PMC Newsletter Aug 07 - Prescott Speed Hill Climb

Remaining Midland Hillclimb Fixtures 2007
Prescott
1&2 Sept British/Midland Championship
22&23 Sept B.O.C. Hill Climb (Re-arranged)
To volunteer or for information for all events please contact John
Hicks on 01242 676848
Loton Park
11&12 August Midland Championship
29&30 Sept Two one-day events
To volunteer or for more information please contact Pete Hempson
on 07971 269547
Shelsley Walsh
8&9 Sept Midland Championship
6/7 October British Championship (Re-arranged)
To volunteer or for more information please contact Lucy Hart on
01886 812211
As you have already read Prescott and Shelsley have had to
abandon meetings due to the torrential rain recently. The
re-arranged meetings are on the 22 & 23 September at Prescott
and 6 & 7 October at Shelsley. We realise most of you will have
your marshalling calendars already booked up but if you can help
either venue out on these dates it will be greatly appreciated!
Newsletter Contact Details
Kevin Cornwall Jim Tatler
20 Delavale Road 198 Brooklyn Road
Winchcombe Cheltenham
Glos Glos
GL54 5HN GL51 8EA
kevin.cornwall@virgin.net jim.tatler@tiscali.co.uk
07776 254300 07845 700629
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Over The Hill !
The Newsletter of the Prescott Marshals Club Aug 2007
National News
While the National hillclimbers were off sunning themselves
in the Channel Islands, two out of the three Midland hills
were suffering at the hands of the weather. During the heavy
downpours of Friday 21st July damage was sustained at
Prescott and Shelsley Walsh.
Jim Tatler had a phone call from Dave Riley around about
lunchtime to say that he was going to Prescott with a view to
abandoning the meeting dependant on what he found. Half
an hour later the call came that confirmed there was a
waterfall cascading down from Esses and through Orchard
and that there was no way the meeting could go on. Also it
was discovered that most of the gravel from Ettores was
spread down the track as far as start line.
Everyone went into full speed to phone entrants and officials
that the meeting was off. Notices were put on various
motorsport websites to inform marshals, Allan Cameron and
Ian Patton were stranded and had to bed down at the club
offices...not together I hope!
Allan drove the hill the next morning and discovered damage
to the track at Semi-In and on the return road. A frantic race
against time ensued to get the track repaired in time for the
next Drivers school and the VSCC weekend.
Temporary repairs were completed in time and both events
took place with no problems reported.
See the next page for Shelsley details
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Beer & Skittles
The Marshals Club is holding its
annual skittles evening on
Saturday 1st September at the
Shutters Inn in Gotherington
starting approximately 7.30pm ish.
There will be the usual fun and
frolics along with prizes for best
and worst score, see if you can
beat the resident professionals -
Jim & Kev!
Tickets are priced at £5 to include
food and are available on the day
or by telephoning or emailing Kev
to reserve a ticket.
kevin.cornwall@virgin.net
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Sadly, our friends at the
MAC have suffered
greatly with extensive
land slippage roughly
between Ess approach
and Bottom Ess. Lets
hope that the repairs
prove to be less costly
than at first thought.
The problem is that
although it seems that
a little bit of elbow
grease and a nearby Matbro (or
similar) would solve this mess, it goes a bit deeper than
that. The slip emanates from outside the Shelsley boundary and
looks like it will take a lot of expensive shoring up. A further problem
might be that if piling is needed then the machine required to
do it is very heavy and might well cause track damage itself.
COMMITTEE NEWS
Firstly welcome to Greg Dixon-Smith and Simon Bloomfield to the
Marshals Club Committee. They have been co-opted onto the
committee in order to strengthen it and hopefully come up with
some more ideas whilst spreading the workload. Talking of ideas,
have YOU got any about what we could do for our 50th anniversary
next year? If so answers on a postcard or email to Jim or Kevin
please.
Over the next few newsletters we are going to introduce you to
members of the Committee, be prepared it could be a shocking
experience for you and you may need counselling afterwards!!
Simon Nettell
Hi I’m Simon and I’m Chief Hill Marshal for the Bugatti Owners’
Club. I’ve been a marshal for 10 years now and I started my marshalling
career at Prescott in the rain at a September Midland
Championship meeting and I was immediately hooked, despite
ending the day face down in the gravel at Ettores when I misjudged
the height of the Armco I was trying to jump over whilst
carrying 2 fire bottles! Oh how they laughed.
At the same time as I joined the Prescott Marshals Club I joined
the British Motorsport Marshals Club and took part in their training
scheme for race and speed marshals which taught me a lot about
marshalling, made me a lot of new friends and helped later on
when Jim Tatler and I were asked to organise the Midland Marshals
training day. A job we both still enjoy. I’ve also marshalled at lots
of circuits around the country, a favourite being Oulton Park. If
you’ve never been up to Cheshire and visited the finest race track
in the country its time you did.
Nowadays at events other than Prescott I’m usually found hiding
from the elements and eating cake in the back of one of the Midland
Rescue Ambulances, a qualification I worked hard for and am
extremely proud to hold. (Rescue Licence that is, not cake eating!)
I’m also very lucky to have been invited to marshal at the Le Mans
24 Hour race for the last 3 years.
So that’s me, loud, disorganized, very proud father and owner of
one of the countries tattiest Land Rovers. I do know what I’m
doing, honest!
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