Organised by the Historic and Sports car Club (HSCC), this was the fifth time the club had run this meeting over the full Silverstone Grand Prix circuit. The club had arranged for a 14 race programme over the weekend, and in addition to all the normal HSCC Championships and races, there was a round of the GT and Sports Car Cup. This was a one hour race with pitstop for a large 37 car entry, including classics such as the E-Type Jaguar, the AC Cobra, the Austin Healey 3000 and more rare cars such as the Iso Griffo A3C. Another large field was in the invited Historic Formula Ford 2000 and URS Classic Formula Ford 2000 race which saw over 40 cars entered.
The GT and Sports Car Cup race saw Ewan McIntyre and Mark Lewis win the hour long race in their 1959 Lotus 15, its two litre engine proving to be enough to beat the mighty 6.6 litre Chevrolet Corvette of Davies and Young in to 2nd place.
The Derek Bell Trophy races were missing a few of their regular competitors due to other races in Europe, but still saw a reasonable grid of Formula 2 and 5000 cars take the start. Again it was the nimble cars that proved to be the winners round the full Grand Prix circuit, with Richard Evans driving a 1600cc Formula Atlantic March 79B winning both races during the afternoon. Jeremy Wheatley in an immaculate Formula 2 Matchbox Surtees TS15 finished 2nd in the first race and 3rd in the second race. The first Formula 5000 car home in the first race was Paul Campfield in a Chevron B24 who finished 3rd while in the second race it was Simon Taylor in another Chevron B28 who finished 7th. Second race 2nd place went to mark Dwyer in a March 782.
The Classic Racing Cars and Historic Formula 3 race saw usual winner Ian Jones pull out a good lead in his Lotus 59, only to throw away victory with a quick spin which handed victory to his usual sparring partner Anthony Ross in another Lotus 59. Jones did battle his way back to 2nd by the end of the race but was over 29 seconds behind at the flag.
The Formula Ford 2000 race saw plenty of spins and incidents at Luffield and saw Ian Pearson take the chequered flag first driving a Van Dieman RF83. The Martini Trophy race for 2 litre sports racing cars saw the smallest grid of the day and an easy win for James Dodd in his winged Chevron B31, who was kept in check by David Gathercole driving a much older lola T210 to 2nd place. The ByBox Historic Touring Car trace saw a great battle for the lead, with Neil Brown claiming victory in his red and gold Ford Mustang, just ahead of Tim Davies in the much smaller engined Ford Lotus Cortina. The final Historic Formula Junior race of the meeting was won by Jonathan Milicevic in his Cooper T59.
By Simon & Janet Wright
