The Avon Tour of Britain, Oulton Park, 1973
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Production Car Racing 1973–1975, The Avon Tour of Britain. PP Video. 60 mins, £12.99.
“This is a blueprint for the future of rallying,” commented Ford’s Peter Ashcroft during the pioneering 1973 Avon/Motor Tour of Britain.
Wonder if he still thinks that?
The Avon tour was a three-year curio, and attempts to revive it a couple of years ago had to be abandoned due to lack of entries, a situation borne of the lack of available cash to sustain the investment necessary in such an intensive and demanding event.
The reproduction quality here isn’t exactly top notch, but the content is wonderful: James Hunt enjoying himself with the Camaro in ’73; Ford Capris and Triumph Dolomites being thrown around in contravention of the established laws of physics; Roger Clark v Gerry Marshall in that epic battle of the Escort RS2000s in 1974; Tony Lanfranchi’s optimistic assertion that he could win the event outright in a Plymouth Hemicuda (a prediction worthy of David Icke, as the brakes were destroyed by a couple of laps of Cadwell Park, which put the thing into an earth bank with terminal effect); hard evidence that Dickie Davies had learned to pronounce Ford Capri correctly by 1975 . It’s all good stuff, and the happy-go-lucky production is in keeping with the flavour of the event. S A