As I am out of action regarding Trials Driving at the moment Mike Hayward and I decided to marshal on The Clee. We were sent to Phil’s Folly, a new section before the farm on the approach to Gattens Gamble, on the lower slopes of The Long Mynd. The journey there was interesting to say the least, because there was snow on the Shropshire hills so discretion was the better part of valour and we detoured around The Long Mynd.
The section started on a level, rutted track, hair-pinned round a tight right hander and went straight up a muddy tree lined gully before emerging on to the exit track which was recessed into the side of the hill. This was to be the scene of some problems as it was very slippery and later some cars went over the edge.
There were four of us on the section, Michael (Chief Official) and Richard from the MAC, Mike Hayward and I. It was an enjoyable, if challenging, day but we really struggled at times.
The first disaster was that the driver of the Discovery recovery vehicle went up to the hairpin and decided that he would get his vehicle too muddy, went back to the farm and spectated on Gattens Gamble for the rest of the day! After this, the four of us had real problems running the section and had to call on competitors and the farmer to help us.
The first car along was Jeff Buchanan. He couldn’t get his ex Dennis Greenslade Reliant round the corner, he was really stuck and we had to go and ask the farmer for help. He came along with a Mitsubishi 4WD but even that struggled and it was more than 30 minutes before we got Jeff out of the section.
Then David Bowlas got his Midget stuck in the same place but we managed to turn him round in the field and gave him a run at the section. However, he half slipped off the bank on the escape road and in the end, the only way we could extricate him was to lower him down the bank with a rope and winch (the farmer’s idea). By that time, we called Clerk of the Course Jonathan Toulmin and cancelled the section for the lower classes.
Determined not to give up the farmer bought along his JCB and scrapped the mud of the hairpin, coming down to a stone surface to give the afternoons runners a chance at the section.
Falcons Ian Davis was the first class eight. He rounded the hairpin without any difficulty and blasted up the muddy hill. We thought that as each car went up it would clean more mud away, making it easier for the later numbers. To some extent this was true, but it was too bring other problems as it wore the edge away at the top of the section and on the exit road, tending to drag cars off the track and down the bank.
Most of the class eights cleaned the section OK. It was all a question of getting the line around the hairpin right. Simon Woodall clearly knew all about the hairpin as he came along the approach track with one wheel out of the ruts and up the bank. Although this should have given him the possibility of a wider turn it didn’t work out somehow and his buggy under-steered straight on into the trees. The same befell Stuart Ridge in his flyweight. Tim Foster and Harry Butcher were two more who couldn’t get around in one bite and failed. Dave Foreshew got round OK but his GVS fluffed and stalled at the two marker and took a while to get going.
Difficult as the hairpin was the real drama was at the top of the section on the exit road.
Extricating the two class fives in the morning had weekend the edge of the bank and Simon Woodall’s VW Buggy slipped off the edge into the field below, only Simons skill as a driver preventing a nasty accident. The same thing almost happened to Stuart Harrold and Chris Phillips. The Troll was right on the edge and in the end Chris hoped out, and swung the front round at 90 degrees so Stuart could make a graceful if rather scary slide down the bank.
Most of the cars traversed the exit road OK but Tony Young saw what was happening and drove off the track and down the bank voluntarily.
By now the edge of the track at the top of the section itself was deteriorating and when Andrew Martin slipped off into the barbed wire on the section itself we had a group meeting with the experienced competitors in the queue and decided to call it a day! The farmer was more than disappointed and said that he would dig the track out and put some stone down so the section would be OK for next year!
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