Race Retro, Stoneleigh Park, 25-27 February 2011

Familiar Faces

Nearly everybody says that the great thing about the Stoneleigh show is that as soon as you walk through the door, you see somebody you know. This was certainly true in my case when within 2 minutes of entering the building I bumped into our Driver of the Day sponsors, and long time hillclimbers, Tony and Shirley Tewson of Superclutch. It wasn't much later when Vincent of Roadbook came onto the Mono stand with Alain, the other half of the Spa organisers. They had come over from Belgium for the show, and it demonstrates that Race Retro is a much anticipated and much enjoyed motorsports show throughout the civilised (= motor racing excluding FIA championships) world. We had visitors on our stand from Switzerland, the USA, Denmark, and Italy. Although Race Retro is a historic show, in reality it's for people who don't race the latest kit, which means it encompasses virtually everybody who races for fun.

One American who misinterpreted our name (the US Monoposto Club being for pre-80 single seaters) told an interestiung tale. He ran a Lola T190 F5000 car in 1970, and had tracked it down, repurchased it, and was now racing it again 40 years later. He had visited Lola where he had obtained copies of their designs for the very high wing supports they ran in 1970.

Our own stand was well patronised with a great interest in the Monoposto SUNBAC Nova award. Thanks are due to Jonathan Baggott for the overall organisation, to Jim Blockley (RT3), Eddie Guest (Lola T640/642) and Pete Allen (Aztec AT1000) for the cars, and to these plus David Cox, Simon Davey, Marcus Sheard, Mark Smith, Patrick Huston, David Parkinson, and Sarah Harvey Fern for staffing the stand.

Jim Blockley's Ralt RT3, Eddie Guest's Lola and Pete Allen's Aztec

Richard Trott, RT3 pilot of the 80's discusses old times with former RT3 man Simon Davey. Richard was the first owner of David Cox's RT3.

A good selection of photos of champions and competitors graced the stand

Pete Allen (no relation to the Peter Allen who used to race in Mono) offers the very attractive Aztec AT1000 for sale and hire in a series of packages

Lancias were a theme of the show, though why somebody would wish to paint the beautiful Stratos so it looks like a chopped TR7 is beyond me. Prettier Alitalia jobs were outside.

Aurelia GT

Delta in Supercharged and Turbocharged Group B trim, and (background) as a nice sensible(ish) road car

Jaguar was another theme, it being 50 years since the evocative, beautiful (and over-rated) E-type first appeared.

LWK707 was the XK120 in which Moss broke numerous long distance speed records in the early 1950's. Metallic chocolate brown was a colour on more than just 70's Cortinas.

The Walkinshaw/Brawn XJR Group C cars of the 1980's had deserved success including LeMans

There was a 1990 hooligan one make series for the Walkinshaw XJR15's, (above) but it was the bulkier XJ220 that made it to production as a supercar. Ferrari lost no sleep.

Too many bonnet louvres to be perfect, but the XJ13 (here in replica form) was stunning, even if it nearly killed test driver hero Norman Dewis.

Ferrari 312T4 as driven by Jody Scheckter to the 1979 world championship graced the MotorSport stand. Scheckter is now a successful organic farmer

Wolf WR1 also on MotorSport stand. Even if you don't take their rather good magazine, they have an excellent podcast where last month Martin Whitmarsh was very frank.

Porsche 962C, the seminal Group C car. A Mono driver has been seen testing one of these.

Porsche 907

Porsche 904 was arguably the most sinuous of racing Porsches until the current 918.

You can't have a show with historic rallying in and not have a big Healey, ideally marked up as Pat Moss/Ann Wisdom.

PA Vauxhall Cresta was an unusual rally car to say the least.

Sierra Cosworth run by Jimmy McRae

Audi Quattro revolutionised rallying in 1980's. Quite good in nostalgic cop series too.

Alan Mann scheme on a Lotus Cortina. Whilst this one may be genuine, our Lotus Cortina expert tells me there is a survival rate of over 100%.

