Don Kerry #429 from Colchester in action:
Dave Miles #80 and #123 was a Spedeworth pioneer:
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- Don Burt with a smile.
- Don's daughter at play.
- Don and famous character Jumbo.
- Happy kid on car!
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October 2016: A thank-you forvaluable infoto David Lloydwhose family knew the farming Cayzers very well, and whosedadmechanic'd for Alan Cayzer and Dave Pierce. One of theCayzer clan, John, raced for almost 50 years.
In the days when father-and-son Wardroppers raced in Spedeworth,
Alan posed with young fan Kevin Taylor, perhaps at the Wardroppers' local Ipswich
Trevor Frost,brother of Pat Frost, was an engineering genius who designed and builtand modified his cars entirely by himself. He travelled and raced andrepaired with his family and no other mechanics. Trevor was known as a"clean racer" by his rivals --- but they crossed him at their own risk.After winning the BriSCA F1 World Championship under #68, Trevor joinedPat at Spedeworth, again racing under #68. (The famous 68 came from theFrost family's house number in Fen Walk!)
Trevor 1:
Trevor 2:
Trevor is with Jerry Newson, who drove for Notcutts Nurseries and for Carters of Melton.
Trevor 3:
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Same car, two bodies:
Ron Allen 172raced in the early-mid sixties in this Ford Y and then Fiat Topolinostock car.
My thanks to Brian Lucas, who was Ron's helper,for the photos and facts.
Here's Ron in the Ford Y at Wimbledon in 1962 or 1963. [Eric Setchell track photo]
At Aldershot in 1964, Ron Allen has re-bodied the car with Fiat 'tin':
Ron enjoying a breather in the sun at Eastbourne.
Brian Lucas, a proud 15-year old about to parade out for the mechanics' race at Eastbourne in 1964.
July 2015 update:
John Graingerraced F2s in the late fifties and the sixties, until 1985. Healso built and ran grass-track cars and oval track midgets. Thesetwo photos are his, and were printed in the OVAL TRACK magazine issue 4in 2010, alas no longer published.
John chasing the pack, in the days when fans wore proper sports jackets and shirts and ties! =====================================================
January 2015 update:
"I raced at Aldershot, Arlington, Eastbourne, Ipswich, Norwich, Wimbledon, Reading, and Portsmouth."
One of hisfirst tow cars was a US Army jeepbought from a friend for ten pounds.
Number 80's constructor Mac McLean appears in this photo of a Humber Super Snipe tow car, at Arlington.
Stan's
car had a centralized steering and seat, and a Ford 10 motor hotted up with a higher-compression Ford 8 head and twin SU carbs, driving a locked diff and reversed Vauxhall wheels. Petrol tank as required by the reg's. Stock-car fact of life: if you're going torace, you're going to crash, and this is what #80 looked like after one of those incidents. Steering and A arm not so happy either.Handsome Stan on the oficial documents all those years ago.
Rare item namingpioneering names: Aldershot's Boxing Day programme from 1961. first column; second column.
Fifty years on, Stan still smiles whenhe's around cars, in this case his rare limited-edition Royal Sabre, one of only 100 examples, which he exhibits at the Bourne Show.
January 1st 2015 update:
It's the 1968 Spedeworth ENGLISHCHAMPIONSHIPprogramme. The programme includes results and notes writtenin.
Front and back covers: Look at the 1968 prices.
- List of drivers:
- Championship race:
- Final and Pop DeeJay vs Spedeworth race:
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December 2014 Update:
Don Martinand Len Parker from Colchester raced under #159 in the early sixties, for Spedeworth. Don was a toolmaker, and if you remember the old Xpelairfans, well Don created the moulds for them. He also in his own timebuilt a 2-person hovercraft, when hewas not simply enjoying working on theirFord Y stock car. Don's son Paul sent these twophotos. They all enjoyedwatching the exploits of Stan Ingle, Spedeworth's 1966 world champion, nicknamed "Fangio" for the wayhe could carve smoothly through a pack.
