Donington Historic
Groundbreakers make the 2019 Donington Historic Festival special
Masquerading F1 KERS test mule among the highlights
The prototype that led to Brawn GP’S fairytale F1 World Championship win in 2009 was among the trailblazers to be found in the paddock at a wretchedly wet Donington Historic for the May Bank Holiday.
Honda R8 1082
Said owner Kevin Mason of his misleading F1 machine, ‘This was the car that Honda built in 2003 to develop the KERS – Kinetic Energy Recovery System – that has ended up on all modern F1 cars. Despite its Mercedes badging and Petronas livery, it’s a Honda through and through.
‘It never raced when it was new. The development of KERS took five years, beginning when the team was still known as British American Racing, before Alex Wurz test-drove it in Spain. Then Honda closed down its Formula One operations and Ross Brawn stepped in and bought the team out. This prototype formed the basis of the Brawn GP cars that won the World Championship in their debut season in 2009.
‘And then of course Mercedes bought Brawn out, and had the car repainted in the company warpaint, and even rebadged, so it could be displayed as a promotional car in the Brackley headquarters.
‘I bought it from Mercedes. It wasn’t easy – I went to Brackley to have a look at another car, happened upon it, asked whether it was for sale and negotiated a deal on it instead. It hasn’t run much since – it’s been in bits in my workshop for a year.
‘It’s tricky to run because of its electronics. Once they play up, that’s it – you need to come into the pits and plug in a laptop.’ Although the R8 only ran in a demonstration at Donington, electronics proved its undoing – the wiring loom burnt out.
Lola Mk2
This freshly restored Formula Junior car, one of the earliest Lolas, returned to British tarmac in anger for the first time in 40 years.
‘It was built in 1959, and was a Fitzwilliam car when new,’ said owner and restorer Michael Hibberd. Richard Fitzwilliam’s team was officially a privateer outfit, but operated as a works-supported team in the early days of Lola Cars.
‘It’s just been reunited with its original chassis plate – it was actually chassis three when it was built, but when it was sold on Fitzwilliam wanted to keep chassis one, two and three for himself, so the factory reassigned it chassis 11.
‘It did alright, some good finishes with Jeremy Bamber when it was new, and competed in support races for the British Grand Prix later on in the Seventies, before being sold to a German collector, Dr Dietrich Merkel, who owned it for more than 20 years.
‘It’s just been restored, and although it did 60 laps of Brands Hatch last week in testing, this is its first race in my hands.’
Alfa Romeo Sprint
‘It’s a genuine Autodelta works car, and this is its first time racing in the UK – we tried to get it ready for last year’s Historic but couldn’t qualify it,’ said Geoff Gordon of his Alfasud Sprint, contesting the Historic Touring Car Challenge. ‘It was built in February 1979 by German Alfa tuner Peter Gleich, and competed at the Nürburgring that year with his drivers Manfred Mohr and Walter Streickmann, although we don’t know where it finished – we’re still looking for reliable records from the time.
‘It’s a Group 2 car, so it has an acid-dipped lightweight bodyshell, a dry sump, and we can use electronic fuel injection if we want – although because we’re still learning how to run the car it’s on carburettors for the time being.
‘I found it in Portugal, where it had been sat dismantled in a garage for many years after being used in club racing. I wanted a car for this series, and already have an Alfa Romeo Giulietta TI, so it seemed logical. However, we had to remake its dry sump based on shaky, grainy black-and-white photos in its FIA homologation papers.’
Autosport Mk2
Richard Burns-miller’s Autosport Mk2 was returning to Donington after an extensive rebuild and a racing tour of mainland European circuits.
Designed in the late Fifties by Bob Hanna and Jack Walker of Lotus dealership Autosport Equipment Co of Cooksville, Canada, to contest Canada Class single-seater racing, it combined a tube-framed chassis and aluminium body designed by De Havilland aircraft engineer Frank Duda. Although originally powered by an engine from a Standard Ten, which also donated its front suspension, it was later fitted with one taken from Autosport’s own Lotus Eleven. Brakes came from a Triumph Mayflower, and the rear suspension was to Hanna’s own design, taking inspiration from the cannibalised Lotus.
‘The Autosport was obsolete before it was even finished,’ said Burns-miller. ‘Hanna and Walker realised this as soon as the first rearengined Lotus 18 was delivered to their showroom.’