1928 Bugatti Type 35B

This was one of the competitors in the Richard Seaman Memorial Vintage Trophy Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club’s meeting at Oulton Park in June 1965.

It’s the 1928 Bugatti Type 35B of John Horton and has a 2,261cc supercharged 8-cylinder inline engine. The Type 35 was the most successful of the pre-war Bugattis and about 37 examples of the Type 35B were produced in the mid to late 1920s.

1929 Lovell Elkhart Sprint Special

This is one of the cars that took part in the Richard Seaman Memorial Trophy Race for Vintage Racing Cars at the Vintage Sports Car Club’s meeting at Oulton Park in July 1987.

It’s the 1929 Lovell Elkhart Sprint Special of Nick Leston with a 3½ litre engine, and the programme of the event had this note about the car: 

'…..another American racer with a Model A Ford engine is Leston’s Lovell Elkhart Sprint Racing Car, which also wins the prize for the car with the longest name!'

Here’s the car at Lodge Corner during the race.

1936/37 ERA R14B

I took this photograph at Foulstons chicane during the Richard Seaman Memorial Trophy race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's meeting at Oulton Park in June 1993.

It's Donald Day's 1936/37 ERA R14B, originally built for pre-war voiturette racing with a supercharged 1½ litre straight-6 engine based on the one that powered the Riley 9, but later changed for a 2 litre supercharged engine. It was one of eight ERA cars that took part in this race.

1933 Barnato Hassan Bentley

This was one of the competitors in the Richard Seaman Memorial Vintage Trophy Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's meeting at Oulton Park in June 1971.

It's Keith Schellenberg's 1933 Barnato Hassan Bentley with a 6-cylinder inline 7,983cc engine. Walter Hassan was a mechanic at Bentley in the 1920s at the time when their 3 litre, 4½ litre and 6.6 litre cars were a force to be reckoned with, winning the Le Mans 24 Hour race 4 years in succession from 1927 to 1930. He had been mechanic to Woolf Barnato and when the Bentley Company went into liquidation and was taken over by Rolls Royce in 1931 he went to work for Barnato. In 1933 he designed a new chassis frame and built a car round this and the 6½ litre (actually 6,597cc) engine from the Bentley ‘Old Number One’ Speed Six that won the Le Mans 24 Hour race in 1929 and 1930, and this car became known as the Barnato Hassan Special. It was raced at Brooklands, but not by Woolf Barnato who didn’t race there following the death of Clive Dunfee in a race in 1932. After serious damage to the 6½ litre engine at Brooklands in 1934 it was replaced by an 8 litre (7,983cc) unit and the car was rebuilt as a single seater in 1936, in which form Oliver Bertram lapped Brooklands with it at 143.11 mph – just short of John Cobb’s 143.44 mph in the Napier Railton.

1926 Bugatti Type 37

This car competed in the Richard Seaman Memorial Vintage Trophy Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's meeting at Oulton Park in June 1981.

It's the 1926 Bugatti Type 37 of Wolf Zeuner, one of 290 cars built between 1926 and 1930. The Type 37 has a 4-cylinder inline 1,496cc engine and Wolf Zeuner's car has the unsupercharged version of that engine, as do about about three-quarters of the Type 37s built. The photograph was taken at Foster's corner, just before Knickerbrook on the Oulton Park short circuit.

1950 Frazer Nash Mille Miglia

This is a photograph I took at the VSCC's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies Meeting at Oulton Park in June 1975.

It's a 1950 Frazer Nash Mille Miglia, one of eleven cars that were built, all with the 6-cylinder inline 1,971cc Bristol engine - although the DVLA record says that the engine of OPL 2 is 1,998cc. The car is chassis 421/100/118 and an article in Frazer Nash's Chain Gang Gazette in August 2004 says this about the car:

'The third MM (chassis 118) was completed for the Earls Court Show in October 1950 and the following month sold via Tony Crook to a Philip Strutton. Painted maroon (a popular colour for MMs) it changed hands each year but was used in only a few minor competitive events until purchased by Gerry Burgess in 1954 for use in rallies including the Alpine and Tulip, when it was painted white. It was then raced in different colours by various owners up to the 1970s and is now owned and kept in beautiful condition by Frank Sytner.'

The Frazer Nash chassis record says that the colour of the car in 2009 was 'now metallic Jaguar grey' which is the colour the car was when I photographed it at Donington Park in 2003 and is the same colour I've seen it in more recent photographs, although the DVLA seems to consider it to be silver.

1959 Lotus 16

This car took part in the Allcomers Scratch Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Oulton Park in June 1973.

