BRSCC takes back control of Fiestas
STEP 6
The BRSCC has taken organisation of its Fiesta Championship in house for this season.
The series had been run by Kevin Shortis’s Ford Racing UK company but will now join the Fiesta Junior category as being run by the club, after concern over grid numbers.
Club chairman Bernard Cottrell said: “We took the Fiesta Juniors back in house a couple of years ago and that is moving forward with great pace. We’ve got between 13 and 17 entries this year and that might be in the 20s by the summer when some more drivers turn 14.
“Fiestas has struggled in the past couple of years and we are hoping to turn that around and are trying to get grids back up again. Al Daly will be the new championship coordinator. He is quite well known and a respected former driver.”
Cottrell added that the regulations will remain unchanged and is hopeful that a deal with Quaife to supply drivers with new differentials will boost entries.
Last month, our sister publication Autosport produced a list of the best Formula 1 drivers never to win a world championship grand prix (February 4 issue). Such lists are always subjective – even once the criteria is set, comparing across eras is a challenge – but they are great for stirring debate.
One of the stronger candidates who missed out on making Autosport’s top 20 was Brian Redman. In a limited F1 career in which he never contested a full season, the Briton’s best result was a third at the 1968 Spanish GP in an uncompetitive Cooper-maserati. But beyond that, Redman’s CV is a very fine one.
Redman impressed alongside such names as Pedro Rodriguez, Jo Siffert, Ronnie Peterson, Jacky Ickx – all GP winners – and future world champion Mario Andretti in the world sportscar championship. He raced for Porsche, John Wyer’s Gulf squad and Ferrari (among others) and racked up 17 victories.
Perhaps less well known on this side of the Atlantic, however, are his scores of successes in America. As well as victories in both the Daytona 24 Hours and Sebring 12 Hours endurance classics, Redman won the IMSA GTP crown in 1981 with Lola’s T600.
Even more impressively, Redman became the man to beat in the competitive North American Formula 5000 championship. The cars of the V8 category were almost as rapid as the F1 machines of the period, and attracted some big names, including Andretti, Jody Scheckter and Al Unser. And Redman ruled the roost.
Having (controversially) scored his first win for Chevron at the end of 1972, Redman won five rounds for Lola in 1973 despite not contesting all the events. He then beat Andretti to the 1974 and 1975 crowns, completing the hat-trick in 1976. In all, he scored 16 victories, more than anyone else in the series’ history.
One of the nicest and most helpful drivers you could ever meet, Redman reacted enthusiastically when MN asked him for a few words on the three best cars of his career. Instead of a couple of lines on each, Brian chose to write a 2000-word account, complete with anecdotes, on three of the sport’s most successful cars. It seemed a no-brainer to print as much of it as possible ( see page 20).
It also got me thinking about some of the other great drivers who missed out. Perhaps sportscar and rallying legend Vic Elford should be the next man on our Great Cars list…
Tanner: “Once all the detail is finalised and applied, we then have to spend 24 hours polishing it and applying the last little bits before it is then sent to the client.”