Vintage Sports-Car Club - Spring Start

Silverstone, 24 Avril 2010

http://www.vscc.co.uk

Low_Res_Silverstone The Vintage Sports Car club started another year of public events with their always popular Spring Start meeting, held on the national circuit layout of Silverstone. A bright day and large grids bought out a good crowd to enjoy the action. A packed 11 race programme ensured there was variety as well as quantity.

The main race of the meeting was the GP Itala and Lanchester Trophies race for pre-1930 racing cars. With seven Bugattis entered to take on the might of the early British Bentleys and Morgans, you might have missed another French car entered. Star car of the event for many fans was the one hundred and five year old Derracq. Originally built in 1905, the special was fitted with a 25 litre engine and was the Land Speed World recorder holder in 1906. Recently restored by Mark Walker, he showed no respect for the age of his vehicle as he threw it around Silverstone in an effort to extract every last bit of performance from the car. Unfortunately it lacked the speed of its younger rivals and it finished two laps down on the winner. Last years winner Geraint Owen won the race again this year, driving a 1930 Bugatti T35B.

The Historic Grand Prix Cars Association held a race for pre-1966 Grand Prix cars. Enrico Spaggiari scored a great victory in his 1960 Cooper T53, but one of the most eye catching cars was the yellow 1961 Shark nose Ferrari 156 of Jan Biekens.

The sports cars are always a crowd pleaser and a large grid saw plenty of racing through the field. Julian Majzub was the class of the field, leading from start to finish in his Canadian built 5.4 litre Sadler MkIII. Crispin Harris finished second driving a Lister Jaguar Knobbly

A great start to what promises to be a most interesting season.