It's the 1959 Lotus 16 of John Roberts, a car previously campaigned in historic racing by Bill Wilks. The first Grand Prix race for the Lotus 16 was the 1958 French Grand Prix where the car's 1,964cc Coventry Climax engine proved to be severely underpowered for the very fast Reims circuit and Graham Hill retired the car on lap 19 with an overheating engine. By 1959 the car was fitted with the 2,467cc Coventry Climax FPF engine, but the front-engined cars were now outclassed by the rear-engined ones and the Lotus 16 never achieved great success, the best efforts being Innes Ireland's fourth place in the Dutch Grand Prix and fifth place in the USA Grand Prix. Eight of the cars were built and John Roberts' car is Chassis 365,

 

1925 Sunbeam Tiger

I took this photograph during the Richard Seaman Memorial Trophy Race for Vintage Racing Cars at the VSCC's meeting at Oulton Park in June 1993.

It's Vijay Mallya coming up to Lodge Corner in his 1925 Sunbeam Tiger, and behind him David Biggins in the 1926/23 Vauxhall 14/40 Rowley Special with a 30/98 engine. The Sunbeam Tiger has a supercharged 3,976cc V12 engine formed from two of the Grand Prix Sunbeam's 6-cylinder 2 litre engines in a V formation mated to a single crankshaft and a note in the programme of the event about the car reads as follows:

'The most powerful car in today's race is the 4 litre supercharged V12 Sunbeam Tiger of Vijay Mallya, another favourite for a win, though a first appearance at Oulton Park, we think, for Vijay himself. The Sunbeam took the Land Speed Record on Southport sands at 152.33 mph in 1926 driven by Seagrave and broke the Brooklands Outer Circuit record in 1929 at 137.58 mph driven by Kaye Don. Seagrave also led the free formula Spanish GP at San Sebastian with the car for four laps later in 1926 after which the tubular front axle broke in the middle due to inaccurate boring-out and Seagrave slid to a rather uncomfortable halt. The car has twice been a winner of the Vintage Seaman Trophy at Oulton Park when entered by Sir Ralph Millais and driven by George Burton in 1965 and by Neil Corner in 1970.'

1933 MG KN Special

This car is pictured at McLean's Corner during a practice session for the VSCC Historic Seaman Trophy Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's SeeRed meeting at Donington Park in September 2007.

It's Anne Templeton in her 1933 MG KN Special which is based on the running gear of the 6-cylinder inline 1,271cc MG KN Magnette, but has a 1,500cc engine and a zoller supercharger. The car behind is another MG, the MG Q Type of Tom Dark which has a supercharged 850cc engine. Only 8 examples of this car were built  and this one seems to be the only one with this type of body. It appears to be the car that was driven in the 1930s at Brooklands by Doreen Evans where she lapped the outer circuit at over 114 mph.

Note 25 Aug 2020: I've been told that Tom Dark's car isn't the one that Doreen Evans used to drive, but I couldn't find any contemporary photos o that car.

1922 Diatto 20

This car competed in a scratch race and a handicap race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies Race Meeting at Oulton Park in August 1992.

It's the 1922 Diatto 2 litre of Bill Summers, and the only information about it in the programme of the event is that it has a 1,991cc engine. It appears to be a Diatto 20 with a single overhead camshaft 4-cylinder inline engine.

1914 Humber TT

This car competed in the Richard Seaman Memorial Vintage Trophy Race at the VSCC's meeting at Oulton Park in July 1987.

It's the 1914 Humber TT of Kenneth Neve and it's the only survivor of the three Humbers that took part in the Tourist Trophy race in the Isle of Man in that year. The car has a 4-cylinder inline 3,295cc engine.

1936/37 ERA R8C

This car competed in the Richard Seaman Memorial Historic Trophy Race at the VSCC's meeting at Oulton Park in June 1984.

It's the 1936/37 ERA R8C of Bruce Spollon with a 1,988cc supercharged 6-cylinder inline engine. The car was originally built for Earl Howe with a B-type chassis as R8B but was rebuilt to C-type specifications before the Second World War. It was drastically modified in the early post-war years with a D-type chassis and streamlined bodywork, but Bruce Spollon returned it to its pre-war specification after he had acquired the car in 1977.

The table below explains the difference between the ERA A, B and C Types, and there were also three different engines available with capacities of 1.1 litres, 1.5 litres and 2 litres.

