Rally day at Castle Combe
After a rather damp Goodwood Revival weekend, we were pleased of some sunshine as the Hamilton Classic and Motorsport roadshow headed to Castle Combe for the ever-popular Rallyday event. Thousands of rally fanatics rubbed shoulders with the sport’s celebrities and vehicles to watch the world’s fastest rally drivers take to the course in some of the best rally cars in motorsport, including M Sport’s Ford Fiesta WRC – officially the fastest rally car in history!
Rallyday organiser Tom Davis commented on the success of the event; “We have to thank, an awful lot of people for what they did to help make Saturday the amazing show it was – not least our sponsors COOPER TIRES, Reis Insurance, Super Pro and Palletforce. And then there’s M-Sport, who brought so many amazing cars and vans down.” Davis offered a special vote of thanks to all the car clubs, volunteers and people who brought their cars to show or run on track. “It never ceases to amaze me how many people bring their cars to Rallyday,” said Davis, “we had around 1,000 on show on Saturday and each and every one of those cars has real pedigree and interest – these guys are the backbone of Rallyday. All the national and club-level drivers are amazing, as are the volunteers and club members. We couldn’t do what we do without them. “We’ve already started thinking about next year and what we can do to expand and improve on Saturday, but it was a good one. My special memory of the day has to be seeing the tribute parade of cars to Colin McRae. Ten years ago, when Colin died, we lost a true legend and hero of our world and to see so many cars and fans remembering him was an emotional and special moment.”
Other rally stars present included Estonian Ott Tänak, Elfyn Evans and Jari-Matti Latvala as well as the 1984 World Champion Stig Blomqvist who was a huge hit. The track was graced by ‘flying Finn’ Harri Toivonen, Colin McRae’s co-driver Nicky Grist, British Rally Champion Keith Cronin and World Rallycross star Andreas Bakkerud.
Hamilton Classic and Motorsport once again supported this event with a trade stand exhibition and it was great to meet such an enthusiastic and friendly crowd throughout the one-day event.
