Vintage Revival Montlhéry
Autodrome de Linas-Montlhéry, France 11-12 May
FROM ANTONY and Alcyon to Voisin and Villard, the Vintage Revival at France’s historic banked Montlhéry track is a treat for those who appreciate elderly and obscure racing cars.
Unlike the Goodwood Revival where the spectators dress for war, at Montlhéry they dress for peace, often from the period before the invention of the automobile – and even in the rain they were all enjoying themselves.
Technically the event features no racing, though there are a number of 15-minute performance-related plateaux for pre-war cars. And riding round the banked track with Duncan Pittaway in his V-twin GN, you wouldn’t know it was supposed to be noncompetitive! Featured in Octane 128, the GN is what Duncan describes as ‘a fairly irreverent GN special’, based on a 1921 GN chassis, axles, chain-drive bevel ’box and cart springs. It has brakes only on the rear wheels and, instead of the standard 1100cc V-twin, it’s fitted with a French Anzani V-twin from an early-20s cyclerace pacing motorcycle, with larger cylinder barrels. ‘The result is a V-twin of 3400cc that usually thumps along at a comfortable 6570mph,’ adds Duncan.
Duncan and friends drove to the event in company with fellow GN users Mark Walker and Richard Scaldwell, plus intrepid passengers and damp luggage. Many of the cars dropped oil onto a track that was already rendered slippery by almost incessant light rain, so Duncan was able to demonstrate how quickly a GN can change from understeer to oversteer, back to understeer and finally power oversteer.
One of the most enjoyable aspects of the Vintage Revival is that every obscure little car has a unique story that its owners are happy to share. The Villard was found by its enthusiastic keeper in a collapsed stone shed in a remote rural farm in Southern France. This extraordinary and rare three-wheeled machine has a tiny single-cylinder engine close to the driver’s feet that drives its single front wheel via a chain to a constant-velocity joint at the centre of the front hub.
Meanwhile I discovered the BNC 527, with a body by Sirejol, and found that a four-cylinder 35hp Ruby is a very modern-looking little car from 1933, and the Paulet Six a large and very imposing sporting car with the long, pointed kind of tail that the French favoured in the pre-war years. The little two-cylinder SimaViolet and the Omega Six from 1926 were also new to me, as well as most of the non-French spectators and entrants.
Of the less obscure cars at the event, Reg Winstone’s Voisin C1 Laboratoire was a classic example of the French love of extreme aerodynamic development that saw almost every sporting, racing or record-breaking car carrying a long and elegant pointed tail rather than the more familiar exposed, rear-mounted fuel tank seen on British and German cars of the inter-war era.
It is such a rare pleasure to see cars you have never seen before that the biennial Vintage Revival Montlhéry is surely an essential event for 2019. The spectator car park is fun too, with Panhards, Peugeots, Citroëns and Renaults of every age and condition, as well as more obscure marques such as Aires, plus dozens of Brits in Morgans who are pilgrims to this charming low-key event. Clockwise from top left Author Stevens at speed with Duncan Pittaway in GN; 1922 Leon Paulet Six AB; crazy threewheeled Villard; Dutch Panhard PL17 crew with picnic; Reg Winstone’s Voisin C1 Laboratoire.