Chassis	A type	B type	C type
Construction	channel section frame	channel section frame	box section frame
Wheelbase	96in.	96in.	96in.
Front Track	52.5in.	52.5in.	52.5in.
Rear Track	48in.	48in.	48in.
Height	44in.	44in.	44in.
Front suspension	semi-elliptic leaf and Hartford friction shock absorbers	semi-elliptic leaf and Hartford friction shock absorbers	Porsche type trailing arm with transverse torsion bars and Girling Luvax hydraulic shock absorbers
Front tyres	Dunlop 16in. x 5.25in.	Dunlop 16in. x 5.25in.	Dunlop 18in. x 5.25in.
Rear suspension
Rear tyres	Dunlop 16in. x 6.5in.	Dunlop 16in. x 6.5in.	Dunlop 16in. x 6.5in.
Brakes	Girling mechanical	Girling mechanical	Lockheed hydraulic
Transmission	Wilson four-speed pre-selector gearbox connected to bevel drive rear axle via a prop-shaft enclosed in a torque tube.
Weight (dry)	2016lb.	2016lb.	2016lb.

1937 Auto Union C-Type

This is a photograph I took at Donington Park in May 2001 at the Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting.

It's a 1937 Auto Union C-Type which Audi had brought to the meeting together with a 1938 Auto Union D-Type and various other vehicles which were displayed in the paddock, and some of which took part in demonstration runs round the circuit. The Auto Union C-Type is pictured here on the straight between the Old Hairpin and Starkey's Bridge. 1937 was the last year of the 750kg weight formula where cars were restricted to a maximum weight of 750kg, but there was no limit to the size of the engine. The Auto Union C-Type had a V16 engine of 6,006cc situated behind the driver, but even this was not enough to challenge the supremacy of the 5,663cc straight-8 Mercedes Benz W125 with Rudolf Caracciola, Manfred von Brauchitsch, Hermann Lang and Christian Kautz finishing in the top four positions at the end of the five race European Championship series. Rudolf Hasse though did win the first race of the season, the Belgian Grand Prix, for Auto Union.

1933 Barnato Hassan Bentley

This car is the 1933 Barnato Hassan Bentley Special and was driven by Keith Schellenberg in the Richard Seaman Memorial Vintage Trophy Race at the Vintage Sports Car Club’s meeting at Oulton Park in June 1975.

Walter Hassan was a mechanic at Bentley in the 1920s at the time when their 3 litre, 4½ litre and 6.6 litre cars were a force to be reckoned with, winning the Le Mans 24 Hour race 4 years in succession from 1927 to 1930. He had been mechanic to Woolf Barnato and when the Bentley Company went into liquidation and was taken over by Rolls Royce in 1931 he went to work for Barnato. In 1933 he designed a new chassis frame and built a car round this and the 6½ litre (actually 6,597cc) engine from the Bentley ‘Old Number One’ Speed Six that won the Le Mans 24 Hour race in 1929 and 1930, and this car became known as the Barnato Hassan Special. It was raced at Brooklands, but not by Woolf Barnato who didn’t race there following the death of Clive Dunfee in a race in 1932. After serious damage to the 6½ litre engine at Brooklands in 1934 it was replaced by an 8 litre (7,983cc) unit and the car was rebuilt as a single seater in 1936, in which form Oliver Bertram lapped Brooklands with it at 143.11 mph – just short of John Cobb’s 143.44 mph in the Napier Railton.

1930/23 Napier Bentley

This car took part in the Richard Seaman Memorial Historic Trophy race at the Vintage Sports Car Club's meeting at Oulton Park in June 1973.

It's David Llewellyn's 1929 Napier-Bentley, a vehicle that he and Peter Morley created in 1968 using a 24 litre Napier Sea Lion engine which has a 'W' configuration - two banks of four cylinders in a 'V' with a third upright bank between them. The car was originally built on a Sunbeam chassis but after an accident was rebuilt using the chassis of a 1929 8 litre Bentley. The nose of the car was later altered to resemble that of the Napier Railton.

1953 Talbot Lago T26C

This was one of the competitors in the Allcomers 12 Lap Scratch Race for Historic Racing Cars at the VSCC's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Oulton Park in June 1971.

It's the 1953 Talbot Lago T26C of T.A.Roberts and was driven in the race by Bill Morris. The Grand Prix regulations for the 1947 season allowed for engine capacities of 4½ litres for unsupercharged cars and 1½ litres for those with superchargers. Antonio Lago increased the capacity of the Talbot straight-6 engine from just under 4 litres to 4,482cc and created the Talbot Lago T26C, a car that was reasonably successful, particularly in the 1949 season when the all-conquering 1½ litre supercharged Alfa Romeo 158 cars did not compete. The programme of this event shows the Talbot Lago to be a 1953 car, but I would have thought that since World Championship races in 1952 and 1953 were run to Formula 2 regulations it is more likely to date from 1949 or 1950.

