Our journey to Sunday’s Exmoor began with a chance encounter on the Classic Trials Facebook. Brian Osbourn mentioned a decaying MGB in Tenbury Wells. We are outside Tenbury so Patrick (15) and I were intrigued….a question on the post, a bit of wondering, and a clumsy answerphone message at home from Simon Woodhall, and we were in the doghouse (again). We arrived home after a school run to ‘have you something to tell me?’ From the ever tolerant and (usually) forgiving Mrs T…….
We bought it, of course, though it didn’t seem to include sills……a few weeks of frantic bursts of fettling, in between bouts of outsourced welding with a target of Exeter-Clee Hills-Lands End.
I first met Isabel in a queue on a Lands End, me and Dad in my first car, A 2CV, she was part of the, rather daunting Team Gray 2CVs….From 2CVs to an Austin Seven I did MCC and VSCC trials for the next 20 years or so, Marrying Isabel along the way, and in 2010 our son, Patrick turned 4 and could come with us in a saloon. Off with the Ulster body, on with a rescued ’29 saloon body and away we went…he has done appx 20 trials as a passenger until, in September ’20 he drove it on the MGCC Bromsgrove trial….
I felt it important to show him what a ‘real’ trial was like, and as part of home schooling, how to fettle, budget, fix and bodge…..Hence the MGB, he has a 1/2 share in it!
Well Covid modified plan A and the first event we could do 2 up was the Exmoor.
We had a great run to the start, where we browsed a small, select, and very serious looking array of machinery, we were, however welcomed cheerfully, our first greeting ‘wow finally, a proper car’ from the gate marshall. We were excited and a little nervous, I haven’t trialled anything other than the Austin for 25 years or so, The B is bigger, more powerful, and a bit blind ( compared to the 7). We started with low expectations and were conscious that we had a 175 mile run home and school for P tomorrow, we really didn’t want to break it.
The first 3 sections at the start venue came very fast, my caution about tyre pressures caught us out on one of the few bits of mud, but the 2 grippy hills were straightforward.
On to Stoodleigh, where we were able to watch the first section from the queue, a tight restart that was catching out many, it caught us too but a shunt and we got away, learned a bit there….
Whilst queuing I had the opportunity to introduce Patrick to Jonathon & Pat Touilmin, which gave him a historical context to what we were doing. They had been exploring sections from Jonathon’s father’s competition days as a works MG trials driver.
After Stoodleigh the route took us to Riverton, a relaxing break as we waited our turn, chatting Skodas to Ben & Evie Giles, they also had ’school tomorrow’. At the line we were greeted by a cheerful fellow who sent us on our way up a smooth track towards a bend, and what looked like a minor cliff face to be climbed, a bit of graunching and we were up, though the nearside rear tyre had punctured, the rock was a bit rough for 10 psi….
Pat changed the wheel for one of the road spares, and I fetched the tube out of the burst one, we than pressed on to King’s Scott via a straightforward special test.
Waiting for King’s we had time to finish the repair, and thanks to Phil and Aiden Parker, we were saved the foot pumping thanks to their compressor. We both rather like their Escort…..
The next challenge was Foxy Copse, a wiggle-with-humps in a coppice. I drove badly, too wary of understeer off the line, we weren’t high enough and/or fast enough to get over the first hump and became firmly beached. Disgraceful. By this time we were travelling with the Peugeot 205 of James Shallcross, a fantastic machine, that Pat utterly fell for! He had been fancying a 205 as a first car, and this is now a plan, though the Fuel Injection will have to wait!
Oakwell was very sociable, with plenty to see, we watched the cheerful fixing of Dave Hazelden’s Scimitar driveshaft, a bit of heated ‘Left or Right’ discussion from some Marlins, and eventually we got to where Adrian Dommett said we would, because we were dragging a live rear axle up the hill!
The Holdridge group of hills were set in a picturesque spot and were 3 wildly different sections, the first ended with my, now customary bad restart positioning, the second a steep simple climb where I suspect the weight of the B hampered us a bit and the third, which was a fiddly tight round the trees sporting type section. With the Hazeldens in front of us we were able to watch and learn….
Dave got over the vicious hump, only to beach a few metres beyond, collecting a puncture too.
Once off the hill Aaron attacked it with vigour, lining the Scimitar up perfectly and applying a lot of power and traction launched upon the hump, fast. The front of the car was a good metre clear of the ground when they stopped, the poor Scimitar coming down very hard on the crest in the middle of the chassis with a very big thud. I wouldn’t have been surprised if it had bent or broken in two. We washed out on the way down from the start and were slightly relieved not to get any further as I suspect we would have taken some extracting….
High Bray, our highlight. Another cheerful start marshall (was it the same chap from earlier?), another innocuous lane disappearing around a blind bend, foot down and crash crash crash, Restart, in a hole, some tyre smoke, some clutch work, and we crawled out of our pit and on up and out, fabulous. Rough but fabulous.
My suspicions that a very slight rollback during my clutch abuse would attract a penalty (a worry for Darren Ruby too in the BMW) were later confirmed.
And that was it! We found a lovely spot just outside the village to change the wheels for the run home and had a long chat with a villager about the history of the section, and how much he enjoyed the trial coming through, and we were on our way home. Overdrive top and sunshine all the way.
We all survived it, car included, learned a lot, including, but not just, that we need a compressor system, more ground clearance, and better seats. A superbly organised and run event, held in fantastic scenery and with beautiful weather, can’t hope for more than that. Roll on the next one!
Winston & Patrick Teague & Tarka Daal the Curry Coloured MGB
Comments, Corrections, Criticism & Concerns are all welcome. You can leave a comment to have your say or tell us about your trial.
Classical Gas 
My old MG nice to see it trialing ,good luck to you and enjoy it .
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