Arnold Lane sets ftd at Falcon's July Autotest

It was another magnificent day as competitors gathered in the Bray family paddock. Neil was much in evidence, very interested in the new cars making their debut. However, his turquoise Mini stayed silent as Neil himself hadn’t entered, a long standing family arrangement calling him away in the afternoon, leaving Falcon’s to play in his garden! This left Arnold and Andrea Lane upholding Mini honours in class A, against Michael Leete’s Nova and Matt Robson’s Fiesta, shared with Ashley Pilsworth, driving in his first autotest. Class B was the exclusive province of the rear engined brigade. Murray MacDonald was Skoda mounted, driving the blue car that is currently up for sale. He was up against Simon Robson in his familiar white machine and a yellow Beetle. No, it wasn’t Michael Leete. Julian Robinson and Chris Simpson from the Herts VW club shared this 1303.

The amalgamated class C & D was headed by Tom Goggin in his Escort, followed by a varied and extremely interesting selection of cars. Peter Manning wasn’t Midget mounted, bringing along his Clan Crusader, Dave Nash bought Noddy out to play, Jack Williams had his smart Tempest for what may have been it’s autotest debut as Jack was down as a novice. Finally, Peter Trulock, another Herts VW club member, had his very nice Porshe kit car. So, some super new machinery on the scene, which I describe in more detail elsewhere.

Clerk of the Course Alan Davies had devised some interesting new tests for this event, with a couple incorporating a little reversing. The jury is out on this, probably half the entry loved it and half hated it! Simon Robson was fastest on the first test but then Arnold Lane put the bit between his teeth and set a string of rapid times to establish a control on the event he was never to relinquish. Simon continued to go well until test four when he got penalties on both runs, dropping ten seconds on Arnold. Matt Robson started out well, but like Simon had a really bad test, number five in his case, which put him behind Michael Leete in class A by the lunch break. Murray MacDonald was slower than Simon on most of the tests, but didn’t make any mistakes, and his consistent driving put him less than two seconds behind at lunch.

Julian Robinson and Chris Simpson were not short of advice from their fellow Beetle experts; the only problem was it was conflicting. Murray saying it was best to increase front pressures and reduce rear, while Michael advised reducing fronts and increasing rears! Julian and Chris were far too polite to ask why neither expert had bought their Beetles out to play! Peter Manning was throwing his newly re-built Clan around in fine style to head C& D. He was chased by a close battle between Jack Williams and Dave Nash. Dave battling with a huge amount of under-steer and Jack with his very low trials gearing. They swapped times test and test about, ending up with Jack’s nose a mere half second in front at lunch.

Peter Trulock (Porshe Replica)	Julian Robinson (1303)
Simon Robson (Skoda)	Peter Manning (Clan Crusader)

So Arnold Lane led the field into the lunch-break, followed by Michael Leete, Simon Robson and Murray MacDonald. It was pretty warm by now and drivers of the open cars were fighting sunburn as well as the competition! The break gave everyone the opportunity to look at some of the interesting cars taking part and these are described elsewhere. The siesta was most welcome and Alan Davies had the greatest difficulty prising competitors out of the shady corners they had found to do battle in the afternoon! When proceedings resumed Arnold continued his domination and ended the day with a lead of eighteen seconds from Michael Leete, who, with Arnold setting ftd, won class A. Matt Robson set some good times in the afternoon but wasn’t able to make up the time lost in the morning, while Andrea Lane and Ashley Pilsworth both had a couple of very bad tests putting them out of contention.

Simon Robson started to fly in the afternoon, pulling closer to Michael and increasing his lead over Murray and they finished 1^st and 2^nd in class B. Julian Robinson had now started to get to grips with the Beetle, setting some fast times in the afternoon. If he starts the next event at this pace Julian will be in their battling for a class win. Noddy started to play up in the afternoon, but with help from Simon and some bits from the Robson/Bray Skoda collection Dave got him running again to pull in front of Jack and draw so near but yet so far to Peter Manning in C & D. Jack had the consolation of winning the novice award, prompting some wry remarks from Derek Flemming when he presented the awards. Between them Derek and Jack must no more about cars and seen more Motorsport than the rest of us have had hot dinners!

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