It was Jim Mountains turn to drive on Stroud&DMC’s Mechanics Trial. With Peter relegated to the passengers seat of his immaculate Class 8 Dellow he had the chance to turn reporter.
Jim’s not done the Mechanics Trial before so we decided it was his turn for a drive. A 5.30am start got us to the venue well in time to unload and have an excellent breakfast roll from the mobile caterers. I noticed that the Wall family had stirred up their normal line up as well with nobody in their usual driving seats and Eric marshalling.
We had a fairly uneventful trial, except that the engine cut out and then recovered in two critical places, so I have to have a close look at the fuel system next weekend. There were quite a few delays and we ended up running about 2 hours late. However, it was a glorious sunny day and the delays gave us time to get the refreshments eaten.
The restarts were real tests and congratulation to Simon Woodall in getting off nearly all of them to take the honours in class 8.
Falcon’s Simon Groves passengered Emma Robiliard in her excellent 1st in class 4 and 2nd overall.
Stuart Roach had a grand event to win overall in his HRG, which was the only class 5 car in the event.
The Stroud & DMC do a very good job organizing two classic trials so close together and nearly all on different hills. On the Mechanics you don’t get the classics like Nailsworth Ladder and Crooked Mustard but the club gave us a good variety of decent hills with some stoppers to test the cars and drivers.
I hope that the crews of the Jago Jeeps and Sierra enjoyed themselves; it is hard to think of any more unsuitable vehicles to go classic trialling with. A couple of the old lanes had us leaning at crazy angles, it must be far more difficult in a wide softly suspended saloon car.
With only 1 class 5 car and no class 6 cars entered I wonder where all the class 5 and 6 cars have gone.
Classes 3, 7 & 8 are the numerically dominant classes and most of the cars in these classes are based on running gear that has been obsolete for a long time now.
I’m looking forward to the Kyrle in 2 weeks; a trial that I’ve not done before.
| Best Overall | Stuart Roach (HRG) | 2 |
| Class Winners | ||
| 1 | David Haizelden (VW Golf GTi) | 8 |
| 2 | Emma Wall (Austin Seven) | 12 |
| 3 | Stuart Deacon (Ford Escort) | 12 |
| 4 | Emma Robilliard (VW Beetle) | 6 |
| 7 | Pete Hart (Marlin) | 9 |
| 8 | Simon Woodall (VW Buggy) | 8 |
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