TV Motorsport Memory - Motors TV

cg7aa · 19 Jan 2007, 01:08 (Ref:1818976)

It looks like motors have got bored of their relentless Aussie V8 season reviews and have decided to show something interesting in the shape of motorsport memory. The last one I caught was the Lucas 1987 British F3 season (Haymarket production presumably for a season review back then probably), anyway although the editing leaved a bit to be desired at times. The racing is fantastic. I had no idea F3 cars back them moved around so much. Glorious oversteer and drifts. My God has the likes of Silverstone and Spa changed alot or what!

Watching the young J.Herbert, D. Hill, B.Gachot. G. Brabham do battle from 20yrs ago had me grinning like an idiot. The myriad chassis and engines were an eye opener too. Who would have thought Dallara would rule supreme today for F3 chassis? What fascinated me was that you could see even in their younger days, their specific driver traits. Good stuff.

**Craig** · 19 Jan 2007, 18:04 (Ref:1819590)

Well spotted, thanks for posting. I'm currently watching the 1987 BTCC, excellent!

Knowlesy · 19 Jan 2007, 18:05 (Ref:1819591)

They showed all these last year, but glad they are being repeated. Good stuff!

Suze · 20 Jan 2007, 11:52 (Ref:1820182)

Wish they had better titles though...I also caught Motorsport Memories - Johnny Herbert in the past week and was surprised to find an F3 season review - great stuff but if they'd called it F3 season 1987 would have been good as would've found it and not missed first couple of races!

chunder · 20 Jan 2007, 13:03 (Ref:1820258)

Even better todayw as the Hodgetts one from 87 aswell, was superb seeing Harvey and O Brien, Carvell, Leech in the Rovers and stuff.

Great cars that were sliding adround all over the place and also good racing aswell. people seem to think that the 2 litre era was the start of great racing, well there was plenty ion the old races aswell.

Suze · 20 Jan 2007, 13:48 (Ref:1820293)

Caught that one too, about half an hour before it ended! There is another one at 8pm this evening though not sure what it's featuring.

Hazard · 20 Jan 2007, 14:45 (Ref:1820334)

Tonight's is the 1987 BTCC again.

cg7aa · 20 Jan 2007, 14:46 (Ref:1820335)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Suze

...There is another one at 8pm this evening though not sure what it's featuring.

I think it is still the '87 BTCC. The next 'new' show is a 500cc GP bike one about Freddie Spencer's '86 season (although the text for the advert said Eddie Lawson at the top)

Good point about the program titles. The BTCC one had Hodgetts in the title. You would think the entire program was about him. The pattern so far is for Motors to add the name of the that year's championship winner onto the title hence Motorsport memory: Herbert etc.

Am the only one who thought the editing was a bit iffy at times? Still some good sliding action.

. Just how many categories were there in the BTCC back then? I was confused a bit. How come someone from Class A wasn't the overall winner (Rouse, Harvery etc) and can someone explain to me what was going on at the wet-dry Oulton Park round (Round 10) where drivers were sharing cars? Needell and Hodgetts coming in different cars and swapping (same team)

.

If it werent for the period cars and clothes of the people in the background, the program would have felt like highlights from a club meeting today on Race and Rally UK!

J-C · 20 Jan 2007, 20:37 (Ref:1820497)

The 1987 BTCC review showed some fantastic racing which hopefully illustrates to newer fans why current driving standards are often criticised. It also shows touring cars that were actually exciting to watch and sounded terrific. For me, watching the BTCC in 1988 was what started off my interest in motorsport - the Sierras, M3s etc were fantastic.

The driver swapping at Oulton would have been the 1hr "enduro" race that was a fixture of the championship until 1991. 2 drivers (usually the regular driver with a non-series regular co-driver) would share the car, and there would be a pitstop for the driver change (and optional tyre changes). I can only assume that the Hodgetts/Needell combo was entered for both cars, hence the car swap at the pitstop.

