HSCC Historic Roadsports Championship

These four cars competed in the HSCC Historic Roadsports Championship race at the HSCC's meeting at Oulton Park in June 2001.

There are three Alfa Romeos and a Lotus. On the far left is Justin Murphy's 1964 Alfa Romeo Giulia Spider which was produced from 1962 to 1966 and has a 4-cylinder inline 1,570cc engine. The yellow car next to it is  the 1961 Alfa Romeo Giulietta SZ of Nick Savage which was produced between 1959 and 1962 an has a 4-cylinder inline 1,290cc engine. Next to that is the 1955 Lotus Mk VI of Stewart Couch which is the first production model that Colin Chapman made and was available in kit form for customers to install their own engine. About 110 were built and they were designed to be fitted with various engines, this one having the popular Ford 1,172cc 4-cylinder inline side valve unit. The blue car on the right is Peter Shaw's 1959 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Sprint, produced from 1954 to 1965, and has the same 1,290cc engine as Nick Savage's car.

Knickerbrook, Oulton Park

On Monday I showed a photograph of a Bugatti near the Knickerbrook Corner at Oulton Park. I was a schoolboy of 13 when I first went to Oulton Park and was curious, as any schoolboy would be, about how the corner had come by this name.

This, courtesy of Google earth, is the Oulton Park circuit. Knickerbrook Corner is the one at the bottom of the picture in the middle. Above it is a narrow pond between Knickerbrook Corner and Cascades Corner. When the circuit was originally laid out in 1953 the loop between Cascades and Knickerbrook did not exist - the circuit carried straight on, though I'm not sure which side of the pond it ran so Knickerbrook Corner may have been some way to the left away from its current postion. The loop was added in 1954 and since then two chicanes have been introduced on the long straight from Shell Oils Corner at the extreme right to cut the speed of the cars (and motor bikes) before they get to Knickerbrook.

Here are three Lotus Elans during a race at the Gold Cup meeting in August 2012 exiting Hislop's Chicane and going towards Knickerbrook Corner. The cars are driven by Paul Tooms, Peter Shaw and Vicky Brooks.

Here, a lap or two later, are the Elans of Paul Tooms and Peter Shaw going round the Knickerbrook Corner.

This is the actual 'Knicker Brook' - the circuit is on the other side of the barrier and tyre wall you can see at the top of the photograph and it's the bottom side of the circuit as you see it in the top picture From here it flows underneath the circuit into the pond and from there underneath the circuit at Cascades and into Oulton Lake.

As to the story of how it got its name.......Well, I don't know if the story is true but it's said that it was given this name by 'Blaster' Bates, an explosives and demolition expert. He had been engaged to remove the stumps of some beech trees before the circuit was built. At the first explosion a courting couple were seen to run from the vicinity of the brook in a state of disarray and afterwards an item of ladies' underwear was found there, leading to the naming of the corner.