Len, who was a fitter and turner, used to closely look at Ingle's engine to spot the finer pointsBelow: Len Parker with the car.
Below: Len and Don survey the damage to their #159 that put the car out of action for the day:
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Spedeworth driver in a road safety test:
And here's a photo of Kelvin at Eastbourne.
For BriSCA fans, there's a similar film of Ken Freeman testing cable barriers at Blackbushe Airport in 1962, at the top of the SENIORS IN THE SIXTIES page.
Above: Sunny day at Cowdenbeath!
First, a huge thank-you is due to long time race fan Alan Humphrey, who contributed the following 68 Spedeworth photos some years ago, and which have sat "somewhere" in my computerever since. These photos also appear elsewhere on the Intenet. Alan's racingstarted in1973 in Jalopies with Tongham Motor Club. Thence toSpedeworth Hot Rods driving #162, then PRI MiniRods #63, thenSpedeworth Stock Rods #262, with a foray into Spedeworth Bangers #55.Braintree Auto Club was Alan's last sign-up where he raced Bangers as#62 andlastly Hot Rods under#228, with a few borrowed ridesalong the way. The last race Alan had was in the banger van #00 that hetook out in a charity event for Cystic Fibrosis: altogether a racing'career' spanning some thirteen years
Secondly,my plea for patience from Alan and others who knew Spedeworth muchbetter than I did, as I cannot accurately place many of the cars,drivers, dates, or tracks. Get in touch with me if you can correct or add a fact to this list. I will try to group the photos as best I can to start with.
Special thanks to the knowledgeable and well-traveled Graham Brown for many driver and track facts I've been able to add to the following photos. Graham has for many years beenorganizing,lap scoring, doingTV commentaries, documentary making,and magazine reporting on oval track racing, as well as running his owntransmission business and collecting stock car memorabilia. He recentlymoved to a road that leads just three miles to the site of StainesStadium, "only 48 years too late!" in Graham's own words.
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Steve Brantom: tarmac or shale, wet or dry, bring it on!
Steve says his #21 car loved wet shale, but evidently Steve loved any surface where he could nail a four wheel drift, as shown at Aldershot, above.
- Two Spedeworth winner photos: one, and two.
- Lining up for a night race at Aldershot.
- Helping someone to "get out of the way".
- Flat out in the sunshine.
- "Plum Crazy", Steve's car at its first Aldershot appearance.
- In 1978 with the second Colin Higman chassisever to appear in Spedeworth (Derek Hales ran the first one.).The Higman design was a difficult car to "turn-in", but Steve B.figured that the locked diff in the Spedeworth version was the problem,and knew how to adjust it. The new breed of professionallydesigned and fabricated cars took over from the traditional old DIYBriSCA motors, and "the game" changed for ever.
scanned from a 1977 Speedweek magazine. I assume she is related to Hot Rod expert Gary Malkin?
The car belonged to Stuart Blythe 235, or Trevor Blythe 475, from Kings Lynn.
The First Junior F2 World Final
This also appears on my JUNIOR F2 page, because in 1961 Spedeworth was essentially BriSCA's "Junior" class.
Fred Swansboroughscanned the programme, andFred's listed there along with somefamous and soon-to-be-famous names; Fred scored third place in thefinal :-). Note that Fred's #21 was his new number for 1961; he had been #689 in 1960.
This is the six-page PDF file.
TheWF was held at Ipswich, and you'll see ads for upcoming Ipswich Witchesspeedway matches --- in 1961 the bikes were using what is now thelonger stock-car "outside" oval.
Also, notice the reference to the celebrity presenter, Doctor Barbara Moore.She was the famous vegetarian long-distance walker who I'm afraid manyof us laughed at; in 1959 she walked nonstop from John O'Groats toLand's End in 23 days. She was a Russian born engineer, hence the 'Doctor' title, born Anya Cherkasova, who won a Russianlong distance motorcyclechampionship in 1932, as well as claiming to be Russia's first women pilot.Lots to see in this programme.
