Neil Howard Stages Rally - Oulton Park 7th Nov

General Meets + Track Day Reports
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If anyone fancies viewing some sideways uncouth motorsport in the North West then the Neil Howard Stages rally is running at Oulton on Saturday 7th November.

I’m taking advantage of a half term trip back to the UK with the family and sneaked in an entry for the rally with Gareth :slight_smile: Unfortunatley I no longer have the Honda Exige and Gareth is still a looong way off finishing his new Elise stage car (just 7 more years to build it I reckon, like his Nova) so we will be entering in my S1400 Ford Puma. I’m well excited but a bit aprehensive as I haven’t even sat in the car yet! I’m picking it up from the prep workshop next week. The LHD bit is now familiar for me but the sequential box will take some geting used to. Obviously it’s going to be super greasy as we rally yobs cut the corners and drag all the mud onto the circuit :wink: sorry for those doing a trackday the week after :laughing:

There’s a really strong national entry, WRC cars and S2000 plus plenty of MkII Escorts to entertain, in the evening they’re having a firework display as well. If you’re at the event then you’re welcome to stop by the service area for a brew with us.

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Was going to put an entry in for this Wes but we killed the cossy on the promenade stages and the diffs are away at Bara at the moment! Hopefully get over to watch will come and say hi!! Graham.

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Sorry to hear you had trouble Graham, the Prom is a very aggressive event on the transmission, high grip tarmac and lots of hairpins :frowning: It would be great to see you at Oulton, we’re running as car number 47, I think we are the only Puma.

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Thanks Wes, the most annoying thing was that we were running 7th overall when we retired the car! Gutted is an understatement. We’ve never had much luck on the Prom!!
The puma sounds like fun to drive! Have a good run at Oulton!!

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Well Gareth and I had an awesome day last Saturday at Oulton Park. The rain was torrential in the morning, normally I would be cursing but this time I was actually jumping for joy after swopping from the mid engined Honda Exige to a FWD s1400 Puma :slight_smile:

It was a steep learning curve for us, I sat in the car for the first time the previous wednesday for an hours test at 3 sisters track. Again it was a soggy slimey day but i was stunned by how much grip the car has, even on slicks! The 90% diff certainly helps.

The stages at Oulton were fantastic, they included a huge watersplash, reverse running of the circuit and a slimy off road mud/gravel track behind the grandstands with a jump :sunglasses:

After a cautious first stage in the rain we made good progress and were holding 3rd in class. Grip on soft cut slicks was amazing . I was a bit of a wuss in the water splash, scared of killing a very good engine :astonished: However some of the other competitors were treating it like D Day landings!

When the circuit dried out at lunchtime then other cars started to claw back our advantage. On stage 5 we lost a chunk of time when we were ambushed by a spinning out of control MkII Escort at the stage merge. We were just rejoining the circuit after the off road section at Lodge and he blind sided me, he was flying backwards through Lodge straight through the cones and into my front end, Grrrr :imp: I’ve calmed down now, at least it was only cosmetic damage and no one was hurt.

In the end we lost 3rd place as a pesky Hilman imp pipped us on the last stages in the dark, respect to him and the other guys at the top of our 1400 class, some great driving. I think we ended up 39th overall out of 100 which was not too shabby. Overall we were delighted with the day. The car is a beast of a mini WRC, the sequential box combined with a 9000 rpm screamer engine was everything I dreamed of. You have to drive the little bugger aggressively though, it doesn’t do chugging along.

Huge thanks to Gareth for flawless navigating, no missed splits or bad calls all day. Also my mate Mark did a great job preparing the car. We were also spoiled rotten this time. RV hospitality unit courtesy of my neighbour Craig and a professional service crew in the form of Myerscough college motorsport team, they did a great job to patch up the front end after the Escort incident and got us back out of service on time.

I was also delighted to see that my rally Exige mate Bill Bates was brave enough to enter the event in his S1 Exige. Given the terrible weather, huge water splash and gravel section he did fantastic to finish in one piece, he deservedly won the spirit of the rally award :clap:

Wheres the next event…




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Well done fella’s. The D day landings, get a picture up of that water splash Wes.

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Great write up Wes! Sorry I never managed to catch up with you on the day, you were always out on track when we were in the service area! You looked to be going well when we saw you powering up casscades the wrong way!! My son loved seeing the Exige out on track!

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That is epic Wes. Congrats! What a fantastic weekend!

Great to hear you enjoying the beast and competing again.
V & I are sorry we could not be there to cheer. Did the family join?


More cool photos for your wall :sunglasses: Car sounds like brilliant fun.
So are you staying or moving??

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Here’s a few of the top runners in the water splash

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Great write-up. Sounds a hoot. And top marks to Myerscough college, eh?
College is just two miles from me and we did a Norlog tour there a few years ago.

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Graham, running Oulton in anti clockwise is certainly a strange feeling! Some of the barriers are a bit close, especially at lodge. Was that your custard cream Exige sprint parked up?

Pierre, do you really think sue would have gone to watch cars rallying on a cold wet rainy day! I think the family were in the trafford centre instead. Still no decision on where I’m going next, looks like I will be in slovakia until next summer so plenty more time to catch up.

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Great write-up Wes, thanks for sharing!! Shame the car sustained a bit of battle damage…

I watched some in-car and going the wrong way around Oulton is just wrong wrong wrong! Its like a computer game where you know you’ve lost so you just drive the other way around the circuit for a laugh…I kept expecting to see the field coming the right way around the circuit…I guess in your case you kinda did :crazy:

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It’s very weird driving the track in reverse direction, the corners tighten up on you and the runoff areas diminish :astonished: Druids is equally hard in both directions though!

I’m still waiting for the incar footage to be edited but here’s some interior car footage of us two muppets in action, a bit of a shaky start on stage one :sunglasses:

The Myerscough college lads and lasses were excellent, really keen to get stuck in and help. It’s a very worthwhile course and they have a strong success rate in getting jobs, especially those that volunteer to run cars on events and get proper experience on their CV’s. I would definetly consider asking them to help again in the future.

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Re Myerscough: A lot of the trainees/students land top jobs, including with M-Sport up in Cumbria.

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Keeping the sheep off the car park?

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Not my car mate, did see that one. Mines black and currently in storage!

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Ha,ha!

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A few clips are now on the MSN Tarmac Championship program on Motors TV. Watch on one of the many repeats!