History of the National Student Motor Sport Championship

compiled by John Upham with contributions from various others as given below.
updated Sunday, May 25th 2003

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Introduction

From Duncan Forrester (DuncanForrester@msn.com)

It all started back in about 1980 at the University of Salford - (I attended Salford between 79 and 83). SUMC were part of MASSAC (Manchester & Salford Students Automobile Club) - comprising Manchester, UMIST & Salford Universities. I was mad keen on road events back then & actively competing on ANCC / NW rallies and managed to persuade one or two others to take the plunge. It helped that we persuaded the Athletics division at Salford Union to pay entry fees!

We also noticed some crews from Liverpool and Sheffield Universities on some events, so we wrote to all the northern universities and after a couple of meetings started the Northern Universities Motor Club group. At the time the active members were from Salford, Leeds, Sheffield, Liverpool and Lancaster. The aim was firmly to promote student motorsport and encourage competition between member Universities.

In 1982 I was on my "year out" and a guy called BILL BALME took things on with some real ambition. Bill devised the concept of the championship event, comprising a mixture of road rally, autotest and maybe PCT. He also persuaded ENDSLEIGH to sponsor it.

All I can remember for sure is that the first such event was sometime in the academic year 1982/3. I acted as C of C for the road rally, which started at Leyburn on the A1 and covered about 130 miles on maps 99 and104. On the night it was foggy like hell, which messed-up the Targa timing completely. I remember going round in the course car (with a lad from Thame called Nick Ground), altering every single watch on the route. Still, nobody "cleaned" any section and nobody went OTL. Unfortunately I can't remember who won - maybe I could find the info if I look hard. We had awards for the Auto-test, for the rally and overall, but I think Bill was the only one who understood the scoring system for how they both came together.

A lad called LEIGH TRAVIS took the reigns the following year & worked very hard for a little while after.

Sadly I haven't seen or heard of anyone from that era for years now, other than CHRIS GRADON - an engineer at Peugeot Talbot Sport - who was at Salford just after I left and (I think) helped Leigh Travis. As far as I'm aware Chris is still at Coventry, but since I haven't competed with them for a couple of years I don't know for sure.

From Mike East (Mike.East@sun.co.uk):

The National Student Motorsport Championship was conceived and first run by Salford University M.C. some time around 1983/84. The Event wass ponsored by Endsleigh Insurance and organised by a commitee headed by Leigh Travis, who still has connections with Salford University. The Event was made up of a Road Rally, a table top and autotest, all organised by Salford University. Leigh Travis can be contacted in the Blue Book under Northern Universities M.C. NUMC was a collective of 7 Universties that used to and probably still does organise an inter University Motorsport Championship, consisting of Road Rallies, Scatters and "specials".

From Martin Whittaker, York, whittaker_mj@hotmail.com

I was a member of Massac between 84 and 87, and had some fantastic times with them, competing in Scatter Rallies all over the North of England. But the highlight for me was being thrown in the deep end as Finnish Timekeeper on the 1984 RAC Rally, 1st Stage at Knowsley Safari Park. You will all remember Tony Pond crashing his big Rover into a tree, but you never saw the poor timekeeper at the end, filling in the timecard for a very unhappy Rob Arthur. Not a pleasant experience then, but now I wouldn't have missed it for anything.

Regrettably, I've lost contact with most of the people I knew in Massac then, but I'm sure I'll run into Leigh Travis one day. I believe Chris Gradon is now at Prodrive, and Leon Gutfreund is a Data Engineer with an Indy Car team?

But I'd like to mention all those drivers or navigators who had the dubious pleasure...Alex Atkinson, Dave Lumby, Phil Eaton-Dykes, Tim Brentnall, Sarah Anderson, but especially Wyn Jones - the events we won in your Allegro! 

From Peter_Trace@europe.notes.pw.com Tue Feb 18 14:16:31 1997Date: Tue, 11 Feb 97 13:27:30 GMTFrom: Peter_Trace To: j.e.upham@reading.ac.ukSubject: Rallying
I was browsing the net today and found your history of the National Students Motor Sports Championship. I was Clerk of the Course of the 1989 event held on one hell of a cold night in February, which resulted in more marshals going off than competitors. We organised more or less off theback of two or three of our crews attending an event in 1988, and we thought we'd give it a go. After a lot of long nights, and long weekends PRing.It didn't help that both myself and my fellow co-ordinator were drunken bums and so never sober enough to drive!

I don't know if you have a list of Winners, but I can remember that the 1989 Event was won by one Ian Speight, who was a member of EUMSC (EUMoC as it was at the time). The Autotest that year was won by Ian Hutchinson (also EUMSC), and unfortunately I cannot remember who won the Table Top but I believe it was a chap from Bath University. (I was going out with a girl from Bath at the time so we had three or four crews come up for the event!). Ian managed to win by having a decent placing on the Autotest but also by being the highest place Student Crew on the 198 mile East Lothian Safari (named after the East African Safari!!). He was perhaps fortunate as it was double points for the positions on the rally in comparison to the autotest and table top (theory was 2 people in car thus twice as many points!). But even so he won, and I cannot remember who navigated for him.

I will see if I have any more details at home - I'm sure I have somewhere!

Regards Pete Trace

The 1990 event run by Leeds University Union Motor Club. The event used the Mobil 1 Northern Lights Road Rally, a table top and autotest. Mike East was second overall and 4th on the Road Rally which was open to any Motor Club.

Year by Year Summary

The following has been compiled from information supplied by Martin Whittaker, David Crooke, Mike East, Duncan Forrester, Lockhart Horsburgh, Andy Juniper, Pete Meloy, Peter Trace, Simon Wallis, Gavin Walker and John Upham.
John Upham
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