Fred Swansborough: in at the beginning
Seethe F21 car up there? Fred was competing in Spedeworth's firstworld championship, in Ipswich in 1961 (won by Jan Scott), bigger jpg file here. Fred, from Hampshire, had visited onerace, liked what he saw, and within days had built his first stock car.
Fred's car at rest.
Fred's profile from the 1961 WF (?) programme.
Fred Swansborough in action in a tidy Topolino. Fred still has some trophies proudly displayed at home fifty years on.
November 2015 update: Fredbuilt that #21 Topolino at his workshop, using a boxed-steel frame welded tothe Ford cross member, and putting on the Ford 10's higher-compressioncylinder head with two SU carbs, and the diff welded; the same enginetype he had used in the 1961 World Championship race, where Fred wasawarded a "place" trophy. Althoughit was 50 years ago, Fred and his brother Patrick were receiving £15start money each at tracks like Ipswich and Norwich. PatrickSwansboroiugh raced car #157, and he and Fred used to tow using "A"bars behind their Morris 1000 vans. He also raced at Aldershot, his'home' track, as well as Reading, Weymouth, and Oxford.
From Fred's copy of the same programme, here are 11 of the racer profiles, some of whom became stars, and ALL had fun:
- Gordon Chapman from Brighton
- Tony Dymott from Caversham
- Morris Egan from Egham
- Arch Hazell from Brighton
- Stan Ingle from Godmanchester
- Peter Linfield from Chichester
- Tony Maidment from Camberley
- Tony Newman from Godalming
- Don Mason from Selsey
- Jan Scott, ex-fighter pilot and inaugural Spedeworth world champion, fondly nicknamed Yogi Bear.
- Eric Taylor from Hindhead.
Can anyone identify any of the other cars in thew photo or in the programme? Please contact me. Old racers never stop. Today, over 50 years on, Fred is owner/builder of a rare British kit car called a "MIDGE", whose fans have their own website here. Fred's lovely lttle tourer has a Mazda engine under the hood. Fred's Spedeworth licences from 1966 and 1967,and his photo:
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Reading Stadium
March 2012: Treasure trove of photos from Spedeworth event at Reading Stadium, thanks to Mike Shonfield.
Parade getting lined up
Parade moving behind the Jag
Jumbo Allen has the flag, but who's the winner? Looks like top man Stan Ingle from Godmanchester
#366 John Astley, a regular Reading winner, with a proper shirt and tie and pullover under the overalls
Imagine the sound of that axle snagging the RSJ
Mind yer fingers ---
- Dashing through the dust: 106 is Sussexdriver Dave Crittall, chasing Frank Luff in the 329 (looks like afour-door Y Model – a rarity) with Reading local Roy Wood 82 coming upbehind.
Turn One action involves, among others, 335 “Ginger” Payne being turned round by 17 Tony Maidment, while the whitetops fall over each other. Paynewas a renowned motorcycle racerand tuner [racedagainst John Surtees and Mike Hailwood in thelate 50s], who turned engine builder in the early days of Hot Rods andhad a long career that included a 3rd place in the 1967 Nat'lChampionship at Hednesford, and had success in saloon cars at Brands Hatch.
Reading's Dick Barker
November 2011: Thanksto Lorraine Saunders for sending these three photos of early Spedeworthmeets at Reading's Tilehurst Stadium, [sadly closed]taken some time between 1961 and1964.
They show her father Richard "Dick" Barker,who raced under #6 between 1959 and 1964 and, quote "lived his life to the full". If it was daring, difficult, or a bit dangerous, Dick was there!
Repairs in progress on the greyhound track.
Reading's underwhelming track fence!
Dick Barker enjoys the victory honours on Spedeworth's Jaguar pace car with Spedeworth's marshal"Jumbo" Allen who is wearing a dicky-bow tie, which he sometimes used to top off witha gold painted bowler hat.
