Words and Photos: Paul Lawrence
A double Road Sports victory for John Davison’s Lotus Elan was among the highlights as the Historic Sports Car Club delivered some fine race action at the Croft Nostalgia Festival (Saturday/Sunday 5/6 August).
With a full timetable for the weekend, the Historic and 70s Road Sports categories shared a grid and a mammoth 40-car field provided battles all the way down the order in a pair of races. However, it was Davison who scored a double victory for the Historic pack as Peter Shaw gave stern chase in his similar Elan. Third overall and best of the 70s pack in both races was Charles Barter in his Datsun 240Z but Will Leverett (Lotus Europa) pressed Barter hard in both races.
Another double winner was Mark Charteris (Mallock Mk21) in the HSCC’s Classic Clubmans Championship, as John Harrison and Alan Cook shared the podium in their Mallocks, while Andrew Park continued his dominance in the HSCC Historic Formula Ford 2000 Championship with a brace of wins. Drew Cameron was the best of the runners in the concurrent URS Classic Formula Ford 2000 Series.
The huge Historic Formula Ford pack again ran over four races and the championship races were won by Richard Tarling and Michael O’Brien after some typically exciting racing. Unfortunately it was a troubled weekend for championship leader Callum Grant and a moment with a backmarker left him as a non-finisher in the second race. Benn Tilley and Sam Mitchell also claimed podium visits, while the qualification race wins went to Max Bartell and Rob Smith.
The Formula 2 Tecno of Julian Stokes was twice on top of the grid for the Historic Formula 3 Championship and the Classic Racing Cars series. The March 712s of Nick Pancisi and Lorraine Gathercole each took a second place with Gathercole starring with a fighting recovery drive after a slow start. In Historic Formula 3, Jon Milicevic (Brabham BT21B) was unstoppable. Meanwhile, having chased Milicevic in Historic F3, Jonathan Hughes switched to his Formula Junior Brabham BT6 to head Benn Tilley (Lotus 22) in both races for the HSCC/FJHRA Historic Formula Junior Championship
Charles Allison fended of Philip Nelson to win Saturday afternoon’s Guards Trophy for sports-racing and GT cars. After 40 minutes of flat-out racing a pit-stop, Allison was less than five seconds ahead as the Elva Mk7S of Max Bartell/Ben Mitchell completed the overall podium. Fourth overall was a fine result for the leading GT car, the charging TVR Griffith of Mike Gardiner/Dan Cox.
Former BTCC racer Richard Belcher took a first win in the Historic Touring Car Championship when he headed the field home in his Lotus Cortina. However, power told in the second race as Jack Drury went ahead in his Fold Falcon.
Finally, the Lackford Engineering-supported Sprite and Midget Challenge was a very welcome guest race and it was Steve Collier who took a brace of wins in his very rapid MG Midget.
For more details about the HSCC, please visit www.hscc.org.uk
