Classical Gas
www.classictrials.co.uk
November 2001 - Part 1
Arnold's Autumn Antic's
Arnold Lane being presented with his trophy by Clerk of the Course Alan Davies
 | Arnold Lane FTD at Falcon's 30 September Autotest |
| Owen Turner non-starter after Rugby injury. |
| You could have any sports car you liked as long as it was green. |
| It was wet but we didn't get too wet! |
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Robin Howard - A series powered Marlin - Robin was another one to make a long journey to Upper Caldecote. He was really flying towards the end and set the fastest time on the last two tests. |
Pete Crawford - Triump Vitesse powered Marlin - Pete was giving his early series car it's competition debut. Pete plans to use his car on the trials hills. |
Keith Oakes - Dutton - Keith motored down from Rugby to compete in his Classic Trials prepared Dutton Phaeton. Look at the ground clearance compared to Ross's Morgan! |
Ross Nuten - Morgan Plus 8 - Not surprisingly Ross struggled to find grip with all that power on the slippery surface and is pictured here well and truly sideways! |
There were thirteen entries for Falcon’s final autotest in the summers foot and mouth shortened series. We were saved from the un-lucky number on the day by a couple of non-starters including Owen Turner who had picked up an injury playing rugby the day before. We were also without our host Neil Bray, who was attending his daughters engagement party down in the West Country. The competitors were very grateful to Neil and Allison for letting them play in their back garden.
It was an interesting entry. There was only one double driver so we had ten different cars. 50% of these braved the showery day in the open car class and to their credit nobody raised a roof all day! Keith Pettit and Ross Nuten were familiar faces. Keith was driving his usual Sprite but Ross forsook his Dellow and bought along his Morgan Plus Eight to do battle with the slippery conditions.
Keith Oakes came down from Rugby in his Classic Trials prepared Dutton Phaeton. We had two Marlins, Robin Howard’s familiar SWB "A" series machine in which he does so well in PCT’s and Pete Crawford giving his in his older version of the Marque it’s competition debut.
Pete’s car is one of the first series of Marlin’s produced, with a Triumph Vitesse six cylinder engine running on twin Stromberg’s and Triumph Herald front suspension rather than the Marina torsion bar arrangement that Paul Moorhouse moved to later in the roadsters life. One final interesting thing was that all the five open cars were British Racing Green!
It was the closed cars that set the pace though, with old hand Murray MacDonald setting fastest time on the first test ahead of Graham Raeburn in his Mini and Arnold Lane in the families yellow Nova. The open cars fought back on the second test with Keith Pettit fastest ahead of Arnold Lane and Robin Howard.
It was consistency that was to win the day though and Arnold put in a consistent set of times all day to set FTD. Murray MacDonald set the highest number of fastest test times but ended the day some five seconds slower.
Keith Pettit was third fastest overall and best open car. Keith was followed home by Graham Raeburn , who didn’t set any fastest times but was very consistent all day and Robin Howard who warmed up as the day went on and was quickest on the final two tests. Peter Manning won the family battle coming home in front of David but both were beaten by Bob Tatum in his diminutive Fiat Panda who went well all day and set fastest time on test six.
| Arnold Lane | Nova | 386.27 | FTD |
| Martin Cheshire | Non Starter | ||
| Graham Raeburn | Mini | 402.83 | 2nd Class A/B |
| Peter Manning | Mini | 423.72 | |
| Owen Turner | Non Starter | ||
| David Manning | Mini | 431.80 | |
| Bob Tatum | Fiat | 417.36 | |
| Murray MacDonald | Golf GTi | 391.06 | 1st Class A/B |
| Ross Nuten | Morgan Plus 8 | 528.48 | |
| Keith Oakes | Dutton | 476.53 | |
| Robin Howard | Marlin | 404.06 | Best Novice |
| Pete Crawford | Marlin | 474.34 | |
| Keith Pettit | AH Sprite | 396.25 | 1st Class D |
