You’d be forgiven for briefly thinking you were watching a re-run of a Goodwood Members’ Meeting Gerry Marshall Trophy thrash, as Ford Capris, Rover SD1s and Mazda RX7s engage in typically fraught action.
APR 22nd 2016
Video: 'Full Throttle' – Capris v Rovers In Epic Group 1 Touring Action
In fact, this film winds the clock back 35 years to the penultimate year of Group 1-specification tintops doing battle in the Tricentrol RAC British Saloon Car Championship.
It’s 1981 and the hitherto dominant Ford Capris, which had had things pretty much their own way in the big class for five years, are joined by the 3.5-litre V8 Rovers.
The action starts at Mallory Park with the Capris still at the front, albeit only just. Andy Rouse, who would become a four-time champion and for many years the man with a record number of series wins, is on pole for his first outing with Charles Sawyer-Hoare’s CSH Racing team. Alongside is the Tom Walkinshaw Racing-prepared Mazda RX7 of reigning champion Win Percy, the rotary-engined machine giving Rouse a hard time at the Leicestershire venue. Rouse holds on to win, from Percy, the Capris of Vince Woodman and Nick Whiting and the best of the Rovers, Peter Lovett’s TWR car.
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Next up is Silverstone, where the BSCC circus runs in support to the BRDC International Trophy European Formula 2 Championship opener. Percy avenges his Mallory defeat by securing pole in the Mazda, but gearbox failure for the Japanese machine hands victory to Rouse and the Juicy Jeans Capri. Second goes to Rouse’s former boss Gordon Spice in his self-run Capri, with Vince Woodman making at a Ford 1-2-3 in his Equipe Esso example. Best of the Rovers, which had yet to exert their authority over the Capris, was the TWR car of Jeff Allam.
On to Oulton Park and Percy is again on pole. This time, the Mazda holds together to record its maiden series victory from a horde of Capris – the cars of Spice, Rouse, Woodman and Whiting. The Patrick Motorsport Rovers of Rex Greenslade and Brian Muir took fifth and sixth.
The final part of this early-season review takes the cars to the Hampshire speedbowl of Thruxton. It’s a happy hunting ground for the Capris, with Spice, Woodman and Jonathan Buncombe locking out the top-three spots on the grid. Woodman gets the jump at the start and heads off to his first win for nearly two years, while Spice and Rouse complete the podium. With the best Rover taking fifth, behind Percy’s Mazda, nobody thought at the time that the big V8 would in fact win five of the seven remaining rounds that season.
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