- Here he is in the smart overcoat on the left,with dog #4:
- And Dick's father.
Request: would anyone who remembers Dick Barker from the greyhounds or stock cars, please get in touch with me.
raced in1967/68 with Todd Sweeney, Biffo Sweeney, Tony May, Dave Pearce and theWarwick brothers. In Spedeworth he was listed as "Mole" Mason, asthere was already a seasoned driver with thenameDon Mason.
Hisfirst car used a Ford motor with twin carbs, 4-branch manifold, allyflywheel etc, but still neede more oomph. After a Wimbledon wreckhe worked with Les Collins and Jack Bavingdonto get a bought-in chassis and installed an 1800 MG motor.- May 1968 Aldershot parade with the Topolino body.
- Just two days later, the Wimbledon fence did this ----.
- --- which called for a new car, here back at Wimbledon.
Brands Hatch
Doug Wardropper #55 and 550.
Doug W. again alongside son Alan #500.
Pete Cayzer #359
Colourful hillside shot of cars 29, 520, and 342
Oct.2016:David Loyd identifies three of them as 342 Johnny Hartfield, 264 Pete Welland, 29yellow top is Les Williams, 359 [mini head on] is Peter Cayzer again.
Wimbledon Stadium
Wimpy burgers wait for car 162!
Very low-slung lightweight #14, with 567 and 546
,
who was John Gray. On the left [chequered paint] is Pat Frost.Square versus rounded: 155 versus 96 body styles.
Another year, 155 Don Ham from Hawkhurt , 160 John Field and the little Topolino #65 of Tony Grant.
Cars 364 Tony May and 320 Dave Pierce from Dorking.
Packed with spare stuff,from Kirton is NormanCrowe's #307. with 399 Chris Studd.
Norman’scar was on at the start of a children’s TV programme everyweek in the 60s and70s called ‘screentest’.
Theopening credits can still be found on youtube.
Youth admiring #217 Bob Perry's car from Diss in Norfolk, and the pace car.
A Scot invades: #2. It's Stan Thomson, son of Armadale veteran "Tiger" Thomson.
Buncha cars: 41, 35 Trevor Carpenter, 576, and 456 Tony Bell wait at Wimbledon.
Sunny Cowdenbeath, "Cowdie"
First, somecelebrity: the Berwick & District Motor Club was privilegedto have visitors and members such as Jim Clark and Graham Hill.Unfortunately, Graham Hill didn't have time to switch from his'serious' face to a smile at the instant the camera flashed. A two-time F1world champ, Indy 500 winner, and Le Mans winner, as well as 5-timeMonaco winner, Hill was a hard man who had left school at 16 as anapprentice with little money, and who believed strongly in supportingamateur sports.
Derek Wood is 2nd from left in the back row.
August 2013 update:That happy chap on the far right is Andrew Cowan, who in 1968scored the first of two London-to-Sydney marathon rally wins. Andrewwas a neighbour and friend of Jim Clark, and a professional rallydriver before running the Mitsubishi works rally team which won fourWorld Rally Championships. [Thanks to Frank Love for the info.]
- Derek on parade with his car, looking cool!
- Storming through a bend with the Cowdie crowd.
- More storming on a tricky surface.
- Looping the loop.
- Car in flight.
- Justhanging around.
Great view for those houses, of cars 98, 114, and 50.
The builder of colourful #51 maybe started with a Metropolitan? Pitted next to 320 Dave Pearce.
, a huge archive that includes the 20-yearcollection of Spedeworth's photographer Jim Fyfe.
Back row l-r: George MacMillan, Vic Russell, Gordon McDougall, Eric Smith, Fred Waite, Gavin Paterson.
Front row l-r: Malcolm Paterson, Walter Brown, Maureen Waite, Peter Dent.
Night races, unknown tracks and dates
#107 and X85.Thanks to Frank Love for identifying Scottish racers MalcolmPaterson 107 and Scottish champ Sam Page X85, on which perhaps the X is the Scottish saltire emblem.
