Museum’s Campbell Entrance road to again meet the Outer Circuit. This new circuit, from its opening on 20 April, 1937 by Dame Ethel Locke King, took the spotlight right off both the Mountain and Outer Circuits. In that 1937 season, there were just seven Mountain Circuit races and in 1938 there was just one, a 10-lap Mountain Championship race during the Autumn meeting. In these two seasons, the majority of races were held on the Campbell Circuit, with fewer still on the Outer Circuit. There was one madcap day on 16 October, 1937 when all three circuits were used in a single meeting. Things looked up a bit for the Mountain Circuit in 1939. By the time that truncated season came to a premature end in August, 13 races including two for motorcycles at a BARC meeting had been held on it, which was as many as had been held there in 1931.
Novelty races From starting out as a bit of a novelty itself in 1930, the Mountain Circuit soon became a home for a variety of novelty races. At the August 1931 meeting, it hosted the fi rst of several Veterans races, this Daily Sketch- sponsored event being notable for having two different 1903 Mercedes recording identical fastest laps of 37.34mph but both beaten on handicap by a 1903 Rover which averaged 24.99mph.
At the same meeting two years later, the BARC tempted out of retirement nine
Brian Lewis’ Talbot follows behind the Bugatti of CS Staniland during the Mountain Championship race on 17 October, 1931.
of the drivers who had starred in the early days of Brooklands before 1914. Driving identical MG Magnas, such luminaries as JTC Moore-Brabazon (later Lord Brabazon of Tara and a pioneer aviator as well as driver), land-speed-record breaker LG ‘Cupid’ Hornstead and Tom Thorneycroft (who drove a 30hp Thorneycroft at the fi rst Brooklands meeting in 1907) battled it out over three laps, with Sydney Cummings the eventual winner. In that same year, the Junior Racing Drivers Club organised practice sessions on the Mountain Circuit on Thursday evenings. Other novelties included an Oxford versus Cambridge Universities race in 1933. It was won by a Cambridge team which included Raymond
Mays, Whitney Straight and Richard Seaman. A Ladies’ Race in 1934 was won by Doreen Evans but made notable by Fay Taylour, who had come second by just 0.8sec, failing to acknowledge that the chequered fl ag had been shown and carrying on racing until a marshal stood in her path in the middle of the track to dissuade her from lapping any further. SCH ‘Sammy’ Davis, the well-known driver and journalist, had his own memorable encounter on the Mountain Circuit, crashing heavily in a low-chassis S-Type Invicta at the Easter meeting in 1931. He ended up hospitalised with a badly broken leg. This was just weeks after he had written an entertaining description of racing on the
The variety of machinery in size and engine capacity that competed equally on the Mountain Circuit can be seen clearly in this image on the Finishing Straight.
MAY - JUNE 2020 | BROOKLANDS BULLETIN 27
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