Gerry Marshall's Firenza "Baby Bertha"

Similar scheme on tamer Firenza built from a scrap road car.

Vintage bikes.

A bike, but not as we know it.

New York to Seattle marathon run entrant. The car, not the bloke with long legs.

1950's Chevy Coupe for Carrera Panamericana type racing

A real Fiat 500 Abarth and the modern 1 1/2 scale replica.

Invicta was a pre-war luxury sports car make. Very elegant.

Hispano Suiza aero engine fitted in an Amilcar chassis.

Bentley on Brooklands stand seemed appropriate. Whilst they can run a sprint at Brooklands, health & safety means the mighty Vickers Vanguard will never run its RR Tyne engines again

Anybody besides me remember a Terry-Thomas film comedy where he played a United Nations health inspector who drove an Austin 7?

Trevor Farringdon showed this part restored Atalanta, pre war single seater. Coil sprung IFS trailing arms...

...and trailing arms at the rear with rockers and a rod pulling on coil spring to compress it.

1 litre F3s - Brabhams BT28 (foreground - prepared by old Mono friends Nemesis), BT16, and BT21.

Damon Milnes' Cheshire Classics had this nice March 703S. 1 litre F3, available as spaceframe ("S") and monocoque ("M"). He has many other cars including Mono friendly Comtec VD F4 and an unbelievably cheap Dallara.

Dastle F3. Dastle went on to make the Raceboxes familiar around paddocks

There's a society to preserve the memory of the Birmingham Superprix. Chris Woodhouse lent them his Lola T90/50 as a centrepiece. Hands up those who lined up on grid markings at the traffic lights by Bristol Street Ford in the 90's.

Very advanced Gemini Mk5 Formula Junior. Very early 60's, looks more like the 10 years newer 703 left.

Classic Reynard SF77 FF2000

This Chaparral CanAm car is one of several which will be racing in CanAm only events. The start would be a scary sight, I imagine.

Octane Magazine had this lovely Maserati Birdcage..

....sight of the cockpit shows where the bircage name originated.

Simca Abarth 2000 was a delightfully tiny car

Sprite-based WRM was a similar concept.

Near to the Mono stand was this Tifosi kit car which allows you to convert a dead black bumper Midget into a cute Sebring Sprite lookalike.

Our next door neighbours were the Alpine club, for the French high performance coupe. Turns out the man with the car had President David Cox's March on his rolling road 25 years ago....

Our good friends at Midland Automobile Club were moved away from us (pity, they have lovely cakes) to be near this Dodge Transporter, recently restored. It was used by Denis Poore (1950 Hillclimb Champion and part of the Autosport founding team) to move his Alfa Romeo hillclimb car.

Said to be capable of 70 mph - which wasn't bad for a car in 1950 - Poore ran it on trade plates because if registered normally it would be restricted to 30 mph. "Notwen" was the trademark of Newton Oils, a Birmingham based oil blender who survived into the 1990's.

Pre-war Alfa engines are available "new".

Barry "Whizzo" Williams and Tony Mason were Friday celebs. Stage was next to Mono stand.

Crossthwaite and Gardiner can supply new aluminium block Jaguar XK engines, Maserati engines and Coventry Climax engines, from almost entirely new build parts. They have created their own patterns for the blocks.

As well as the engines, C&G are currently working on a batch of 5 replica Mercedes pre-war GP cars and have completed a replica (using a period Ford V8) of the Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion. 1933, streamlined 3 wheeler, 6 metres long, rear mounted V8, rear steer, driving position in front of the front wheels. If you wanted to design a death trap, this would be a good starting point. It killed one driver and nearly killed Fuller's daughter. Click here for a link to a description and films. It's brilliant, in a mad, mad way, and has been paid for by wobbly bridge designer Norman "Lord" Foster.

Tony and Shirley Tewson, our SuperClutch Driver of the Day sponsors and first stop for racing clutches.

Somebody was asking nearly £2k for this 1950's E93A based special, or rather the bits it has dropped into.

Words and pictures by Tony Cotton. Please email factual (wrong car identification) errors to editor.