ILKLEY JUBILEE HISTORIC RALLY

Sunday 12th September 1999

Forty five cars assembled at the Ilkley and District Motor Club's headquarters at Pool in Wharfedale on a bright sunny morning for the start of the eighth round of the HRCR Historic Road Rally Championship, the Ilkley Jubilee Historic Rally. The leading three entries, Geoff Twigg/Graham Carter, Peter Horsburgh/Anthony Preston and Dick Appleton with John Thornley beside him, were all in Cooper S Minis. All three were in contention for the overall honours in the championship, and so with scores to be dropped after this round were all looking to strengthen their championship position.

The event started with a brief test around the paper mill, the low sun causing visibility problems as crews finished the test heading due east; Horsburgh/Preston posting a time one second quicker than Twigg/Carter with Appleton/Thornley over ten seconds behind. Crews were then sent on their way by Dean and Lynn Jackson to start the first regularity, which was defined by Grid Squares. The route going via Leathley, Lindley and Norwood through Stainburn Moor forest, to finish at the next test site Scargill reservoir, with this section claiming the first casualty of the event; David Astle and Colin Francis, their Cortina GT suffering from fuel starvation problems, which took most of the morning to rectify and would be next seen arriving at the lunch halt as the leading cars were leaving.

It was another Cortina GT of Pat Johnson/Graham Harper who was quickest at Scargill, which was more a bhp test than moverability, next quickest being the Lotus Elan of championship sponsor David Holroyd of XL Refrigerators, but for this event swapping seats with his usual stage navigator Richard Bruce. Then the first of the Coopers, but not one of the leading trio this time but the novice crew of Stephen Wood/Ian Gibbins.

From Scargill a set of straightforward tulips took crews to Thruscross and up to West End to finish near Pioneer Quarry at Greenhow for tests three and four. Appleton/Thornley recovering some of the time lost on the first test by cleaning both controls. It was the Minis who were quickest at the quarry, on the first run through Twigg/Carter and the second run Horsburgh/Preston only one second off the bogey time. This would be where Twigg/Carter's rally would end though as they were left stranded mid test with no drive.

Spot heights defined the next section of route via the Skyleholme and the hard to spot on the map T-junction, near Appletreewick as maps 98 and 104 join, on to Barden to finish at Eastby. It was at Barden that a road accident that happened before the event arrived, caused a hold up to some crews as the Police stopped the traffic so that the damaged vehicles could be removed.

A small neutral section through Embsay took crews to the start of the next regularity, which ended at the lunch halt at Coniston Hall. This was defined by passing to the left, right or through text on the map and went on the A65 towards Gargrave, then onto the yellows via Ray Bridge, Eshton, Winterburn and Bell Busk to end by Coniston Hall itself.

The usual short test at Coniston, which starts by the lake on the tarmac drive and ends on the gravel track to the restaurant, had been re-laid with more gravel to smooth out the bumps on the track that have seem to get bigger after each year’s event. Horsburgh/Preston were one second ahead of Bruce/Holroyd who were one second up on Appleton/Thornley and Astle/Francis who were rejoining the rally after their early morning running concern.

Times at Coniston showed the two leading Minis over a minute clear of the rest of the field, Appleton/Thornley just two seconds clear of Horsburgh/Preston, with the Nigel Sykes/Nigel Bromley Cooper S having a 19 second advantage in the semi class over Jerry and Claire Hutton’s Triumph TR4, and in the novices the test times of Wood/Gibbins giving them the lead from the 1936 Riley Sports Special of Andrew Davies and Jonathan Davies whose superior regularity times saw them only seven seconds behind Wood/Gibbins.

The afternoon section had promised to be run through the Dales and started of with a herringbone, a short section over Scosthrop Moor taking the crews to Settle for the fuel halt and then onto Langcliffe to start a seventy mile Dales section. Defined by Tulips the route took in the scenic Dales countryside and went up the Nab End hairpins, along Littondale up Wharfedale, through Kettlewell, Startbottom and Buckden and then into Langstothdale where the usual Sunday spectators were parked up enjoying the sunny conditions. Through Oughtershaw and into Sleddale to run along Wensleydale and go by Semer Water before returning to Wharfedale by going down Coverdale and the Park Rash hairpins.

 The location, between junctions, of the eight regularity controls was indicated by the navigation instructions to help crews if they were held up by the Sunday tourist traffic, but with such a small gap between the top two crews any delay at a control could prove decisive. It was to the last control after the second visit to Kettlewell, that Horsburgh/Preston were delayed by traffic and saw the twenty second gap they had put between themselves and Appleton/Thornley turn into a twenty second deficit.

Seconds did not really matter for Terry Schraider and Chas Davies as their Sunbeam Rapier promptly appear to run out of fuel as soon as they left the fuel halt at Settle. They found that their forty year old fuel pump objected to providing fuel to the engine whenever they reached a steep incline. This was resolved by turning the pump into a gravity feed pump on hills by going up them in reverse.

A short break for both cars and crews at Stump Cross Caverns tea room allowed the rally to regroup, with most people either having tales of encountering Sunday traffic or running out of bhp on the long climbs and in the case of Colin Jebson/John Barber 1957 Austin A35 with a 990cc engine both!

Two more runs at the quarry followed Horsburgh/Preston clawing back 4 seconds on the first run and 5 seconds on the second run from Appleton/Thornley. The final regularity was again spot heights but with a direction of approach and departure given at each instruction, it made crews go the long way round Heyshaw Moor triangle with those crews who opted for the shorter route missing the first intermediate control. Appleton/Thornley consolidated their position at the top by dropping three seconds at the three controls to Horsburgh/Preston five seconds.

The event ended with another visit to Scargill for the final test, run in the opposite direction from the morning visit, with both the Coopers of Sykes/Bromley and Horsburgh/Preston airborne over the cautioned brow, Sykes/Bromley beating the bogey by 1 second and Horsburgh/Preston just one second over bogey and 10 seconds clear of Appleton/Thornley.

So to the finish where again the event questionnaire showed crews had thoroughly enjoyed themselves in the Yorkshire Dales and vowed to return again in 2000 to take up the challenge of the Jubilee. The results saw Appleton/Thornley take a 28 second win from Horsburgh/Preston, the Chris Naylor/Nick Pullan Volvo PV 544 taking the Semi award and a excellent result for Wood/Gibbins who finished nearly ten minutes clear of rest of the Novices and brought up the top ten in tenth overall.

TOP 10 RESULTS

1

Dick Appleton

John Thornley

Morris Cooper 'S'

1965

12:58

2

Peter Horsburgh

Anthony Preston

Mini Cooper S

1965

13:30

3

Geoff Awde

Peter Ward

MG A Coupe

1957

14:55

4

Cliff Doe

Paul Doe

Riley 1.5

1962

15:02

5

Ted Manktelow

John Evans

Ford Escort Sport

1974

15:47

6

David Marsden

Mike Garstang

Ford Cortina GT

1965

16:23

7

Chris Naylor

Nick Pullan

Volvo PV 544

1961

16:48

8

Nigel Sykes

Nigel Bromley

Austin Mini

1972

17:13

9

Ian White

Tony Widdowson

Triumph TR4

1963

17:24

10

Stephen Wood

Ian Gibbins

Austin Mini Cooper 'S'

1964

17:48