Auto Union Typ 650 Sokol

This was one of several vehicles - including a 1937 Auto Union C-Type and 1938 D-Type - that Audi brought to Donington Park to take part in a display and track demonstrations at the VSCC's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting in May 2001.

It's a car that was at one time in the Donington Park museum where it was displayed as an Auto Union E-Type that was designed in 1939 to challenge the Mercedes Benz W165 1½ litre voiurette that had won the 1939 Tripoli Grand Prix, but the completion of which had been halted by the outbreak of the Second World War. Tom Wheatcroft was said to have acquired it as a chassis with engine, and a body was designed and built to show how the car would probably have looked had it been completed in 1940.

The Auto Union factory ended up in East Germany after the war and all the racing cars and equipment were removed to Russia. There are suggestions that this car is of post-war East German or Russian manufacture, possibly with the help of pre-war Auto Union design technology, but Audi seemed to be sure enough of its Auto Union origins to have included it in this display at Donington Park in 2001, though I can't find any mention of it in the commemorative 'The Return of Auto Union' brochure or the programme of the event.

1956 Aston Martin DB3S

This car took part in the Twelve Lap 1950's Sports Car Race at the VSCC's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies Meeting at Oulton Park in June 1993.

It's the 1956 Aston Martin DB3S of Tony Smith and is chassis #DB3S/10, the last of the team cars to be built and has the 2,992cc 6-cylinder inline Lagonda engine. In 1956 it was driven to fifth place in the GP de Rouen by Roy Salvadori and driven by Peter Walker and Roy Salvadori in the Le Mans 24 Hour race but failed to finish. In 1957 the car finished in third place in the British Empire Trophy race at Oulton Park driven by Noël Cunningham-Reid, and that was its final outing for the Aston Martin team. Peter Whitehead entered the car in the 1957 1000km race at the Nürburgring and finished in ninth place, and the following season the car was acquired by John Dalton.

1913 Monarch

The Vintage Sports Car Club's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophy meeting at Oulton Park in August 1992 included a short handicap race for Edwardian Cars - only 4 laps long in deference to the age of the cars. This is one of the cars that took part.

It's Mark Walker's 8,237cc 1913 Monarch, and the programme of the event had this note about the car:

'The 4-lap Handicap for Edwardian Cars features Mark Walker's 1913 Monarch which caused a sensation at Mallory Park last month! Having built the car, Walker made a winning debut but had to battle wheel to wheel with Roger Firth in the 1913 Theophile Schneider.

Monarch was a short-lived marque which built cars designed by Robert Hupp (late of Hupmobile) in Detroit from 1913 to 1916. Into the chassis, which Mark bought in the US, he put an OX5 Curtiss V8 aero-engine of 8.2 litre capacity. This was also acquired in the US and was originally fitted to Curtiss JN4 or 'Jenny' training aircraft, as well as to the British DH6, during the First World War. Plain to see are the exposed rockers, each operating both an exhaust and an inlet valve per cylinder, as on the four-pushrod Salmsons and the Fiat with which Nazzaro won the 1907 French Grand Prix. Walker completed the car with a Panhard-Levassor gearbox and other parts, such as the radiator, sourced from the Beaulieu Autojumble.'

1934 Alfa Romeo P3

This car took part in the Richard Seaman Memorial Historic Trophy Race at the VSCC's meeting at Oulton Park in July 1987.

It's the 1934 Alfa Romeo P3 of Rodney Felton, chassis #50009, with a 3,165cc twin-supercharged straight-8 engine designed by Vittorio Jano. The P3 was introduced in 1932, and Tazio Nuvolari won two of the three races in the European Championship that season with his team mate Rudolf Caracciola winning the third race. The Alfa Romeo team was suffering financial problems and missed the early part of the 1933 season, but later in the year the cars were handed over to Scuderia Ferrari and won the last two European Championship races of the season. The first two races of the 1934 season were won by Alfa Romeo but the second race, the French Grand Prix, marked the entry of the Mercedes Benz and Auto Union cars into the fray, and these cars went on to dominate Grand Prix racing until the start of World War 2. The Alfa Romeo P3, however, had its swan song in the 1935 German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring, Tazio Nuvolari beating the 5-car Mercedes Benz and 4-car Auto Union teams.