Speedscene, August/September 2017 – Trevor Willis

I got bored with road cars and couldn’t afford a Caterham, so I built a Westfield and used that on the road. Triple C magazine ran an article about how easy it was to go sprinting – just yellow tape on the earth lead, ignition on/off marked, turn up and do events! – so I went along to North Weald (not the most salubrious venue, just a mass of cones on an airfield) and really enjoyed it.  I finished towards the back end of the class, but I thought it was fabulous.  At that time the Westfield had a bog standard Ford crossflow, but I eventually installed a Vauxhall and gradually leant the craft. Naively, I thought that everyone in Roadoing used standard road tyres and standard engine, but I gradually improved the car and started concentrating on the Triple C Championship. Living near Aylesbury then, a lot of the events were within a reasonable distance and were a really good mixture of sprints and hillclimbs.  After managed to win the championship in the mid-nineties, the first National hillclimb round I did was at Loton.  As a newcomer it was quite intimidating with all the top contenders there, but somehow I won and broke the class record.  I also took the record at Prescott in 1999, but the class had moved on a bit.  I had some good battles with Scott Moran in his Caterham-K series, who eventually equalled my record which we then held jointly for several years.

 

In 2000, with a Vauxhall engine OMS2000V. It’s the same spaceframe chassis that Harry Pick runs today, although it’s been considerably modified by Steve Owen. I got my first British Championship ‘number’ with the car the following year and the best overall top ten finish I had with it was fifth in 2003. Apart from the odd guest drive I’ve driven OMS cars exclusively ever since and in 2004 I switched to a carbon-tub CF04, the car Geoff Guille drives now. Then we went to the CF06 and fitted the Suzuki-based Powertec V8 in 2006, which was essentially two Hayabusa blocks on a common crankcase. The following year I got my first British run-off win, at Bouley Bay, with a hill record. Then a couple of weeks later I tied with Martin Groves for the win at Wiscombe Park.

 

Basically because I wanted to go as fast as I could afford to. We looked at NME and Judd engine and I couldn’t justify spending that much money. We knew we were going to struggle on the power front, but at least the Radical built Powertec in the CF06 would be faster than the Vauxhall. There weren’t many engine of those engines in anything other than a Radical, so the company were quite interested in what we were doing.

 

I switched to an OMS25 chassis in 2011. This was Steve’s second model with pre-preg tub, a high nose chassis with a stiffer construction and more advanced aerodynamics. For various reasons the 25 ended up being quite a big car; not a problem with the V8 but it was for some of the smaller bike engine. I won the Championship in the 25 in 2012, after we’d switched to the bigger 3.2-litre engine which was basically two 1600cc Hayabusas. The 28, which I ran the following year, came about because we wanted to go a bit smaller and lighter with improved visibility — just details changes that would make it better than the 25. 

Having driven his cars for 17 years I’ve had a long and fruitful working relationship with Steve Owen. Latterly I’ve been doing more and more work on the car myself as Steve’s customer base is the 1100/1600cc market. I enjoy working on the car and developing it and Steve teaches me a lot about how to do things. If I come up with an idea I’ll discuss it with him. It was always a collaboration, even if I ended up doing the work myself. In Aylesbury I only had a single garage, so moving to a place with a much bigger garage has been a real luxury!

 

It has to be Scott (Moran). We were really good opponents for the couple when we overlapped in the Westfield/Caterham days. You could see he was going to a class act and it’s against him that I’ve had the greatest number of battles over the years. He’s always super-difficult to beat as he never seems to have an off day! He always seems to be able to find just enough to beat you. 

Martin Groves and I had some really good duels back in the 2-litre class, too. I’ve been up against some really good people but the depth of talent is probably as good now as it ever was with Scott, Will (Hall), Wallace (Menzies), Dave (Uren) and Alex (Summers). Plus people coming through like Jason (Mourant), who’s been driving superbly. Then of course there are the 1600cc drivers like Richard (Spedding), Sean (Gould) and Eynon (Price). Every meeting you go to now there are probably more than half a dozen people who could win a run-off.

 

 

It is what it is. Through the speed traps at, say Gurston and Shelsley I’m down quite a lot, but at places like Karousel at Gurston the car’s quicker. You spend more time in there than you do on the fast bits. My split time to Karousel is usually pretty good but coming out of Ashes I need to be quick too, as after that the more powerful cars will get it back off me. At Shelsley you spend a good third o the time in the Esses, so being quick there and though Kennel and Crossing is a big advantage.

 

Probably taking the record at Bouley Bay last year. Even though I made a mistake when I lost the back end into Radio I managed to get it back. You have to be very precise at Bouley, hitting the apexes and getting on the power just right. It’s the slowest hill in the Championship, so the big can’t make so much use of the extra power and it’s more of a level playing field.

 

I think it has to be Wiscombe because of its varied nature. It has a bit of everything and on a summer’s day it’s a glorious place to be. Doune is fantastic as well. It’s probably where you get the biggest buzz — your hands are shaking every time you get out of the cockpit! I don’t think there’s a hill we do where there’s not something to like about it. Even Le Val des Terres, which I’ve never won. It’s a great hillclimb, I’m just not very good there. To be honest I’ve never really been close to winning. For whatever reason I think the car just isn’t suited to the hill.

 

Flying through the air at Craigantlet when I went off at Allard in 2010. I’d no idea what was on the other side of the bank that launched me. All I could see was sky and I was up there thinking: ‘Is there water here? A building? Cows?’ That was certainly scary.

 

Apart from the OMS I’ve only driven Will Hall’s Force AER a couple of times, at Prescott and Loton. I didn’t find it that different apart from the power. At Loton though the finish it was absolutely immense. Otherwise it wasn’t dissimilar to the OMS. Bit of a delay with the turbo, perhaps.

 

A Land Rover Freelander and a motorhome. You can’t really have a quick car on the road these days. The Westfield was quick but you couldn’t really use it without losing your licence. The roads now are just too busy and you can’t overtake. Motorbikes are my real passion. I’ve got six. A couple of Laverdas: a 500 twin Montjuic and a 1000 triple Jota which I’ve rebuilt over the winter, a couple of Ducatis: a classic 748 and a more modern road bike, a speedway bike in the living room and a trials bike. Trialling takes an awful lot of skill and I’m no good at it, but it’s nice to go and do something where you’re at the bottom of the ladder and there’s room for improvement. IT’s a whole new experience, really. Bikes are good things to collect as well as they don’t take up much room, whereas finding space for four classic cars would be very difficult. They’re appreciating in value too, so they’re better than a pension!

 

Radio 4, or Radio 6 Music’s Radcliffe and Maconie Show

 

I don’t know. It keeps changing. Most of the drivers I mentioned, really. Wallace, Will, Alex and Dave Uren is picking up the pace quickly now. Richard Spedding to, although we’ve got two Shelsleys and a Gurston when he’ll struggle. This year it’s really unclear who’s going to do it. But it would be great to get that second championship.