Safety Fast! Notes for June 2006

Weather for the Kimber Classic Trial was 'beautiful' according to the report from Andrew Owst - a welcome change from last year when the organisers did well to prevent the event from being a wash-out given the conditions! Apparently it was necessary to cancel the last hill (Lyons Farm) at the last minute due to a change of mind by the new owner, but Alan Grassam managed to persuade one of his neighbours to let us use part of his land and therefore we had an extra section - Malcs Ridge - in the village of Hardington Mandeville. Some hills were cleared by all competitors but Alham Splash and Honeycliffe claimed a few, thus making life a little easier for the results team. Assuming that I have understood the provisional results correctly (!), the winner was Stephen Baldwin in an MGB, followed by Stephen Dear in a Wolseley Hornet (boo, hiss) and George Ward in an MG PA.

The Wessex Sprint was well supported by the MGCC in terms of competitors, marshals and organisers. The circuit uses part of the perimeter roads and main runway of what was once RAF Colerne, and is now Colerne Airfield (the home of The Bristol University Air Squadron). MG entries included an L1, an MGA Coupe, a double-driven ZR and a diesel ZS in addition to the usual clutch of MGBs, MGB GTs and Midgets. The MGs are generally ruled out of silverware at such events by the class structure (the MGB GT V8 of Bruce Morgan, for example, being pitched against outrageously fast Mitsubishi EVOs and the like), but competition is nonetheless fierce. Terry Pigott's Midget won him the Nuffield Trophy for the 'Best MG by Class Index'. My prize for the most unusual MG of the day goes to Alec Sharp for his Lenham Midget, which looks like a lovely little car in the picture (from the camera of John Bird) but even better 'in the flesh'.

The California Cup  Inter-Centre Challenge Match is the club's premier Autotest event, taking place on the Saturday of MGCC Silverstone. I am assured that a fuller feature will appear elsewhere in this issue of Safety Fast!, so look out for that if you want to know more. If you want to enter, pick up a form from the website or complete the relevant section of the Silverstone Supplement. I'm still accepting offers from potential marshals!

The MG Auto and Aero Day takes place at Oaksey (near Malmesbury, in Wiltshire) on Sunday 2nd July. As I said last month, the special visitors this year are the DH Moth Club who will be arriving (weather permitting) with forty assorted Tiger Moths, Hornet Moths and every other sort of Moth as part of their summer tour. There will be a barbecue and a fun gymkhana too - contact Tony Blake on 0117 979 0108 for more details.

Finally for July, the Pucklechurch Gymkhana will take place on Sunday 16th. The event is always well supported, and normally blessed with sunshine. Give Jon Pittard a call on 01275 879632 to find out more.

Neil

neil@port-z.fsnet.co.uk
01275 817915 (before 9pm please)
SW Centre website: www.mg-cars.org.uk/mgccsw