As for the class structure, in the late 80's there were 4 classes, divided by engine capacity. Class D would be up to 1600cc (mainly Toyota Corollas of varying description), Class C was up to 2000cc (Golfs/Astras etc), Class B was up to 3000cc (BMW M3s) and Class A was over 3000cc/turbos (RS500s, Rovers etc). Basically each class was a separate championship, and the overall championship was simply the class championships amalgamated into 1. So after round 1 there would be a 4-way tie for the overall lead between the winners of classes A-D. This meant that the champion may often come from a lower, less competitive class.

stradlin21 · 20 Jan 2007, 21:07 (Ref:1820507)

i love the way on the btcc 87 has all these young guns on the scene

Win Percy and Dave Brodie turned up at Silverstone and whiped the floor with them

BILTEL · 21 Jan 2007, 12:35 (Ref:1820882)

Truly fantastic. Hey I'm biased towards the Silverstone round with Brodie in the Starion (Starions of my own

), but this is what saloon car racing was all about. Brodie did have a habit of cranking up a good Starion for the Silverstone rounds and blowing the doors off the big names.

Nice one MotorsTV.

Where are those cars now? SD1's, 635's, XJS's, Capri's, GTV's etc,etc

cg7aa · 22 Jan 2007, 09:12 (Ref:1821527)

Quote:

Originally Posted by J-C

The 1987 BTCC review showed some fantastic racing which hopefully illustrates to newer fans why current driving standards are often criticised. It also shows touring cars that were actually exciting to watch and sounded terrific. For me, watching the BTCC in 1988 was what started off my interest in motorsport - the Sierras, M3s etc were fantastic.

The driver swapping at Oulton would have been the 1hr "enduro" race that was a fixture of the championship until 1991. 2 drivers (usually the regular driver with a non-series regular co-driver) would share the car, and there would be a pitstop for the driver change (and optional tyre changes). I can only assume that the Hodgetts/Needell combo was entered for both cars, hence the car swap at the pitstop.

As for the class structure, in the late 80's there were 4 classes, divided by engine capacity. Class D would be up to 1600cc (mainly Toyota Corollas of varying description), Class C was up to 2000cc (Golfs/Astras etc), Class B was up to 3000cc (BMW M3s) and Class A was over 3000cc/turbos (RS500s, Rovers etc). Basically each class was a separate championship, and the overall championship was simply the class championships amalgamated into 1. So after round 1 there would be a 4-way tie for the overall lead between the winners of classes A-D. This meant that the champion may often come from a lower, less competitive class.

Thanks for explaining all that. Appreciated.

You are absolutely right about the Hodgetts/Needell thing. Had I thought more about it I would have realised the results list had them listed twice.

cg7aa · 22 Jan 2007, 09:15 (Ref:1821528)

Quote:

Originally Posted by stradlin21

i love the way on the btcc 87 has all these young guns on the scene

Win Percy and Dave Brodie turned up at Silverstone and whiped the floor with them

Exactly what I thought. I only know about the likes of Percy, Brodie, Chris Craft etc from reading old Autosport race reports but clearly even in the 80s when presumably their careers were almost over, they could still peddle pretty quickly!

**chunterer** · 23 Jan 2007, 17:57 (Ref:1823955)

Quote:

Originally Posted by cg7aa

Exactly what I thought. I only know about the likes of Percy, Brodie, Chris Craft etc from reading old Autosport race reports but clearly even in the 80s when presumably their careers were almost over, they could still peddle pretty quickly!

Like the guys you mention, there were an awful lot of very good drivers who had carved a niche for themselves throughout the 80's and there were championships all over the place. A lot of the guys saw this level as a decent stepping stone to sportscars and Group C whereas some of the guys created big enough names in touring cars in their own right, like Steve Soper, Andy Rouse, Klaus Ludwig, Hans Stuck, Roberto Ravaglia etc..

In Australia drivers in the same categories became national heroes like the late great Peter Brock, Dick Johnson etc..

I reckon that there must've been hundreds of cars spread across the classes all over the world!

I need that 1987 review!

cg7aa · 1 Feb 2007, 22:15 (Ref:1831445)

Friday 1800hrs to 1900hrs: Motorsport memory on Motors TV. Assuming its what I think it is, it will be a review of the 1994 British F3 season which has been on a couple of times already this week.

The likes of Magnussen, Franchitti, Radermacker and Rees et al do battle. Rosset, Warren Hughes, Erdos and even Verdon-Roe get a mention at some point.

Where did it all go wrong Jan? I wonder...

