Motor Sport News Circuit Rally Championship

Cadwell Park 

3 Apr 2022

Cadwell Park hosted the final round of the Motor Sport News Circuit Rally Championships, the Alan Healy Memorial Stages, last weekend. The previous six rounds had not delivered a runaway leader as teams dipped in and out of the competition.

Mechanical problems and contact with the circuit furniture resulted in dropped points for some teams, so it was all to play for over the last eight stages.

We went along to capture the action on what turned out to be a rather pleasant day in the Lincolnshire Wolds. If you have not been to Cadwell before the paddock is a tarmac and grass area to the left after a short drive from the main entrance.

Here the 80 or so cars were parked up so we had a look round and the teams were happy to chat about the forthcoming day's rallying.

I have mentioned it before but Circuit Rallying can be a confusing sport for the regular track spectator. Generally you will go to your favourite area and watch the action, maybe moving to a different location during the day. 

When spectating at Circuit Rallying you cannot guarantee that "your spot" will be available or that there will be anything to see. Let me explain, there are usually four different track configurations, each run twice, to give you eight stages during a meeting; nine at Cadwell for the final meeting.

These stages may not be going round the recognised way, clockwise in Cadwell's case, and they might not be using all of the track. Pit, paddock access and safety roads can and do get used to mix it up.

The official programme will have all of the details and is well worth investing in especially if you plan on taking some photos. 

I only got caught out once just after lunch on stage 6, having chatted to a few friends during the break, a hurried snack and a quick look at the programme confirmed that the cars were going to be using Hall Bends the correct way having been going the wrong way all morning.

The pictures from the morning were very nice, the lighting is correct when the cars are going the "wrong way".

So, off I headed to what was a deserted part of the track, alarm bells anyone! The distinctive sound of a high performance rally car started to reverberate round the trees. I got ready to shoot. The distinctive sound of a high performance rally car faded into the distance without appearing.

I had a word with my self that I won't repeat here, and walked up to the café to see the next car take the pit road to the start / finish straight. Have I missed something? I checked the programme a little closer this time. No, there was a split at the top of the mountain on the second lap, I scuttled back to Halls just in time!

Enough of my first world problems so who is the 2021-22 MSN Circuit Rally Champion?

Neil Roskell in the appropriately numbered one car the Ford Fiesta R5 took the honours with Co-Driver Andrew Roughead by the slenderest of margins - one point.

However, they didn’t win on the day. Barry Morris in the distinctive Darrian T90 car #4 co-driven by Tom Hutchings were fast all day and were crowned the Alan Healy Memorial Stages winners.

John Griffiths in car #3 another Ford Fiesta R5 co driven by Nigel Wetton came in second on the day. 

We had a chat about our car of the day and this was a tough one.

When picking the car we were spoilt for choice - the old school Fords especially the Mk1, the wide Mini and Scoobies were all great to watch and it was like a history lesson of rallying as they flashed through the wooded sweeping bends of Cadwell Park.

However, our car of the day had to be the MG Metro 6R4 driven by Mark Holmes and Craig Simkiss. There is just something about that car.

The final shot of the day is Tony Robinson and Mark Jones in the Skoda Fabia at the bottom of the mountain, hitting the curb then one of the tyres.

It looked like they were emulating the hey days of British Touring Cars Championship. Great stuff! It wasn’t just me that appreciated it, the crowd loved it!

Thanks to RPW Photography for helping out on this report which you can share on Social Media.