Death’s Radical V8-
engined Mini also wonRichards’s Mini Traveller won
first Fastest Mini in the World race25 JULY 2019 AUTOSPORT.COM 63NATIONAL REPORTS CLUB AUTOSPORTthis weekend’s National round. Three
of them proceeded to dominate as Neil
Maclennan won twice in his Kevin Mills
Racing-run Spectrum. Cliff Dempsey
Racing team-mates Jonathan Browne
and Spike Kolhbecker pushed him hard –
Browne passed Maclennan for the lead
of race two at Graham Hill Bend, only to
be sold a dummy into Paddock with three
laps to go. As Maclennan eased Browne
wide on the exit, Kolhbecker also slipped
through for second, reversing their
positions from the earlier race.
Toby Goodman cut the gap to points
leader Robbie Dalgleish with two wins in
the Mini Challenge Cooper Pro category.
Polesitter Goodman held on in a one-lap
dash after a lengthy safety car period in
race one, but Dalgleish turned the tables
in race two when he got a run on Goodman
out of Clearways, before Martin Poole
passed Goodman in similar fashion. Fourth
on race three’s reversed grid, Goodman
soon hit the front. Poole also beat Dalgleish.
Cooper S category dominator Daniel
Butcher-Lord continued his run of success
by easing to a hat-trick, making it six wins
from seven races.
Neven Kirkpatrick was pressured by
Greg Jenkins throughout the first Super
Mighty Minis race but took a more
comfortable victory in race two.
MARK PAULSON
Veteran racer Bill Richards ended last
year’s Mini Festival with his spaceframe
car, affectionately known as Bessie, in bits.
A heavy accident in the combined
‘Fastest Mini in the World’ and Allcomers
race sidelined the machine until last
weekend when it returned to the track in
Friday testing and won Sunday’s first race.
Now running a two-litre Ford Duratec
engine providing around 220bhp, the
car started life as an 850cc Maguire Mini
special saloon in the 1970s, before being
transplanted with the BDH variant of the
Ford BDA. It’s also on its third body shape,
going via Metro to its current Mini
Traveller/Countryman shape.
“We thought, ‘The Metro’s got a lower
drag coefficient, so we’ll put a Metro
body on’,” said Richards. But, with
backing from Mini Spares and seeking
to win the Fastest Mini race, another
change was required two years ago.
“The wheelbase on a Metro is exactly
the same as a Mini Van so we unhooked
the body and put on a Mini Van body –
and it becomes a Countryman!”
Bessie had been running with
magnesium brakes from a Shadow
Formula 1 car and ground-effect era
Williams suspension made by Koni, but
the unique parts were destroyed in last
year’s accident. A switch to Quantum
dampers and bespoke AP Racing brakesBESSIE STARS AGAIN IN HER LATEST INCARNATIONMINI CHALLENGE - JCW
Race 1 James Gornall
Race 2 Nathan Harrison
Race 3 Ben PalmerMINI SE7EN
Race 1 Darren Thomas
Race 2 Jeff SmithMINI MIGLIA
Races 1 & 2 Nick PadmoreCHAMPION OF BRANDS FF1600
Races 1 & 2 Neil Maclennan (Spectrum 011C)MINI CHALLENGE – COOPER PRO/COOPER
Races 1 & 3 Toby Goodman
Race 2 Robbie DalgleishMINI CHALLENGE – COOPER S
Races 1, 2 & 3 Daniel Butcher-LordSUPER MIGHTY MINIS/MIGHTY MINIS
Races 1 & 2 Neven Kirkpatrick (Super Mighty)FASTEST MINI IN THE WORLD
Race 1 Bill Richards (Maguire Mini Traveller)
Race 2 Harvey Death (Austin Mini Cooper S V8)ALLCOMERS
David Enderby (Radical SR4)BRANDS HATCH
WEEKEND WINNERSFor full results visit: theresultslive.co.ukfollowed, but the car retains its roots.
“It’s all 1970s technology and she’s
old,” Richards said. “The last thing we
want to do is put a massive horsepower
engine in – it will pull the chassis apart.
But the car’s nimble.”
Richards’s chief rival for the Fastest
Mini title was Harvey Death, winner of
a similar event celebrating the Mini’s
50th anniversary at Silverstone in 2009.
“I’m a bit of a Mini buff,” said Death.
“I went to Mallory Park for the 40th
anniversary of the Mini and they had
the Fastest Mini in the World race. So
I said then, ‘For the 50th I’m going to
build the fastest Mini in the world’.”
Death began installing a 360bhp
Radical V8 engine into a KAD spaceframe
and had the car finished off by Rollcentre
Racing. It duly dominated the Silverstone
event and Death dusted it off to enjoy
a tussle with Richards en route to two
wins at the 2015 Mini Festival. He then
embarked on a two-year round-the-world
sailing trip before rolling out the car once
more, now with newly fabricated rear
arms “to stop it twisting at the back”.
Despite Richards’ assertion that “to win
this race, you need a spaceframe”, he and
Death were pipped to pole position by Jim
Lyons’s steel-bodied machine – his road
car from more than 20 years ago, with its
A series block mated to a BMW K1100
motorcycle engine and Audi turbocharger.
The three different approaches proved
remarkably well-matched on track but
Lyons retired from third in race one when
his gearbox blew. Richards survived a
hairy moment on oil into Paddock Hill
Bend to hold off Death, before suffering
his own gearbox and differential problems
in race two, gifting Death an easy win.
MARK PAULSON