2011 Classic Harvest Tour

Entry List | Picture Gallery | Organisers Report | Entrants Reports

Another sucessful Classic Harvest Tour, and the weather was pretty good too.

We started with our Saturday evening Scatter Rally for those who were staying overnight at the Comfort Inn Hotel, this, the evening meal and a chat at the bar later was a great start to the weekend and proved very popular.

Sunday was a great success with everyone enjoying a fabulous tour of the surrounding countryside
with a few surprises thrown in!

Once again we had professional photographer Tony Large with us,
please visit his website to view his superb selection of pictures.

Tony Large website link (click on the 'rallying' link)

tony beale | webmaster | contact

25th September 2011

Classic Harvest Tour Entry list

Car	Driver	Co-Driver	X	Make/Model	Year	Reg
1	Ian Mackenzie	Peter Martin		MGB GT V8	1973	OFR 531M
2	Susan Mackenzie	Liz Martin		MGB GT V8	1974	THK 500N
3	Michael Bird	Kevin Hancock		Triumph TR6	1974	XLH 988N
4	Matthew Ollman	Peter Gal		Sunbeam Alpine	1967	RLU 380E
5	Andy Simpson	Roz Simpson		MGB GT V8	1974	UWY 132N
6	John Hill	Jenny Hill		Triumph TR4a	1966	VMA 210B
7	Sally Rowe	Adrian Collins		Ford Escort	1981	PFL 224X
8	Soames	Hannah		Alfa Romero GT	1976
9	Ralph Page	Andy Page		TVR S3	1990	H215 POA
10	Joern Schaenzier	Andrew Barker		Porsche 911	1984	KBN 911
11	Nigel Bartram	Michael Bartram		JBA Falcon	1980	RFK 45W
12	Ken Edwards	Paul Richardson		Triumph Stag	1973	HIA 7917
13	Jill White	Richard White		Volvo Amazon	1967	GAW 312D
14	Dave Hansford	Jill Hansford		Austin Healey 3000 Mk2	1961	2290 WD
15	Ed Chambers	Mags Sizer		MGB GT	1981	RPV 69W
16	Lorimer Burn	Alexander Burn		Daimler SP250	1960	250 BOL
17	Neil Lott	Darryl Cleevely		Ford Escort Mexico	1970	XCV 683J
18	Robert Madge-Miall	Lisa Moulder		Volvo Amazon	1967	OUC 1F
19	John Barton	Janice Brown		Sunbeam Rapier SIIIa	1961	YCJ 259
20	Graham Hallett	TBA		Ronart W152 V12	1974	GHH 202
21	Sarah Blezard	Martin Carpenter		Triumph TR6	1974	GOA 939N
22	Mike Bouet	Anne Bouet		Alfa Romeo 1750 GT	1971	GDA 3J
23	Richard Mitchell	Susie Schraider		MGB Roadster	1977	TTL 827R
24	Colin Woodage	Mark Church		Morris Mini Cooper	1968	MRD 222F
25	Brian Dwelly	Janette Dwelly		Morris Minor 1000	1959	226 ENY
26	Chris Langdon	Heather Langdon		Morris Cooper S 1275	1969	RVC 254H
27	John Smith	Chris Campsall		Suzuki Cappuccino	1994	M510 RWG
28	Tony Brown	Steven Brown		Escort Mexico Mk1	1972	GNK 923L
29	David Yorke	Robert Fowkes		BMW E30 M3	1989	TRF 124
30	Mark Highfield	Julie Highfield		Morgan 4/4	1968	KWM 685G
31	Terry Powell	Oliver Fosythe		MGB BT	1969	CGT 187H
32	Russ Pemberton	Rikki Pemberton		Ford Escort Mk1	1969	TRX 751G
33	Paul Rogers	Helen Rogers		Mini Cooper S	1967	SRR 84F
34	Mike Stratton	Hilary Stratton		Austin 1300GT	1972	TND 579K
35	Richard Hodson	Martin Hurley-Trinder		Lancia Stratos	1989	F906 MRA
36	Helen Scott	David Burton		Morris Minor 1000	1968	UJD 868F
37	Nick Barnes	Liz Barnes		Austin Healey 100/6	1956	RSJ 526
38	Peter Beaven	Robert Beaven		MGB GT	1981	NMR 613X
39	Paul Trill	Lyn Trill		Jaguar XK140 FHC	1955	EEN 104
40	Terry Douce	Pam Douce		Lotus Cortina Mk2	1967	JDK 560F
41	Richard Hornsby	Jane Hornsby		MGB Roadster	1975	HTC 395N
42	Paul Critchley	Dorothy Critchley		MGB GT	1973
43	Mike Tanswell	Helen Tanswell		Triumph Stag	1971	XUT 39J
44	Julie Martingale	Ian Martingale		Ford Escort	1969	JPP 207G
45	Steve Morris	Rob Thomas		Volvo Amazon	1967	LHA 360E
46	Charles East	Helen Pearce		Wolseley 15/50		VLX 106
47	Robert Rowe	Setsuko Rowe		Triumph Stag	1976	MVF 66P
48	Luke Allies	Angie Oliver		Ford Escort Mexico
49	Richard Jansz	Rebecca Jansz		Mini Cooper S	1966	D124 VPN
50	Allen Haughton	Beverley Houghton		Mercedes 300SL	1988	F199 OYO

