VSCC Race Meeting at Donington Park (2023)

Another great VSCC race meeting at Donington Park; being British we have to mention the weather: scorching sun to torrential rain and back again! The rain was so heavy that the penultimate race had to be cancelled and it was only by waiting for a long period beyond the scheduled finish time that the last race got started, albeit with reduced length.

This was a rather special race and features in most of the photo gallery here: the Longstone Tyres Light Car race. This was only the second time that the Light Car race had been run this century! It was revived in 2021 at Oulton Park and everyone agreed that it must be repeated- it’s like nothing else, anywhere in the world! I think that it was last run prior to WW2 before these two modern “revivals”, when some of these small cars were still fairly new.

When I reported on the 2021 race I tried to define exactly what a “light car” is and the best I could come up with is that it ain’t heavy! Here is what I wrote at the time:

Firstly, what is a “light car”? Wiki says:

A paragraph in the Autocar Handbook, sixth edition (1914) states:

“As a matter of fact no definition of a light car exists beyond the fact that the R.A.C. (Royal Automobile Club) has so far limited the size of engine for light cars in trails (an early form of rallying) to 1400cc”.It goes on to state:” Nor indeed would it be very easy to devise a definition since there is between the light car and the large car no great gulf fixed, but merely a line of demarcation”.There was a specification for the light car promulgated in 1912 by the ACU (Auto-Cycle Union), by which engine capacity was limited to 1,500 cc (91.5 cu in). Also in 1912, cars in Europe with engines smaller than 1,100 cc (67 cu in) were classified for motorsport purposes as cyclecars.^[2]

So; that’s pretty clear then… there is not much of a “definition”! My interpretation is that these were the sort of cars produced early in the 20^th century to cater for motor-cyclists who wanted the relative safety of three, or four, wheels and possibly had now got a couple of kids. They would undoubtably not have been wealthy people because there were already all manner of larger cars to cater for those folks.

Secondly, who are Longstone Tyres? Readers in the UK will probably know but unless you have an older car requiring the correct type of tyres (tires?) the name might not be familiar to you. The best way to explain them is to link their website: https://www.longstonetyres.co.uk Under the leadership of well-known Vintage racer Dougal Cawley they have established themselves as one of the premier suppliers of “old car” tyres in the UK, if not Europe.

Dougal and friends decided to revive the Light Car race and having had many expressions of interest, stump up the cash to get the race on the VSCC calendar; the number of entries surprised everyone, cars being unearthed from years of slumber in barns and sheds and many people who had never even considered racing went through the processes required to get their cars entered and themselves licenced to race.

Dougal again decided to sponsor the race this year as there was so much interest and enthusiasm, this resulted in quite a few “new” old cars being dragged out; many of the cars were various types of Austin 7 but there were also some intriguing odd-balls. For example, can you imagine why a belt-driven tandem two-seater, with the driver steering from the rear didn’t catch on? That was the Bedelia, from France, and there were two in this year’s race!

The rules for the race are rather odd, the first three finishers get disqualified because they are obviously driving too fast and are too anxious to win! You can imagine the rest. It was great to see these tiny cars sometimes four abreast, drivers looking across at each other to see who is creeping past who. There is a sizeable hill at Donington and it did look like one or two might be struggling to get up there but I think they all made it; I’m not sure what might have happened if a Ford Model T had been entered, I know it was common practice back in the day that if the drive bands were slipping, the answer was to reverse up steeper hills. I’m reasonably sure that even this might have been allowed and there might have been points given for ingenuity!

I do hope that we can repeat this spectacle in a couple of years and I guess those that partook of copious amounts of Champagne would agree (it was drinks all round for the finishers ,and anyone standing close by, courtesy of Longstone).

There should have been nine races in total but, as reported, one had to be pulled, these were for: