Historics 2025 season review: old-timers keep up the pace

Paul Lawrence: As a stalwart of the UK motor sport scene since the 1980s, Paul has long been a contributor to these pages

Seldom has there been so much change and upheaval in historic racing as there was across the 2025 season. It was a case of shifting sands as prime promoters came under new ownership, clubs changed focus, championships and categories moved around and rival series proliferated. All of this came against a background of challenging financial times and generally smaller grids than anyone would have liked.

Despite the general unease, the positives included a more concerted effort to push back on the excesses of car development in historic racing and the creation of new initiatives like the Motor Racing Legends Generations Cup and the development of the Equipe Classic Racing 6 Hours.

At a fairly grassroots level, the excellent Classic Touring Car Racing Club marked half a century since the inaugural outing for Pre-57 Saloons by further strengthening its offering for anyone wanting to race a period touring car from across four decades. The development and burgeoning appeal of the Super Touring Power event at Brands Hatch had CTCRC races at its core.

One of the annual highlights of the season, the Silverstone Festival, proved to be the last event of the genre as Silverstone switched its prime focus away from a dedicated historic racing festival as an anchor point in the summer season.

Meanwhile at Goodwood, despite some mixed weather for the Revival, the show was as good as ever with strong grids and close racing. BTCC champion-elect Tom Ingram underlined his class in historic cars by sharing the Jaguar E-type of Richard Kent to TT glory.

Events like the Donington Historic Festival emerged bigger and better under new management. The big push from MRL to evolve and expand was clear when the Donington Historic Festival ran in early May. Though grids were realistic rather than record-breaking, the atmosphere, the paddock set-up and the whole package for participants was enhanced. Notable winners across three days included new MRL boss Shaun Lynn who, partnered by son Maxwell, won the three-hour Pall Mall Cup in their Lotus Elan.

The big changes in 2025 went back to the middle of ’24 when Motor Racing Legends was acquired by racer Lynn and Masters Historic Racing was acquired by Frenchman Fred Fatien. Inevitably change was likely and it was quickly apparent that MRL was firmly on the front foot as it added a new GT3 category to its portfolio and the successful new Generations Cup, which pitched two family members from different generations into a two-driver race for Appendix K MGBs.
The trial race at Silverstone at the end of the season was a resounding success and was won by father and son Rick and Joe Willmott. It will grow further in 2026 as a great platform for bringing new drivers into the sport in a fairly stress-free environment.

There is no doubt that attracting co-ordinator Rachel Bailey across from Masters was another major coup for MRL and it seems that MRL has taken the advantage in terms of delivering across a wide range of categories. As the two organisations moved into a similar place in the market, that rivalry will continue into 2026. Importantly, MRL will have a big hand in the re-worked Silverstone Classic next July after Masters stepped away from the event.

At a lower level, but in a similar vein, Equipe Classic Racing continued its determined growth and targeted several traditional Historic Sports Car Club categories in particular, with a move to run period single-seaters and 1960s sports racing cars. ECR was clearly targeting core HSCC grids for its on-going development.

The six-hour Equipe GTS race at Donington in early July was a great success, with 33 cars on the grid and a race headed by a gaggle of Lotus Elans, including the lead car anchored by former BTCC racer Rory Butcher. The race will grow further with a move to the Silverstone GP circuit next year.

The HSCC battled on with its core activities but nothing much in the way of new initiatives and was able to count on the period Formula Ford categories to support much of what was going on.

Under the drive of former club chairman Chris Sharples, Historic Formula Ford 1600 came back from a rather sorry state to once more become the series that it had been only a couple of years earlier with 30-plus grids and close but sporting competition. At the end of the season, Sam Mitchell took the title for the second time after a break of a decade and was able to repeat the championship crown that his father Westie won in 2009.

“The remarkable Rick Morris, 78, won twice over the final weekend”

In Classic Formula Ford, for pre-1982 cars, it was Jordan Harrison who took the title but the remarkable Rick Morris, 78, was a serious contender and won twice over the final weekend of the season. It was a fitting conclusion to Rick’s 53rd season of racing.

Other notable single-seater successes included Formula Junior, in its debut year outside the HSCC, which just seems to go from strength to strength as it heads relentlessly towards a 70th anniversary season in 2028. The UK championship went down to the wire at Silverstone and was won for the third time by Nic Carlton-Smith, this time in his Lotus 20.

Both Thruxton and Castle Combe enjoyed good historic festival weekends but the bid to create a historic racing festival at Snetterton again fell flat as competitors simply voted with their feet.

Over in rallying it was also a time of change with the emergence of Category 4 for the cars of the 1980s. Now, Category 5 will be added to cover the story right through to 2000. The adoption of Category 4 fully into the British Historic Rally Championship delivered a new champion in Baz Jordan, who guided his Mitsubishi Galant VR-4 to the overall title with a measured campaign. Some threw their hands up in horror at the prospect of a four-wheel-drive turbocharged car winning the British Historic title but this was a 35-year-old car and, as the saying goes, time waits for no man.

However, it was still among the Category 3 Ford Escort Mk2 pack that the fiercest competition continued and they generally set the pace in the hands of drivers like Dan Mennell, Paul Thompson, the former single-seater racer David Henderson and David Crossen.

Then at the end of the year, the biennial Roger Albert Clark Rally offered the biggest and toughest challenge in UK rallying with five days of competition through the forests in snow, ice, fog and rain.

Through it all, Osian Pryce and Dale Furniss delivered a masterclass performance to win by over two and a half minutes from Paul Barrett and Gordon Noble, while former British Rally champion Matt Edwards and Sion Williams fought back from losing six minutes due to a puncture to finish a remarkable third overall as Ford Escorts swept the podium.

However, the pace of Marty McCormack in the development BMW M3 from Category 4 was a signal that times are indeed a-changing. It’s not only in racing that 2025 proved to be a year of change.