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25th September 2011

Pictue Gallery

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Organisers Report

For Helen and I this year’s Classic Harvest Tour seemed to be nothing but a series of problems.
Many months before the event we learnt that the Hughes Rally in Kent was changing its date due to one of the test venues being unavailable on the event’s regular date. The alternative date they chose to reschedule to was the same as Harvest Tour, with the result that some of our regular marshals and, more importantly, our results crew, were double booked.
Naturally they chose to support the Hughes, it being a proper rally and part of the HRCR Clubman’s championship. This meant we were short of marshals and we had to develop our own results software. This took quite some time in the months before the event as the deposits for reserved entries rolled in.

Then, as the date of the event drew near effort was put into preparing the presentation for the navigator training session, and the navigation for the Saturday evening scatter. Meanwhile entries stopped rolling in and started rolling out again as the original list of 66 crews dwindled to 46 on the actual event.
A last measurement run one month before the event revealed a couple of closed roads, so on the Friday before the event we decided to go and check that they were open again. They were, but now a different road was closed. So we decided we had better check the whole route, thus writing off the whole day. Fortunately there were no more closures so only one change had to be documented during the evening. Unfortunately we also heard from one of our marshals who had decided that they could not come after all, so the whole marshalling plan had to be revised, the number of controls reduced and the results package adjusted accordingly.

When the day of the event arrived we loaded up the car and set out early for the start to prepare for the navigation training. Our hosts had set up a screen and projector for us but we could not get a reasonable image with it. Fortunately we had our own projector with us but managed to bend one of the cable pins while we were assembling it. So then we used the hotel’s cable with our projector and managed to get a reasonable image just in time for the training to start. That seemed to go well with quite a large audience getting involved.

After a very large dinner (the hotel seemed to have prepared for too many people) we started the scatter and, once again, had to encourage people to stop plotting and get on the road before they ran out of time.

Whilst they were away we tried to get the results software onto our stand-in results crew’s computer only to find that their software was out of date and would not work. So our laptop was handed over to the results crew, our only back up now in use.
When the scatter crews returned it was clear that they had fared much better this year than last, having achieved some very respectable scores. The winner was Richard Scott who actually lives right in the middle of the scatter area, so his success was not too surprising.
Finally it was the day of the Tour and, surprisingly, all of the marshals arrived nice and early so we were able to get them signed on and organised quickly, which meant that we actually managed to get some breakfast. Perhaps things were looking up.
Actually, once the event was underway, everything went reasonably well. We did have one problem where the marshal was not in place when we arrived at their control, but when we called them they assured us that they were on their way. So we put out a code board in case they didn’t make it and went on. A second problem came towards the end of the second section where a short gravel road we were to use was completely blocked by parked cars and, to avoid confusion, we repositioned the marshal to end the section at that point. In fact this was probably the only problem that the entrants noticed.

