FIA Masters Historic Festival – Brands Hatch 25th May 2014

Brands Hatch are celebrating 50 years since first hosting the British Grand Prix back in July of 1964, a race which featured drivers such as Hill, Surtees, Brabham, Hailwood and McLaren – all names which subsequently gave name to features on the legendary circuit. The race was won by Jim Clark in his evocative yellow-striped, British racing green Lotus 25, fighting off Graham Hill’s BRM and John Surtees’ rather more distant Ferrari to top off an all-British podium.

After kicking off the season at the Circuit du Catalunya, Barcelona, the Masters comes to the famous cambers, curves and gradients in the Kentish countryside. The main event day saw a great sunny Sunday after a rather rainy start the day before and thousands were out enjoying the action on and off track, including some fine static displays of classic road and racing cars.

The first Tony Brise Invitational Formula Ford race opened the day as I managed to view the garages and sneak through onto the pit lane.

Next up was the Masters Pre-66 Touring cars, made up of a huge field of 34 cars racing 60s-style. Full of tyre screeching and body rolling, the mini-endurance race included pit stops to change drivers. The late double F1 champion Jim Clark was well known for his exploits in the small Lotus Cortina, which was represented today alongside big Ford Falcons and Mustangs, BMW TiSAs and the diminutive Mini Coopers sliding round the bends. Leo Voyazides won his second race of the weekend by taking the chequered flag on Sunday in the Falcon with Phil Keen in another Falcon taking an amazing second from the back of the grid and Roger Wills in the Mercury Cyclone Comet in third.

As the touring cars were speeding round the Brabham Straight, engineers in the paddock were starting up brutal 3-litre Cosworth DFV V8 engines, in preparation for the main event – the first of two FIA Masters Historic Formula One races throughout the day. Featured machinery today ranged from the early ‘70s to the early ‘80s, including a 1973 Jackie Stewart Tyrell Ford, a Ronnie Peterson Lotus and two James Hunt McLarens. Every car must run in its period livery and the formation grid harked back to an era of cigarette and alcoholic drinks sponsors like John Player Special, Malboro and Martini, and the crazy wings and air duct designs matching the screaming V8s. Seeing the runners thundering around leafy GP circuit was an emotional sight. Each of today’s two races were won by Steve Hartley in the orange and white 1982 Arrows A4, followed by Simon Fish’s 1980 Ensign N180 and an Alan Jones era Williams FW07 piloted by Mike Wrigley.

Just before lunch, the glorious sight of Stirling Moss Trophy pre-‘61 sports cars and sports racers whizzed around the track, including a stunning day-glo red Ferrari 246S matched by a Maserati 250S, 300S and 200SI, Lolas, the funny Cooper bobtail and a deliciously silky black Aston Martin.

Incidentally, Stirling Moss is president of the Historic Grand Prix Cars Association and it was the pre-’65 grand prix cars that took to the track next with 1.5L and 2.5L epoch F1 machines as well as smaller-capacity ones built to F2 regulations. The fabulous line-up included a rather outclassed 1934 Maserati 8CM 3020 and a more able 1952 A6GCM, Cooper-Climaxes such as the red-nosed, powder green ex-Stirling Moss T51, a brace of Brabhams, a Lotus 18 in which Stirling won the 1961 Monaco and German GP, a stunning 1956 Monaco Grand Prix-winning Maserati 250F and the stand-out car, a 2.5L V6 Ferrari 246 Dino, in which American Phil Hill triumphed in the 1960 Italian GP at Monza, the last front-engined car to win an F1 World Championship race.

Next, in Sunday’s Gentlemen Drivers race, Mike Whitaker in the TVR Griffith fended off a tin-topped AC Cobra, with third going to a Jaguar E-type.

The competitions took a pause halfway through the afternoon as we stopped to remember Sir Jack Brabham who died just days earlier. The three-time Formula One World Champion and team leader was remembered in a parade which also featured son David and grandson in Brabham F1 cars.

The decibels rose once again past acceptable limits for FIA Masters Historic Sports Cars, for Le Mans-style sports cars and ‘Group 4’ period cars from 1962 up to 1974. The sports prototypes and GT cars taking Paddock Hill Bend was indeed a superb sight, with examples of Chevrons, Corvettes, Abarth Orsellas, Porsches, Lolas, Fords and even a roaring De Tomaso Pantera supercar all represented rumbling around the track.

As the remaining crowd started making their way home, the day was rounded off by the 1958-60 Formula Junior Lurani Trophy race, the Dutch tourers and GTs of the NK HTGT series followed by the second Tony Brise Invitational Formula Ford race to close the day.

Sunburn, ringing ears and race fumes; £25 well spent!

2014 FIA Masters Historic Formula One Championship Calendar
April 4-6 – Barcelona, Catalan Classic
May 24-25 – Brands Hatch, Masters Historic Festival
July 4-6 – Brno, Historic Festival
July 25-27 – Silverstone, Silverstone Classic
August 8-10 – Nurburgring, Oldtimer GP
August 29-31- Zandvoort, Historic Grand Prix
September 19-21 – Spa, Spa Six Hours
October 10-12 – Jerez, Masters Historic Festival