Thursday, 8 October 2015

It's Castle Combe again

Castle Combe surely was the place to be for us folks, last weekend and the weekend before. First we had the Mini Marcos' 50th Anniversary party (Stuart Watson's lovely picture report here); then Gary Marlow and Pete Flanagan took their cars (Mk1 Mini Marcos and Janspeed Unipower GT) to the Autumn Classic at the same venue. And photographing Stuart was there, too! Pete wrote: "We had a great day and drove the Unipower round the track that it spent most of it's early racing life for the first time in 48 years. The Marcos suffered from a dodgy fuel pump so didn't make the track for the racing car parade but Gary's done a fine job of recommissioning a very original car that's essentially the same as it was when it last raced 45 years ago or so! The crowd were very appreciative of both cars. We met a guy who was working on one of the Jag Mk2s entered in one of the races who had owned two Unipowers back in the day which he remembered very well. Commentator Marcus Pye was also very complementary about both cars and pointed out that BTCC star and now TV commentator himself Tim Harvey is actually Brian Harvey's nephew (who owned my Unipower). Small world eh?" Indeed. Thanks Pete!

Dynamic derivative duo: Pete's Unipower and Gary's Marcos at Castle Combe
Picture courtesy Stuart Watson 

Castle Combe was local to where this Unipower spent much of its early life
Picture courtesy Stuart Watson 

Gary's Mini Marcos is a very early car and is basically unchanged since being built
Picture courtesy Stuart Watson 

It's a racer, so like Pete's Unipower no registration plates here. And tiny lights!
Picture courtesy Stuart Watson

Note the front air dam at Pete's car, which was added after the Spanish GP in July 1967 to stabilize the front end. The aero development was done in the MIRA wind tunnel and is reportedly one of the first uses, if not the first use of a front air dam on a production car
Picture courtesy Stuart Watson 

2 comments:

  1. We also had a great day at Castle Combe, fab racing and some amazing static displays.

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  2. the Unipower is mentioned in Autosport this week!

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