At the finish there was a great atmosphere as people enjoyed their afternoon tea and swapped tales of things that had happened during the day. Lots of people took the trouble to congratulate us, and thank us for a great event and suddenly all of the problems we had had did not seem to matter. The fact is that, so long as people continue to enjoy what we organise, there are no problems that would stop us wanting to continue with the event so we will be back next year.

Terry Schraider

A novice's view - Hilary and Mike Stratton plus Dippy.

DIPPY GOES HARVESTING in SEPTEMBER

Another new event to Dippy and crew: the Classic Harvest Tour organised in association with Windsor Car Club. We were first attracted to this event way back in January at the HRCR Open Day at Gaydon. When the Regulations arrived, we found that there was also the option to tackle a Scatter Event the night before the main tour - again something new to car and crew.

On arrival at the Comfort Hotel in Padworth, we joined a number of the other competitors for the excellent Navigation Workshop, hosted by Terry Schraider. This was first class, with a power point presentation followed by table top navigational exercises.

We had not realised how many different methods there were to find one’s way around an OS map! This was to be Hilary’s first time with night navigation and the Poti had decided to fail. (It had worked OK when we had tested it at home.) Surgery with gaffer tape and a few hours cursing did make a temporary repair to the electrics. We hoped it lasted the night!

Following a successful scrutineering of the car, we were presented with our scatter route and clues at 20.30 hours. Using our new found plotting knowledge, we set about putting the points onto the map. There were 16 of these, with only 12 to be visited. It was at this point that Hilary did think marshalling would be a better option rather than competing! At 21.00 hours, Terry suggested that we really should take to the roads; otherwise we would run out of time as the aim was to be back at HQ by 22.00 hours. We set off into the dark and were soon finding the spots and answering the clues. With just 5 points visited, we took the decision to return to the hotel to be within our time allowance. Like all good plans, things went wrong. First, a long wait at a set of traffic lights controlling a single road over a railway bridge and, then, more lights at road works just before the hotel. We clocked in just 3 minutes late which did not help our points’ score. Within a very short time, the results were declared and we were half way down the finishers’ list - those 3 minutes had cost a lot.

Day 2 and a beautiful morning for the start of the Classic Tour. Fellow QMC Members Rikki and Russ Pemberton had journeyed down from the Midlands to join in the fun. Our start number was 34 and we left the Main Control at 09.49 hours for Section A of the event, which was to be a Jogularity section. The route went via Pangbourne for the first crossing of the Thames and then into the superb quiet lanes in the Chiltern Hills. After just over 29 miles, we arrived at the Herb Farm near Sonning Common for the first rest of the event.

Section B was now back to navigating by tulip directions, which would take the route north-east towards High Wycombe. The roads used here through the old beech woods were a true test of driver and navigator skills.

Following on from last night’s workshop, the organisers had given us the opportunity to put into practice what had been learnt in the way of a personal challenge. At certain points along the route, a hand-out was distributed with a different way to solve a route round certain tulip diagrams. This really started hurting the brains of the Dippy Crew and did result in a few wrong code boards being found. We had now covered another 34 plus miles, which had brought us to the main break of the day that was at the Plant and Harvest Garden Centre in West Wycombe. A number of choices were on offer here: lunch in the garden centre, a visit to the Hell-Fire Caves or a picnic in the sun. We chose the latter.

Section C headed up the Chiltern Scarp and most of the 52 miles would be spent driving through the fantastic scenery of the Chilterns. After this, the route dropped down from the hills to cross back over the Thames at Goring and Streatley that must be the one the most picturesque parts of this massive river. During Section C, more hand-outs were given to us, but, sadly, not many were solved and more wrong code boards were written down. We should have taken more notice of our teacher last night! “Could do better” may be the report for 2011. After the river crossing at Goring, we headed back to the start hotel at Padworth to join the other 50 or so competitors.

Congratulations to the organiser - the event was faultless with the superb road book, very accurate mileages, a perfect choice of route with very few main roads used and the very informative paperwork all made for a perfect weekend. Will we be back next year? “Yes” has to be the answer - our deposit is all ready paid!