Knowlesy · 2 Feb 2007, 17:18 (Ref:1832032)

Yes, a reminder that Jan could once drive very well, then suddenly forgot to in F1 because the races were too long to withstand his nicotine cravings.

What a waste of talent.

strider · 3 Feb 2007, 23:54 (Ref:1832898)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Knowlesy

Yes, a reminder that Jan could once drive very well, then suddenly forgot to in F1 because the races were too long to withstand his nicotine cravings.

Where did you get that idea? Yes, he was a bit of a maverick, which never suited the Stewart family even when he was winning for them in F3, but I always felt that the timing of his dismissal from F1 was very unfair. He had just finished 6th in the Canadian Grand Prix in an old model Stewart, with Rubens Barrichello in 5th in the new version. Not the kind of performance that usually results in a driver being fired.

There's nothing wrong with his stamina. He races Corvettes in the ALMS and only last weekend drove a blinding race for 24 hours at Daytona, particularly with Max Angellelli, recovering from 4 laps down to be challenging for the lead in the closing stages.

As you can tell, I was and still am a fan!

**touringlegend** · 4 Feb 2007, 00:06 (Ref:1832902)

Next Wednesday's edition is about John Cleland - I'm guessing it's a 1 hr review of the 1995 BTCC season.

Knowlesy · 4 Feb 2007, 02:27 (Ref:1832946)

I was of course exaggerating.

He is a very good driver. Just lacked the commitment during the most important stage of his career. Not that Jos did better when he replaced him!

strider · 5 Feb 2007, 00:02 (Ref:1833589)

No problem!

I just watched the programme and it brought back many memories. Dario Franchitti was Stewart's favoured son, but was really no match for Jan apart from the very first race. Jan's 14 wins from 18 races has still not been beaten since, even though there are now 22 races in a season.

He had been signed up my McLaren before the British GP support race. An extra driver there was the Italian hotshoe at the time, Giancarlo Fisichella. Completely overlooked was his team-mate, another young Italian making his F3 debut by the name of Jarno Trulli.

If you listened closely, the commentator for one of the races was a young Martin Haven, watching his current GP2 co-commentator, Gareth Rees!

Other future names were Pedro de la Rosa and Marc Gene.

Knowlesy · 5 Feb 2007, 20:42 (Ref:1834193)

It's always amazing watching these old races. When I watch some old F3000 or F3 races or whatever, some of the names that crop up together in the races are quite amazing. You find yourself either comparing the drivers to their successes (or not!) today or wondering where the hell they went!

Nostalgia is great.

luke · 5 Feb 2007, 20:54 (Ref:1834199)

Can't wait to see BTCC 1995 review again, well parts of it.

Kieran20 · 7 Feb 2007, 18:26 (Ref:1835645)

Quote:

Originally Posted by strider

No problem!

I just watched the programme and it brought back many memories. Dario Franchitti was Stewart's favoured son, but was really no match for Jan apart from the very first race. Jan's 14 wins from 18 races has still not been beaten since, even though there are now 22 races in a season.

He had been signed up my McLaren before the British GP support race. An extra driver there was the Italian hotshoe at the time, Giancarlo Fisichella. Completely overlooked was his team-mate, another young Italian making his F3 debut by the name of Jarno Trulli.

If you listened closely, the commentator for one of the races was a young Martin Haven, watching his current GP2 co-commentator, Gareth Rees!

Other future names were Pedro de la Rosa and Marc Gene.

yes until i watched this i never really rated jan a s a good driver, but when i saw his performance, really changed my mind on him.

strider · 7 Feb 2007, 23:08 (Ref:1835843)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kieran20

yes until i watched this i never really rated jan as a good driver, but when i saw his performance, really changed my mind on him.

A convert! Trust me, the guy was and still is very good.

cg7aa · 9 Feb 2007, 15:13 (Ref:1837418)

Quote:

Originally Posted by luke

Can't wait to see BTCC 1995 review again, well parts of it.

I see what you mean now by 'parts of it'.

I know there is much more footage per round in this review but one can't help thinking too many rounds are being missed out. If I remember correctly, after the season opener at Donington, the next round shown was the wet Brands meeting. A bit too much of a jump which spoils things.

I was just getting into touring cars at that time and I would have loved to have seen Rydell's first victory of the season in the Volvo.

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