Wipac’s headquarters in Buckingham were used for signing-on, scrutineering and the first test. A rather tight time schedule confronted those competitors who elected for scrutiny on Sunday morning as the first car started at 8:30am and the test venue doubled as the route in and out of scrutineering. One suspects that there were one or two crews wondering whether they would manage to complete all necessary formalities, calibrate trip meters and present themselves at the test start at the correct time! None however will have been as rushed as Graham Carter whose road car had seized on the way to the start. He abandoned his car on the motorway hard shoulder and had to run several miles across country to hire a car and left a note on the windscreen to the police explaining that he’d be back to pick the stricken vehicle up as soon as he could. He omitted to mention that he had a 150 mile return trip to the start of a 145 mile Historic Road Rally to complete first!
Test 1 was quite tight and Dick Appleton/Anthony Preston’s Cooper S was 2 seconds quicker than the similar mounts of Wiseberg/Blackett and Twigg/Carter with Dave Hughes’ Volvo a further 2 seconds back. As the regularity sections were all timed to the minute crews expected the tests to have a major bearing on the results and the drivers were all trying hard. Test 2 was next door to 1 in Tesco’s car park and Wiseberg was quickest by 1 second from Twigg with Appleton another second behind. Tying with him in 3rd on this test were Simon Rossiter, Nick Akers and Peter Noad.
Regularity 1 followed immediately from test 2 and although 6 crews were clean at all the intermediates, several expected front runners had penalties with last years’ winners Ibbot/Cunnington and Gill and Richard Dix dropping a minute at the first ITC. Worse was to follow for Twigg/Carter who were probably still settling down from Graham’s early morning antics and dropped 2 minutes at ITC4 plus 15 minutes for a missed code board immediately afterwards dropping them well out of contention. The competitors now had two opportunities to tackle a really excellent 1 mile test with two straw bale chicanes and two stop astrides. Unfortunately, 9 crews were able to clean the first attempt and 15 second time through so it had no real bearing on the results.
The leaderboard after card 1 had Appleton and Wiseberg tied on 319 with Peter Noad’s Class C Audi 5 seconds behind in third and Peter Stonor/Paul Doe’s Porsche 911 a further 2 seconds behind. Skinner/Pettie A35 had dropped 3 minutes but were leading Class A and in 10th place overall just ahead of Burrage/Mead's similar car.
The next regularity had four ITC’s and 4 PC’s and caused some more upsets amongst the leaders. Stonor/Doe dropped minutes at 3 controls and fell to 6th whilst the Dix’s dropped 4 minutes and were back in 8th. Skinner/Pettie and Calvert/Smith dropped 18 and 20 minutes respectively at ITC 9 leaving Laurence Burrage/Brian Mead comfortably in charge of Class A. Meanwhile confusion reigned at the front of the field where the Anglia of Griggs/Williams miscalculated and came into ITC10 a minute early. They overtook Appleton/Preston as they entered the control just before the clock ‘clicked’ onto the next minute. Although Anthony Preston ‘discussed’ the time with the marshal for over a minute he was unable to persuade the official to concede that the Mini had come in at the same time as the Anglia and they were credited with the following minute thus losing their clean sheet. Following them in around 10 seconds later (despite having run out of petrol about 3 miles before the control) Wiseberg/Blackett were now the only car which was clean on the road and led by 50 seconds from Appleton followed by Ibott, Noad, Griggs and Stonor at the mid-morning fuel halt.
Regularity 3 took the cars to Gaydon for two tests followed by lunch. This section didn’t appear to cause any particular problems amongst the leaders and 1 cars were clean throughout. Noad/Cox were a casualty here missing a code board and dropping down the order as a result. A downpour started as the leaders drove through the gates of Gaydon where the Minis were again fastest in almost flood conditions with Twigg 1 second faster than Appleton over the 2 tests whilst Wiseberg dropped 7 seconds when he stopped astride the wrong line at the finish at test 4 and had to hurriedly reposition the car! Worthy of note here were Clive and Leana Berry who were only 3 seconds slower than Twigg and Dave Hughes who dragged the Amazon round a further 1 second adrift. At lunch the order was Wiseberg by 53 seconds from Appleton. 56 seconds behind was Ibbott then 2 minutes 10 seconds to Griggs. Peter Stonor was hard on his heels 14 seconds further back with Gill Dix 59 seconds behind him. As the regularity was all to the minute most of these places could change simply by one crew or other getting their calculations wrong by a couple of seconds and coming in on the wrong ‘side’ of the minute.