#267 [with 55 Dougie W.in the background],is Graham North, who later moved into Saloon Stocks.
Alan Freebody was #295 and autographed this photo of himself on the drivers parade at Wimbledon.
In rain gear and with a toy on the roof, #319 tries to look cheery. He should do: Denny Pearson was an undertaker by profession, and on carnival nights would dress up the car with a coffin!
A very cut-down doot being blackened by exhaust, on #82,probably Reading, 'possibly' Oxford.
Three directions: left, right, and oops for 345, 224 and Dave Hall.
Anyone recognize this chap, and these happy men?Thanks to Alan and Russ --- the chap with the dicky bow tie isSpedeworth's marshal "Jumbo" Allen, who often topped it off with agold-painted bowler hat. Big thanks to Bill Riley and Graham Brown for the other names.
In BriSCA and Spedeworth, the smart driver's suit and horn rimmed glasses above a big smile meant "Asling's here."
- His chauffeur has a shirt and tie.
- Below: Eddie's trophies
- Eddie's autograph
- Asling in the flash light
- Eddie corners hard
- Eddie grids beside champ Dave Pierce. Trivia: on Pierce's cab side you can see a cartoon of the Dorking co*ckerel --- a breed of chickenbred over 2,000 years ago in Italy and brought to Britain by the Romans. Dorking has one 9 feet high!
- Bright red top car.
- and --- did the scrutineer check his helmet for fit???
- Dutch driver #14 at Wimbledon
- Bob Elson #173 waits and watches an escape at Cross-in-Hand.
- Car #586 leads the pack and #226 Eddie George "hangs in there", also Cross-in-Hand; Eddie went on to be an ace in saloon stock cars.
- Berrie "Barry" van den Oetlelaar #4 dives into the bend, probably at Lydden Hill.
- Hey, is that a STOCK car? Midget #6, a S.African team car from their "Superstox" class, at Lydden.
- Dave "Perfect" Pierce #320 leads, and the rest go pear-shaped --- at Arlington.
- Pretty in pink #94 white-top leads the blues and reds on Cowdenbeath's oval.
- Dave Hindle #170, two secs before a headache, as Geoff Goddard clears off at Arlington.
- On Arlington'scentre greenafterwards : Dave Hindle, Bill Bridges [bottom right],and the ambulance man.
- A pefect barrel roll half-way completed. Derek Howe # 268 at Brands Hatch.
- Leon Smithmay be the only driver to earn a BA in Economics, open a garage,and successfullyrace( #401) in Superstox and Hot Rods. He wastaught engine building by an ex Vanwall mechanic. This is almost certainly Cross-in-Hand.
- The car is brand new, unblemished, in the 'rural' pits at Foxall Stadium, Ipswich. #24 Terry Sayers.
- Below: Dutch invasion; #4, #14, and #24 are all Van den Oetelaar cars at Aldershot:
- Graham Brown identifies the Wimbledon pits, with the distinct chimneys of the "Corner Pin" pub. Thanks to Frank Love, August2013, foridentifying the husband and wife team of 605 Fred Waite and631 Maureen Waite from Darlington. They towed every Sunday up toCowdenbeath torace, and in this case took the long road South toWimbledon. Car #94 is Vic Russell from Dunfermline.
- Distinct from most BriSCA F2's of the era, 91 and 61 wait in the pits at Ipswich. #61 is Ron Harris who used to trail a feather after his roof fin.
- In Eddie Asling's garden at Overton Road, Abbey Wood [the flats in the background are those of the Thamesmead estate] is#632 Dave Troughton. This car was bought by former PRI AngliaRod driver Pete McLeod and raced as #400. Eddie's Topolino-bodied car in the background.
- Here's a different looking 632 car, pitted beside #269 Howard ----?
- A neatly-shortened VW bug with a hefty front bumper is #618.
