Round seven
Jeremy Easson and Den Golding emerged victorious on round seven of the Armajaro MSA British Historic Rally Championship when they won the Tour of Flanders in Belgium over the weekend (17/18 September). In the historic category, Dessie Nutt and Geraldine McBride took their Porsche 911 to victory during an event that gave the championship standings a real shake up.Historic (category 1)Disaster struck championship leader Steven Smith early on Saturday when his Porsche 911 hit gearbox failure. Partnered by Howard Pridmore while his regular co-driver John Nichols was busy at his daughter's wedding, Smith posted his first retirement of the season.On an event when intermittent rain made tyre choice a nightmare, a series of incidents decimated the historic category as crews tackled the trick Belgian roads. The ditches that lie in wait for cars finally collected the Sunbeam Tiger of Patrick Watts/Elgan Davies on Sunday and their rally was over.
Through it all came Watts/McBride, driving with a typical blend of speed and consistency to score a resounding historic category win.With no other class B5 finishers, second overall in the historics went to B3 winners Alan Honess/Tim Sayer in their Cortina GT, even though they were a massive 13 minutes down on Nutt at the end of 22 stages and over two hours of rallying.All of the other historic finishers claimed class wins, as Keith Pettit/Sharon Chilver (Lotus Cortina), Mike Barratt/Michelle Calvert (Mini Cooper S) and Gordon Cameron/Sheila Grimshaw (Mini) all did well to get their cars to the finish of a tough event. Among the casualties were John Parker and Robert Harrison who badly damaged their Saab 96 in a ditch.Post-historic (category 2)For much of the rally, a mighty contest for post-historic honours raged between Easson/Golding and David Stokes/Ian Oakey in a battle of the Mk1 Escorts. However, over the final two stages, Stokes hit mechanical problems and failed to emerge from the final stage of the rally. Prior to that, Easson/Golding had stretched out a lead of a little over a minute and were able to score an important victory to set up a dramatic conclusion to the title race.
Into a class winning second in post-historics after they best performance to date went Peter Lythell/Gill Cotton in their Porsche 911. Not for the first time this year, they enjoyed an epic battle with the Escort Mk1 of Craig Salter/Preston Ayres and after over two hours of rallying, the verdict went to the Porsche crew by just 15s.Second in C4 behind Lythell/Cotton was the Porsche 911 of Andrew Street/Jez Mason after an excellent run. Class C3 fell to Irish crew Frank Cunningham/Arron Forde in their Escort RS2000, although they only had half a minute in hand over the Escort of Chris Gravestock/Mark Harmer
As ever, class C2 was fiercely competitive and a storming drive netted victory for the Escort Mexico of Derek Belbin/Michael Davison. Half a minute behind came Ken Forster/John Stanger-Leathes, while John Worthing/Roger Sutcliffe were third in their Escort.Notable retirements in the post-historic category included Neil and Chris Parsons who rolled their Escort heavily and Graham Samuel/Tony Phillips who knocked a wheel off their Escort against a kerb on the Zoning stage.