Hilary and Mike Stratton plus Dippy.

An experienced rallyist view - Brian & Janette Dwelly

Another year and another great season of classic rallies and tours which, for us, ended on the Harvest Tour, as we are now going away on a trip to New Zealand.
If we had to answer a question as to which was the best tour of the year we would say that there was a tie between two (for different reasons) and The Harvest Tour is one of them.
The Harvest has an element of challenge (although it is not a competitive rally) and the great format of an evening Scatter on the Saturday before the main event on Sunday. All being well we will be entering again next year, in fact our provisional reservation form for 2012 is already in the post.

This year Terry and Helen introduced a Navigational Training session on the Saturday afternoon for those looking to improve their understanding of the numerous ways of describing a classic rally route, and covered most of the methods we encountered over the weekend.
Although we seem to be considered “experts” we went along as there is always something else to learn from the real pro’s. However it is not necessary to attend, in order to both enjoy and complete the event but it was an very informative taste of what is on offer on competitive rallies.

Once again our 1959 Morris Minor was ready to go and successfully passed the scrutineering on Saturday evening prior to the Scatter. Having (somehow) scored the best result in last years event we felt a little under pressure but were ready to enjoy ourselves regardless.
The Scatter consists of a number of clues to 16 points on a map (supplied) and then visiting them and answering a question which relates to each location. Each answer has a different number of points allocated to it. You decide how many you can plot & visit, up to a maximum of 12, within the overall time of only 90 minutes - no more. Just in case there was a tie there was a deciding question which we read and answered – but stupidly didn’t act upon especially after all the emphasis placed by Terry on the importance of reading the instructions CAREFULLY.

We were one of the last teams away and after driving around the lanes and only failing to answer one of the clues we aimed for (due to being in the wrong location) and then losing the last two points gained by being late back at the finish, we managed only the second best score this year having been beaten by local man Richard Scott. Lots of discussion in the bar afterwards did nothing to improve anyone’s results but did result in the conclusion that night navigation is a world apart from daylight events.

Staying overnight at the start venue always affords a more relaxed start to an event and this was no exception with the traditional rally breakfast of a bacon roll and tea or coffee. Terry briefed the teams and the first was away at 9.15 with the rest following at one minute intervals. Whilst you could simply follow the road book and enjoy the scenery,

which was excellent, you could also try out the personal challenge offered on this event. This is in two parts. Firstly to follow a recommended time schedule, making sure not to arrive early at any point on route, and secondly to decode navigational handouts, given out en-route, which describe how to negotiate deceptive triangular junctions ensuring a correct approach and departure. This was monitored by a control or a code board – some of which were placed on the wrong route to fool the unwary. Once again we made at least one mistake by not reading the instructions telling us to NOT to go via certain points. Will we ever learn?

This year the route took us north of the Thames towards the Chilterns using jogularity directions to a coffee stop at The Herb Garden at Sonning Common and then using tulip directions to lunch at the Plant and Harvest garden centre on the outskirts of High Wycombe. After lunch we ventured to the most northerly part of the route through Chinnor before heading south for the finish.

However, the afternoon section which continued with tulips proved to be the most challenging with 5 of the total 8 handouts being given closer and closer to junctions to be negotiated with a final one cleverly written back to front in an unusual type style directing you take the long way around the next two grass triangles.

Arriving at the finish we felt reasonably pleased with our attempt at the personal challenge but knew that we had not been precise enough to improve on last years second best score. In fact when we compared our score with the other entrants we found had 3 penalties against us along with 3 other crews.
The least penalty was achieved by Ralph and Andy Page in their TVR.

A great event once again which was not hampered by the procession of cars you get on some events which may be due to the personal challenge as a large number of crews appeared to be attempting to arrive at controls at a particular time thus keeping the cars spread out. For most of the time we did not see another ca apart from those coming towards us and those who wanted to drive faster and pass us. The event seems to have a perfect recipe which we will look forward to it again next year on our 5th Harvest Tour.

Brian & Janette Dwelly

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