- Pete Fox #60 at Wimbledon followed the same approach with a Ford Pop.
- A Mini-bodied #42 and in the background #33. Anthony Spencer kindly points out the Corner Pin pub in the background, proving it is Wimbledon https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4326828,-0.1853216,3a,75y,278.24h,86.24t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sTka-csKLIeNyG6GuIiPoDQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 .
- Lots of folded sheet on this one. Behind are 175 and 302, at Wimbledon.
- This old Ford Y #362 didn't make it to BriSCA.
- Looks like #348 started as an A40; conventional Fiat "Topo" #526 Dave Olding behind, in the Aldershot pits.
- Below: a classic Ford Pop #310in the lineup at Aldershot; Les Collins 284 behind.
- Barry Wigman 345 at Aldershot in ca 1966 (Thanks Alan)
- The old Austin, #302 can't race with his number there, can he?
- Derek Fiske#304. at Wimbledon
- To finish, you can look at this panorama of 19 photographs arranged by Alan Humphrey.
From
Alan Humphrey's large Spedeworth archive I am going toselect somesensational --- fires and crashes, yes I knowthis gives a bad image! Thanks to DavidLloyd for identifying several of the drivers. Here we go:
- Car 364 joins five others in a jam.
- Cars 430, 380, 407, 401. David Lloyd identifies 380 Alan Cayzer, 443 Steve Monk, 160 Tony Field, 29 Ian Williams [who is actually on the dog track!] , and on-his-side Jim Davison 407.
- Crash featuring 439, 111, 211.
- Here are 531 [punctured] Todd Sweeney and 586, with a rear view of empty #35 Trevor Carpenter.
- Dick Hall 209 on his side. Nasty-looking "end over end".
- Johnny Hartfield in the fence. Leon Smith on the hook.
- Three-car pile-up. Unknown fence climber.
- Totalled upside-down wreck. David Lloyd identifies the smart young guy with the tie as future starting marshal Dave Smith who took over from George Marshal.
- Car 630 upside down.
- Driver hopping out of a fire. Mal Lindsay 602 on fire.
- Big fire. Second photo of the same fire. [Background info from David Lloyd in Oct. 2016; David was there and watched it.] This happened at the British Championship weekend at Ipswich, when Peter Cayzer's car was totalled, and Pete actually lost a shoe in that fire.The other two parked cars are #125 Danny Hoare and #202 Fred Belt.
Doug Wardropper, when he wasn't busy being Senior (F1) World Champion, could also be seen racing his Junior # 505, and his Spedeworth Superstox #55 with 316 Pat Frost Trevor Frost's brother) just behind,at Ipswich 1968.July 2010:Another photo of the Wardroppers' foray into Spedeworth 1968 in their identical cars; Doug is 55 and Alan is #500. This is Ipswich. Ahead of the Wardroppers are 530 Biffo Sweeney and 69 Skid Parrish.Photo from Gordon Bland.
August 2010: Here are two photos of thelate Leslie Hobbs, who raced Spedeworth all over the South-East in theearly 1970's. Leslie'sson Graham kindly sent me thesephotos a couple of years back, andI lost them in my files until recently.Leslie's long-bonnet #111 car, and shown again here with sons Grahamand Russell, was once found handy as an "elves float" in a localChristmas parade. Graham Hobbs recalls as a youngster thedominant presence of the great "Foxy" Dance at most races, and thateternalSwingin' Safari
The following twophotos were taken at Ipswich in 1965. "Nev" Thompson enjoying a parade lap on his #50, and at a different date(with a bigger crowd) storming through a corner. Also, a snapshot of Neville's car on its trailer. NevThompson was from West Dereham, Norfolk, and had earlier raced inSenior F1's, and was a buddy of the famous Ron Pears from Wisbech.Nev's Senior was taken over by his brother Keith Thompson, thefather of Tim who kindly supplied the info and photos. Keith heldthe enviable record for rollovers from a ramp at Norwich.
