2020 President's Trial
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| As Stuart and I were not from the same social bubble, we had to wear masks to reduce potential infection. Obviously, this also made us much more aerodynamic. (Photo : Pete Brown) |
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| The view is always good from behind aero screens |
For the first time, I was passengering Stuart Palmer in his Austin 7 Ulsteroid, which made an interesting comparison with the Candidi Provocatores Allard of Robert Robinson-Collins. I may have slipped mention of that vehicle into posts on this blog before.
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| That was about as far as we got on the last hill (Photo : Pete Brown) |
I had never attempted the President's Trial before. it usually occurs in April but was postponed until 18th October this year. It was held only a few miles away from me in the Bonyalva Woods, not far from where there used to be a splendid traditional country scrapyard. (Eyes glaze over at thoughts of past treasure hunting adventures)
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| The Ulsteroid is a very neat fit in its tailor-made trailer |
Stuart had been in the Exmoor Clouds Trial in September as a single driver with no bouncer. He'd found it very rough and retired in the end as he really needed more crew and ballast. As the Ulsteroid is actually his dad's car and his dad is 6'3" I felt confident I would fit in, especially as I managed to squeeze myself into Brian Partridge's Ridge-Cannon for the 2016 LET.
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| Another potential Vintage Thing, the Coates Orthoptera of Roger Ashby |
Right next to us in the trailer park were Roger Ashby and Andy Laing in the Coates Orthoptera. This is a Ford sidevalve powered Austin 7 and it was very interesting to compare the two.
1172cc sounds a lot against 747cc.
The President’s Trial consisted of two loops in the woods. From previous experience with other
single venue off-road trials in local woods, I expected a rough trial with lots of tree
roots but I was pleasantly surprised. Stuart is like me and doesn’t want to
break his machinery. I wouldn’t have blamed him if he felt it was going to
be too destructive and retired. It wasn’t and we were able to finish the day without not even any punctures.
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| There's that Coates Othoptera again |
Each section is named after The Presidents of the USA and there were one or two Doon Buggies among the marshal’s cars. (See what I did there?) And a few Lumps made the rear suspension bottom out. (I’m doing it again). But our brains were not so rotten and insane. (That’s enough of that)
Only a few sections featured only once and we had 21 in all
including a special test.
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| Lunch stop and tyre change, they mean much the same thing |
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| The recovery Disco whistled purposefully at idle and then on full throttle... |
The Ulsteroid was prone to jumping out of first so it was my job to keep the gear lever in place when we were in attack mode up the hills. This must have made a single drive incredibly difficult for Stuart.
Latterly, the battery began to lose its charge and Stuart
had to start it on the handle of bump it. Later still, it boiled on the last
hills we did since we kept the motor running to maintain the charge but the
brave little car stood up well to the abuse we meted out to it.
I was very impressed by the flexibility of the Austin 7
chassis. The seat of my pants involved a little massaging from the car over
the bumps as it squirmed its way. We had to tighten the bonnet down after
a few very sudden camber changes and during the day the cable brakes worked
their way out of adjustment but they had plenty of use on perilous descents
down muddy banks.
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| Suzuki X90s are now so popular they have their own class for trials |
We didn’t seem to lack much in the way of power although that may have been Stuart’s knack for nurturing momentum. He’s known the car for 40 years and has developed it with his father over that time. What stopped us most frequently was deep, thick mud. On the second loop, the ground had been churned up in many places and we didn’t do so well. On other sections the sun and drying wind made the going easier.
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| The Adams boys with their diesel 205 |
As we running as Number 2 between the Adams boys in their
Peugeot 205, we finished in time to walk back and see the rest of the entrants climb
the last sections, number 21 called Bush. This had separate restarts for Class
7s and 8s and we witnessed some great performance here. Bush was rearranged at
the last minute and proved to be a significant test. We probably performed
worst of all since there was thick mud on the first corner. We were delighted
to see two Class 8s get away from their restarts but one clipped a marker on
the nadgery chicane those pesky marshals had put together specially and the
other got away from the restart line and wriggled its way through chicane poles
only to succumb to a puncture near the Class 7 restart!
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| Watching the top drivers in their Class 8 specials is always instructive |
I saw many familiar faces and renewed a lot of old acquaintances. I think between Stuart and me, we knew about half the entry and field and organising team. It was a great day out and, despite the evident good will and bonhomie, everyone was very conscientious about maintaining distance.
After the event, Stuart investigated the overheating issue and found that the fan pulley had come loose on its spindle. Austin 7s enjoy thermo-syphon cooling so - as Stuart pointed out - running the engine in between sections to aid cooling would achieve the opposite effect since there's no water pump.
There were a couple of sections where I had to bounce hard to keep us going and that caused my glasses to steam up. That was okay. It wasn't me that needed to see where we were going.
Learning points were - put your glasses over your mask (like a surgeon in the operating theatre), under way the breeze demists your lenses and the MCC snood (what? you haven't got one yet?) minimises misting as it's bigger and more adjustable.
Fingers crossed for more events soon.
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