Scottish Hill Climb Championship round

Doune, 17 Jun 1973

Notes on the cars:

1. Marlyn Special [March 712M-21] (Sir Nicholas Williamson): Built as a hire car for March Engineering's F2 team and raced by Sten Gunnarson, James Hunt and François Migault. Sold to hillclimber Sir Nicholas Williamson for 1972, and fitted with a 2-litre BDA engine. In 1973, Williamson had the car converted by Lyncar into the "Marlyn Special, with F1 Cosworth DFV engine. Retained in this form in 1974. Bought from Williamson at the end of 1976 by fellow hillclimber Roger "Doc" Willoughby, and fitted with the 3.5-litre Buick V8 engine from his ex-Roy Lane Techcraft. Raced by Willoughby in this form in 1977, 1978 and 1979, then loaned to Alan Payne for the 1980 season. Willoughby reclaimed it for 1981 and raced it regularly until it crashed heavily into a stone wall at Wiscombe Park in September 1983, and Willoughby decided not to repair it.
2. McLaren M10B [400-07] (Richard Thwaites): New to David Good (Maidenhead, Berkshire) for the 1970 British Hill Climb Championship, fitted with a 5.5-litre Alan Smith Chevrolet. To Richard Thwaites (Dewsbury, West Yorkshire) for 1971, now using a 5-litre Chevy, and retained for 1972 when Thwaites was very successful in smaller hillclimbs. Retained again for 1973 when Thwaites used a 5.7-litre or 5.8-litre engine. Sold to Martyn Griffiths (Arley, Worcestershire) July 1974 and used in the British Hill Climb Championship in 1974 and 1975. Griffiths had a second M10B during 1975 having damaged the monocoque of one car at Pontypool at the end of April. Sold to Godfrey Crompton (Tenbury Wells, Worcestershire) 1976 for hillclimbs but crashed at Loton Park August 1976. Sold still in crashed condition to Keith Cox (Halesowen, West Midlands), rebuilt and again hillclimbed. To John Peskett (Leicester) 1977 and remained unused in his collection, with 400-06(A), M10A 300-16 and other F5000s. Later to restorer Rick Hall (Bourne, Lincolnshire), then to Jeffrey Pyett (Oundle, Peterborough) 1989, then Richard Eyre (Rayleigh, Essex) 1991. Sold by Eyre to David Mitchell (NZ) mid-2012 but the car remained with preparer Simon Hadfield (Shepshed, Leicestershire) through 2013. Shipped to New Zealand in May 2014.
3. Brabham BT36 [10] (Iain McLaren): New to John Wingfield (London NW11) in September 1971 and raced in libre with a 1.7-litre Felday BDA. Raced in F2 in 1972 with Felday's 1973cc BDA and then converted to F/Atlantic specification for one race at the end of the season. Sold to Iain McLaren (Broxburn, Scotland) for 1973, fitted with a 1.8-litre Alan Smith Cosworth FVC and used for hillclimbs and libre. Advertised by MRE (Bourne End, Buckingham) in October/November 1973, who had a 1930cc Racing Services BDA in stock at the same time. Sold to Chris Choat and John Hardesty for 1974 and used in libre with a 2-litre Racing Services BDA. Retained for 1975 until sold in the summer to Nick Overall, still with the same RS BDA. To Mike Gue for 1976. Then to Ian Henderson who has retained the car.
4. Brabham BT35 [44] (Gray Mickel): Husband-and-wife hillclimbers Gray and Agnes Mickel (Glasgow, Scotland) bought a new Brabham BT35 for hillclimbs in 1972. It was fitted with a Hart twin-cam and first appeared at the Kinkell Braes hill climb in March 1972. Retained by the Mickels for 1973 and used in British and Scottish championship hillclimbs, acquiring a Hart BDA engine some time during that year. The car was advertised by the Mickels in November 1973 and was bought by Jim Campbell (Bothwell, Scotland) 1974 who raced it until 1978. It was then used by Chris Dowson (Pershore, Worcestershire) in hillclimbs in 1979 and 1980. Fred Edwards (Warboys, Cambridgeshire) bought it in 1985 and used it in Monoposto and HSCC events until 1991 but it was then unused until bought by David Irwin (Evergreen, Colorado) in 2001. Irwin still had it in 2004. It was restored by J&L restorations and had moved to Don Roose (Bainbridge Island, Washington) by 2005. Advertised by Roose in 2007. Sold to Allen Nicholas (California) in December 2009 and used in west coast historic events. Sold by Nicholas to Peter McLaughlin (New Hampshire) in December 2014 but not raced. Sold to David Smoker (South Australia) in April 2016.
5. Hillman Imp (Barrogill Angus): Barrogill Angus (Thurso, Scotland) raced a "Shannon Imp" in Scottish hillclimbs from 1972 to 1974, a Hillman Imp with Shannon-tuned 998cc Imp engine in the under 1000cc special saloon class. In 1973, the car was said to be ex-Tony Charnell (MN 21 Jun 1973 p28).

Sources

Note that the identification of individual cars in these results is based on the material presented elsewhere in this site and may in some cases contradict the organisers' published results.

All comments, clarifications, corrections and additions are most welcome. Please email Allen (allen@oldracingcars.com) if you can help in any way with our research.

Individual sources for this event

AS 21 Jun 1973 p33