Tavern Motor Club Washingpool Farm Targa Rally.
On my way over to Castle Combe I observed Rowland Turner was wearing ear protectors at the wheel of his 1975 Mk 1 Ford Escort as he made steady progress on the motorway, Rowland finished 8th in the up to 1800 cc / 109.8 cui class.
One of the more powerful cars in the paddock was Roger Banks’s Audi S4 powered by a twin turbo 4.2 litre / 256 cui 40 valve V8 said to produce over 700 hp. Roger recorded fastest time in his all wheel drive beast with a NASCAR sized rear spoiler in the C3 modified class on the practice run but broke down on his first timed run, leaving Keith Murray in his old school Audi 80 to take class spoils as he had done on this event in 2013.
6th in the up to Racing Cars up to 1100cc / 67 cui E1 category was Nick Mizen in his Irish built Leastone F5 fitted with a 900cc / 54.9 cui Suzuki Motorcycle engine.
Martin Pickles qualified for the top 12 run offs and finished with 7th best time of the day with his 1 litre / 61 cui Jedi Mk1.
The larger engined Reynard DB Mk 1 shared by Mark Smith and Craig Sampson recorded first and second fastest times of the day respectively.
Thanks for joining me on this “The Great Western Sprint” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at a 1931 Chrysler. Don’t forget to come back now !
