Anyway, upon arrival at 5.30am local time after a lovely 26 hour flight I made my way to Keynsham and our second home in the UK with Clive and Helen Holloway. Pulling into the drive in Clive’s big red Rover 827 he points out Monty, Dad’s UK based Midget that Clive and Helen very kindly look after for us. Clive explained that he had intended to pick me up in Monty but made it out of the garage but not much further. Between us Clive and I traced a faulty fuel pump earth which we quickly solved (well Clive quickly solved, I was fairly dazed and jetlagged at this stage….). Apart from that Monty was all ready to go and raring to head out to Silverstone to stretch his legs again, and after heading up on the Thursday in convoy behind the Clive’s BGT Monty and I had a good rest ready for a full on weekend of Octagonalism of every variety….

Friday was mainly spent setting up my tent with the South West centre team, drooling over some fantastic cars and of course adjusting the handbrake and tyre pressures ready for the California Cup autotest the following morning. For those that don’t know, the California Cup is the MGCC’s most prestigious autotest (or motokhana as we call it) event and the winning team receives (very briskly before they hide it away again) a £80,000 trophy donated by the California Centre and is a team prize. Last year Dad and two SW centre members won the trophy so the pressure was on for me to emulate him. So after being duly appointed an honorary member of the SW centre myself, Mike Hawke and Phil Tintnell. The event was laid out in one of the huge carparks at the entrance to the circuit, which allowed all 5 tests to be laid out at once. The first test was similar to our ever decreasing circles but with an S bend after the last circle before the finish. This was something of a disaster test for me as I got something of a surprise when Monty wouldn’t quite drift on the throttle like the Widget does (an extra 80 ish BHP does make a difference I guess…) and so I took a little while to adapt to the different driving style required of Monty. Whereas in the Widget once the back end has broken using the handbrake it is easily controlled using light throttle, in Monty a much heavier right foot is needed. Of course it took me some time to work this out and in the meantime I over compensated with the handbrake….  Ah well, at least I’m told it was very entertaining…. However after a couple of tests Monty and I reached some sort of agreement whereby I’d drive properly and he’d do what I asked. After that things started going a bit better, one test involving a short slalom then stopping astride a line, reversing to stop astride a second line then forward over another line beside the first and back once more before tearing off in a big loop to the finish. Auckland member Darryl Bretherton was judging this one, good thing I didn’t notice that till I’d completed it otherwise I’d have made a mess of it… as it was I got round very neatly 2 of my 3 runs (in the California Cup your best 2 of 3 are counted towards the final total) and was very happy.

The next test I pulled up to was one that I had, during the 2002 California Cup, made a double error on, costing us big time. So I figured to just get round without a mistake would be a good start. It actually is a very fun test, basically four cones laid out in a square involving driving round each set of diagonally opposite cones, round the top and to the finish. In the Widget it is easily possible to go sideways all the way round, and on my last run in Monty I did manage to repeat that feat, though it was my slowest time on the test (by a second or so). But it was the most fun run.

The next test was a slalom with two right hand 270º turns at the top, very enjoyable, very entertaining (I even had my own cheerleading team of MGCC Auckland members on the sideline) and for once quite quick. Obviously I was feeling far to pleased with myself. The next and last test was once again one I had done in 2002, involving 4 270º turns separated by a charge down a tunnel to the next one and back again. However this one I had got spot on on that occasion BUT! this time Monty and I had a disagreement about how he really should be a bit tighter around these cones… yes that cone way over there Monty we should have been much closer to it…. Ah never mind it was good fun still.

Along came the prizegiving and sure enough we hadn’t quite managed to win the California Cup coming in second. At the time of writing I haven’t yet seen the full results but have heard I placed 4^th in class (MG’s with LSD’s) with a total of 315 seconds, 7 seconds behind the winner who also won the Magnette award for fastest overall. Not as good a result as I was hoping for, but I’ll be back next year and this time properly armed with the Wighty Widget. Then I won’t have any excuses…..

Saturday afternoon was spent catching up with Darryl Bretherton (who has been resident in the UK for 5 or so years now…) and watching the spectacular MG racing. I especially enjoyed seeing the Metro Cup race, which this year was run as a split grid with the Mini Miglia 1380 cars, the Mini’s occupying the front half of the grid and the Metro’s the second. It seemed a strange thing to do to me especially considering the fastest Metro Turbo’s and K Series Metro’s where on the grid directly behind the slowest Mini’s. Still it was good to see the Mini’s get dealt a serious blow to their pride as the top half of the Metro field flew through the Mini field, after the first lap the 3 leading Metro’s had already passed a half dozen Mini’s. It was great fun to see them all 3 wheeling through Luffield. Another favourite race of mine was the MMM race, seeing all these fantastic legendary MG’s being thrown round the track is simply awesome, what makes it even better is these cars have no silencing… Highly modified K3’s charging round the track, their supercharger’s whining gloriously…..

Sunday morning dawned bright and clear and I made my way out of the inner circuit complex and round the access road to the start of the sprint. As the racing uses only the International circuit and not the full Grand Prix (as used by F1), the North West centre can use this part of the circuit to run a round of their speed championship on. After some scrutineering issues (NZ standard overalls aren’t good enough apparently, and driving with the roof down required me to wear driving goggles too, luckily MG people are very friendly and I was able to borrow some from  MMM and Midget owner Mark Boldry. Thanks again Mark), Monty and I were already to go.

In previous years a tyre wall has been erected to form a chicane down the main straight of the sprint in order to keep speeds down somewhat, and this year was no different however I’m told compared to previous years this one was much gentler. After walking the course and a brief wait for some problems with the timing equipment (ie the timekeepers didn’t show up) we were underway. Now, Monty being a sensibly modified road car he was in the road modified Midgets class, alongside cars that were only not classed as full race because they had an MOT. Most of these cars were putting out around 30-40bhp more than Monty but today Monty and I were getting along just fine. The course, after the chicane, has a nice sweeping almost double apex right hander, followed by a slight left hander down a hill to a 90º left leading onto a long sweeping right hander and the finish. By the end of our 5 runs Monty and I had sorted it all nicely. The entry to the chicane we were treating with considerable respect as it was fairly solid but still pushing harder as the day wore on; the first sweeping right we were taking almost flatout and drifting over to the exit on the left and back again before slamming on the brakes and throwing ourselves sideways round the lefthander, just gathering it enough to get wide for the entry to the last sweeping right and hurtling over the finish. Monty and I stopped to watch from the bank some of the other competitors but it didn’t seem to us as though anyone else was quite as brave heading into the left hander (or maybe they’re just not so stupid….). Monty performed exceedingly well against much quicker cars and even embarrassed a few, beating some of the very rapid cars (all with the roof down too).

All in all Silverstone 2006 was a great fun weekend and really every MG enthusiast has to make the pilgrimage there at least once. And it’s even better competing in such a world class event. The MGCC Silverstone event has been billed as the best car club gathering in the world and it certainly can’t be far away.

Andrew Walbran and CJV303, Monty the English Midget