30 years of motorsport memories - 1958-88 – Part 2

Report by David Harbey

7 January 2022

Welcome to the second part of my wander through my late father’s motorsport photographs. In the first part, we started in 1958 with a Kodak “box brownie” and had moved onto an Ilford Sportsman in 1965.

The latter did excellent service capturing family holidays and motorsport alike for getting on for 20 years. Now, it’s 1981 and time to spread our wings a little.

Any chap interested in motor racing in the fifties would have been very conscious of the Le Mans 24 Hours alongside the Grand Prix races.

Success for Jaguar and British drivers, alongside the romance of racing twice round the clock, made it a “must do” for many fans. So, in 1981, Mum and Dad joined the thousands of British fans at La Sarthe, in their case as part of a holiday in France.

Access to the pits featured and they happened to be watching near where one of the glorious Ferrari 512BB’s race came to an end.

It’s also where he took, what is for me, his greatest shot. Technically it probably wins no prizes (I think he was still using the Ilford Sportsman at this stage) but this shot of the Martini liveried Lancia Beta Monte Carlo at the Forest Esses with the marshals in the foreground and the fairground in the background absolutely encompasses Le Mans for me.

For 1982, it became a family affair with the first of my 26 trips (and counting, I hope). Somewhere around this time, Dad bought his first Canon SLR but I confess to not having any more details.

He thoroughly enjoyed his wanders through the pits – perhaps his training as a mechanic helped here.

There’s also evidence of a shift in loyalty to Lancia. He’d left Jaguar Rover Triumph as it was subsumed into British Leyland and his company car at new employer ICS, who provided computerised stock control systems to the motor trade, was a Lancia Beta 2000ES. 80,000 miles in two years and nary a fault and no rust.

In 1981, as he left ICS to follow his vocation as a Methodist minister; he purchased a Lancia Delta and thus confirmed lifelong honorary membership of the Italian Car Fan Club.

Touring holidays continued to feature and, overnighting somewhere in the middle of France, the car park included a Lancia 037 and Talbot Samba. I reckon that it is the 1984 Rallye Nationale de Maurienne in the Dijon area.

Training for his new vocation took up time, but by 1985, it was time for a second family trip to Le Mans. By now Group C was in full swing and Jaguar was back – in the guise of the Group 44 Jaguar XJR5.

The Lancias were quick but fragile; likewise, that year, the works Porsches.

The paddock provided the usual range of shots including Derek Bell and – now MSV supremo - Jonathan Palmer.

The privateer Porsches had the upper hand in the race with the Joest NewMan car beating the Richard Lloyd Racing Porsche to the win.

I was driving a Golf GTI at the time so my loyalties lay with the RLR car which carried GTI Engineering support. I have since seen the Italian light …

The British Grand Prix that year was at Silverstone and had moved to Sunday which meant that we made the trip for qualifying on Saturday.

In doing so, we got to see Keke Rosberg’s fastest qualifying lap in F1 history which stood for 17 years – at an average speed of 160.9 mph.

There was also a trip to Oulton Park for a clubbie featuring Porsches, ModSaloons and the Lister XJ Challenge.

To finish off the year and no doubt inspired by the debut of the Lancia Delta S4 on the RAC Rally, it looks as if there was a quick trip to what was probably either Chatsworth or Donington.

Come 1986 and it’s the RAC Rally done properly with a road trip round the country. There’s Hamsterley Forest with a Manta and 6R4 to get the pulses racing.

There’s the ford further into Hamsterley …

There’s close up action as the cars come up to the start of the stage … or standing in a ditch for the low-down action shot of a 6R4 …

There’s the glorious British countryside as a back drop … I just love the snow-covered hills as a backdrop to the Peugeot.

A shorter visit to the RAC Rally in 1987 – the first year of Group A regulations, but still including a Lancia in Martini colours. I’m in one of the shots – they wouldn’t let you stand there today !

Of course, it doesn’t always go to plan.

1988 saw a return to Le Mans and for what a race ! Jaguar’s brilliant win in front of 280,000 spectators.

Later in the year, there was a first trip to the Isle of Man – not for the TT, although the course was driven - but for a holiday to include the Manx International Rally. It perhaps helped that Tabaton was there in his integrale.

There was a night stage around Castletown and Colin McRae was in his Vauxhall Nova  – no panel left undamaged – phase !

There’s 17 minutes of coverage here.

Patrick Snijers took the win in his glorious BMW M3 – although I suspect Dad would have preferred a win for Tabaton.

We are not finished yet – the year ends with the RAC Rally – I suspect that the snowy stages are up north somewhere – and with a glorious sunset to boot !

Derek Bell, accompanied by Mike Nicholson, were also competing in the Vauxhall Astra GTE #15. Nicholson recounts in his book “Listen to Me!” how he took part in a few Brailsford and District Motor Club events in a Ford Thames van early in his co-driving career (see part one for the connection).

Of course, there was also the mighty Lancia Integrale. Number 2 driven by Markku Alén and Ilkka Kivimäki who would go onto win the 1988 Lombard RAC Rally. That year the Rally covered 4514.35km of which 602.60km were on gravel!

The final shots from 1988 look more like Wales

Postscript

After this point, there’s much less motorsport photography; partly due to a shift away from slides to prints. There’s a return to Spa in 1992 which has changed markedly against 1968 and will change much more over following years.

I mentioned in part 1, that the Harbey family were originally from the Bourne area of Lincolnshire before moving to Derbyshire in the early 1900s. BRM, Dad’s favoured team in the sixties were based in Bourne.

In 2012, there was a celebration of Graham Hill’s 1962 World Championship win in the BRM with a parade in the town and thus tickets were booked. By now, Dad had gone digital with an Olympus u820 and these are some of his memories from the day.

Trips to Le Mans continued and on occasions became a grandfather, father and son weekend. In 2015, Dad joined us for a final time.

While some of us headed off around the circuit, he was happy to sit in the Tribune with a perfect view of the Audi pits, the big TV screen opposite and listening to the commentary on Radio Le Mans.

Goodwood was also a favourite – whether Revival or Members Meeting. At the 2016 Revival, he was determined to attend the communion service they have on Sunday at 8am.

We made it in good time and, perhaps for a man of the cloth, it was a fitting way to start his last day at motor racing. The photo below was taken of the service by Steve Tarrant. Within weeks of this photo, Dad was taken ill and passed away peacefully.

Thanks for everything, Dad

Albert Harbey 1935 - 2016