Good response to new Historic Stage Rally Challenge

Good response to new Historic Stage Rally ChallengeThe new HRCR Historic Stage Rally Challenge, supported by TR Enterprises, is attracting an encouraging response from prospective competitors ahead of the opening event in January.The Challenge has been created to encourage owners of Category 1 (registered before 31.12.67) historic cars to compete in a lower cost, less damaging series of events and will compliment the Dunlop/Gambia MSA British Historic Rally Championship.Co-ordinator Steve Suckling reports a good level of interest, with over a dozen crews already looking seriously at the new series. To date, most of the enquiries are coming from crews not currently competing on the BHRC, so the initiative to attract both new competitors and those returning to the sport is on target."We've got a good spread of cars among the list of enquirers," said Suckling. "The list includes Saabs, Ford Anglias and an Austin Healey 3000 and we've even got a Ford Mustang being prepared for the series."To support the older and smaller-engined cars, an additional class for pre '60 up to 1000cc cars has been added to the regulations.The opening round is the Red Kite Stages on 20 January, and the full calendar is:1 Jan 20, Red Kite Stages, Mid Wales (gravel)           2 May 3, Welsh Rally, Epynt (asphalt)3 May 26, Millbrook Stages, Bedfordshire (asphalt)4 Jun 21, Rally of the Midlands, Nuneaton (asphalt)5 Aug 16, Neath Valley Stages, South Wales (gravel)6 Sep 27, Trackrod Historic Cup, Yorkshire (gravel) The co-ordinator of the Historic Stage Rally Challenge is Steve Suckling, who can be contacted by e-mail at: steve@hrcr.co.uk