Lunch gave crews a chance to look round the impressive exhibits although some found the lure of watching the opening laps of the French Grand Prix too strong as a helpful guide set-up and plugged-in a large TV. The Gaydon tests were now run again and the Minis again dominated. Appleton took a further 3 seconds back from Wiseberg whilst Twigg’s time was equalled by Clive Berry. Regularity 4 caused further problems with Ibbott dropping another minute together with Griggs, Stonor and Dix. The Minis of Wiseberg and Appleton togther with Burrage’s A35 were the only cars to clean this regularity and returned to Gaydon for the final 2 tests where Appleton took a further 2 seonds from Wiseberg to reduce the deficit at the head of the field ot 48 seconds. Peter Stonor took a massive 16 seconds from David Griggs over these four tests to move 2 seconds in front of the Anglia. Ohter leading positions were unchanged but a stray minute lost by anyone could siginificantly alter positions.
On to the final regularity with only 2 controls (of which 1 was subsequently scrubbed) but what a sting in the tail! Both leading Mini crews got to within 2 miles of the intermediate control before misinterpreting a route instruction. Being wary of choosing a route which would again take them through a junction which had been previously used (albeit from a different direction) they plotted a route which took them several miles from the correct one. Anthony Preston realised his mistake a little before Peter Blackett and both crews raced back to visit the final control with as little damage done to their time cards as possible. Alas, Dick Appleton dropped 15 and Adam Wiseberg 17 minutes and thus, having been leading the rest of the pack by almost 4 minutes dropped to 6th and 8th overall respectively. As their incorrect route had taken them further along the organisers intended route some of the front runners on the road had cause to check their route instructions very carefully indeed when not one but both of the leading cars passed them travelling in the opposite direction at high speed. One navigator claimed to have had to resort to threats of violence after his driver refused, point blank, to continue, believing that they must be on the wrong route!
Final results took some time in arriving but confirmed that last years winners, Ibbott and Cunnington in the TR4 had done it again by 1m45s from Peter Stonor and Paul Doe who were just 2 seconds clear of the Griggs/Williams Anglia followed by Gill and Richard Dix. Laurence Burrage/ Brian Mead were a fine 5th in their A35 winning Class A ahead of the Minis of Appleton and Wiseberg which had appeared unbeatable (almost) all day. The Minis sandwiched the P6 Rover of David Roxburgh/David Galbraith which had a good steady run.
The organisers certainly managed to produce a few surprises for several competitors who expected to drop no penalties on regularity run to the minute although most navigators felt that the navigation had been rather too taxing to be considered enjoyable. The route made a pleasant change for most drivers as single track roads were rarely utilised and as a consequence there was no baulking caused by errant tractors or Sunday afternoon motorists.
AHW
Top 10 Results
| 1 | Tim Ibbot | Adrian Cunnington | Triumph TR4 | 13:01 |
| 2 | Peter Stonor | Paul Doe | Porsche 911 | 14:46 |
| 3 | David Griggs | John Williams | Ford Anglia | 14:48 |
| 4 | Gill Dix | Richard Dix | MGB | 16:16 |
| 5 | Laurence Burrage | Brian Mead | Austin A35 | 23:49 |
| 6 | Dick Appleton | Anthony Preston | Mini Cooper S | 24:12 |
| 7 | David Roxburgh | David Galbraith | Triumph TR4 | 24:34 |
| 8 | Adam Wiseberg | Peter Blackett | Mini Cooper S | 26:24 |
| 9 | Richard Fisher | Neil Lewis | Lancia Fulvia | 30:08 |
| 10 | Peter Noad | Peter Cox | Audi 80GT | 30:34 |