Tour of Cheshire by David Griffiths & Noel Dutton

This was a daytime historic road rally held in the Cheshire/Staffordshire area on Saturday 8th March and run by the Knutsford and District Motor Club. Anything historic can be used on this type of event, Porsche 911s, Alfa Romeos, Volvos, Anglias, Sunbeams, even a Triumph Herald and a Standard 8 were having a go.
The format is a series of tests, similar to a high speed autotest/autosolos on private grounds, in different locations, interspersed with regularity road sections in the morning and ending with a lunch break.
The afternoon started with a short road section to reach the large military camp at Swynnerton near Stone. This was test 11, and was 18miles long and had 14 time controls, 13passage controls and numerous observed junctions. There were 150 marshal's signed on to run this test. The route was basically three very varied laps and the navigation required had to be spot on as several of the top crews, Porsches and the like found out, got wrong and ended up coming through our time control twice. They were not excluded but got a heavy penalty.
This test was not just all tarmac, many of the sections were gravel, undulating and in and out of woodland. This is also an active military site, not a baracks, and when we arrived alot of live firing was going on somewhere. We came across solders on various activities as we passed through this vast area.
Clwyd Vale crew Roger and Leigh Powley were running at car 22 in one of their Imps, and seemed to be going well on the first four tests at Booths Hall near Knutsford, but went out later on test 5 with a broken driveshaft.
Results were:
1st overall Bob Taylor/Jeanne Taylor 1967 1293 Mini
2nd overall Roy Gilligan/Andy Gibson 1960 1680 MGA
3rd overall Jon Wood/Paul Bosdet 1966 998 Mini Cooper
All in all an interesting and at times hectic event.

David Griffiths and Noel Dutton.