North Humberside Motor Club Cadwell Stages Rally and NHMC Cadwell Junior Rally

Cadwell Park - 19 November 2023

Cadwell Park’s last event of the year usually goes off with a bang, quite literally as it’s a Circuit Rally followed by a fireworks display. The PistonClick team went along to check out the MGJ Engineering Circuit Rally Championship round 2 run by the North Humberside Motor Club and the Junior Rally which was running alongside the main event.

This is our review from a spectator photographer’s view point with a few observations as a motorsport fan thrown in for good measure, so you have a good overview of the event if you decide to go to a round in the future.

First to appear on the stages were the Junior Rally or Formula 1000 teams. This championship gives young drivers between the ages of 14-17 the chance to take part in competitive rallying over eight rounds. Using cars up to 1000cc, it’s dominated by the cars your Nan will head off to the shops in - Nissan Micra, Citron C1 and Peugeot 107 are the “weapons” of choice in this class.

Not the most exciting motorsports vehicles but great reliable machines to develop your rallying skills without breaking the bank account of Mum and Dad

The Junior Rally led the way for most of the day taking on the eight stages before the MGJ Engineering Circuit Rally Championship cars. For the spectator photographer this was helpful as it got you warmed up by taking a few pictures of the Junior Rally before the faster cars that followed. And did we need warming up!

It was a cold and damp Sunday at Cadwell which made the track surface a bit greasy so there were a few twitchy moments for the crews as they were struggling for grip.

The R5 Fiestas, Hyundais, Skodas with the standard Rally car stalwarts, WRX and Mk2 Escorts attacked the circuit with much more vigour. With around 80 crews entering the event there was plenty of different rally cars going past, so lots of action and loads of interesting cars to photograph.

This being a circuit rally with eight stages there was plenty of opportunity to get images from different view points around the track. 

The stages were run twice before being changed, so prior planning is the order of the day. I started off at the top of the track at Park corner as this would be the only time the cars would be taking that corner in the “wrong” direction.

I had completed my planning the night before by downloading the stage maps from the NHMC website and had picked Park as my start location as the sun would be to my back. That didn’t really matter on the day as the sun didn’t make an appearance! For the other shots I had considered I adapted my plan as the day progressed. 

My next location was just past Charlies where there was a straw bail chicane to slow the cars down. A quick WhatsApp message and I met up with my shooting partner for the day, David Harbey, a long time contributor to the PistonClick site. Pleasantries exchanged and after a brief discussion on what we are going to do over the winter months it was back to capturing the action.

In my head I wanted a shot with one of the cars clipping the bails with straw flying, and whilst we were chatting at least three cars lost their wing mirrors so I was confident I would get the shot. 

Joshua and Kimberley Wallis in the Honda Civic Type R duly obliged. I hung around for the next stage as the chicane was still being used before a change in the stage layout and this area is great for spectating.

Charlies is one of the highest spots at Cadwell so walking up to the apex of the corner gives you a great view of most of the track and the opportunity to take a different type of picture.

I have mentioned in previous reports that if you don’t have prior knowledge of the stages you need to grab a programme when entering the circuit. It is very much needed for this championship, not just for photographer but also the spectator.

You might know Cadwell like the back of your hand but if the stage doesn’t use the part of the track that you have walked to you will miss out on the action and feel rather foolish when the roar of engines is heard and nothing appears where you are standing. Been there, done that!

Using the access roads as well as the main track in both directions does give the spectator photographer a different set of images to take away from this meeting rather than a standard motorsport event at the mini Nurburgring ring. The officials that planned the event had, I’m sure, considered the crowd so they could maximise the fans’ enjoyment.

The spectators were spread out around the full length of the track and a few like me used their cars to get to the less accessible locations - some were happy to sit in the cars track side with the heaters on drinking tea while watching the action. 

When I had had my fill of the furthest reaches of Cadwell I headed for the main car park which was quite full by lunch time, and made my way to the mountain complex.

This is one of the best places to spectate from at Cadwell and is also a great location to take a few snaps as there are multiple angles of the track within a few 100 metres. There is also the bonus of food and drink stalls here. I didn’t partake but it wouldn’t be a motorsport event without the heady smell of fried onions and unburnt hydrocarbons. 

Just up from the mountain is a good spot for a nice panning shot and you can see the cars going in both directions. On this and the next stage the cars would change from going round the track the right way to the wrong way. 

One of the cars heading the wrong way down Coppice was #31, a Ford Escort Mk2 crewed by Gordon Davies and Jack Morris. Jack sent in a few words about his day.

Competitors View Car 31- Gordon Davies/Jack Morris - Ford Escort MK2

“We set out from the start with the aim of just getting a decent finish around the mid 30's to help towards our ANWCC Championship Campaign. To meet our objective meant we had to avoid something as a simple spin which could lose us time! This was Gordon's first time at the venue, my 2nd time, we picked the pace up throughout the day and really enjoyed the night stages and were able to push on throughout them.”

“We achieved our objectives, coming away with 30th overall and 8th in Class! We would like to thank the organisers for providing us with a well run fun day out.”

I spent too long at the mountain and didn’t make it to the rest of the track and all too soon the sun had disappeared below the horizon. I grabbed a few shots in the gloom and headed home leaving the ever growing crowd to enjoy the fireworks display.

Photographic Post Script

Cadwell is a great track for the spectator photographer as you can get close to the action, therefore a fancy long lens is not required for most of the circuit. The standard 70-200mm sports lens will work well if you stay in the Hall bends to the Mountain complex. Check out our photographic guide to Cadwell Park if you are unsure if where these locations are.

At the two high points of the track, Charlies and Park, you will need a long lens. David and I had different approaches to getting that extra reach. I used a Nikon D500 which is a 20 megapixels crop sensor camera matched to a Nikon 200-400mm f4 lens. David used the Nikon D850 a full frame sensor with 45.7 megapixels and a Nikon 500mm f5.6E PF ED VR AF-S lens. Both produce similar results after post processing, compression and uploading to the internet.

We both used the latest Nikon 70-200mm f2.8 for the rest of the track. David captured Daniel Bird and Nigel Barber in the #8 Ford Fiesta R5 with an interesting body modification after visiting the green suff instead of staying on the grey stuff. There were, as can be expected in any rally, a few casualties.

To finish off our review of the NHMC Stages here are a few of the cars that will need a bit of T-Cut and elbow grease. 

Hopefully all of the competitors and cars will be fixed and out on track for the next round at Donington Park on the 3rd December 2023. The PistonClick team will be there to capture the action come rain or shine!