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| Andrew Morland in his 1955 Lotus 6 |
The Course
de Cote d'Etretat-Bénouville is rather unique because of the number of British VSCC cars and competitors that participate. Its closeness to the Portsmouth-Le Havre
ferry and the attraction of the famous Normandy seaside town of Etretat
obviously contribute to this. For the
Brits there is the rare chance to do a hillclimb on public roads and a hill of
1.6km which is longer than those in the UK.
The late August date marks an end to the summer holidays with a last chance to
breath in the pleasant Normandy air before “La Rentrée” (return to school and
work after the vacations). As well as
the competitors a number of Brits make their way to spectate in their classic
and historic vehicles which adds to the atmosphere around the town and the
climb. Well worth a visit.
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| Historic cars in the Hotel Ambassador car park in Etretat |
The course
itself rises out of Etretat along the D11 public road to the pleasant cliff top
country village of Bénouville where the finish and paddock are. For the spectators there is just one place where
you are allowed to watch the climbs but it provides a very good view of two of
the corners. However, you don’t get as close to the cars as on other courses
and thus need a long lens to take good photos. But at least French hillclimbs
are not blighted by high fences.
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| What you see as a spectator at the Course de Cote de Etretat-Bénouville. Here the VHC cars go back down the hill to the start. |
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| Etretat makes a nice back drop in the distance as Peter Livesy in his 1938 Frazer Nash TT Replica makes the climb. This photo was on the Saturday during the practice runs. It was not as sunny on Sunday. |
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| If you stand in the right place and use a very long lens you can just capture pictures of a third corner. Here Lyn Padfield's 1955 Lotus 6 has come to a stop. |
You access
the spectator areas via Bénouville and drive through the paddock that is
enhanced by some pleasant Normandy farm buildings. Most French hillclimbs are quite difficult to
find but I was pleasantly surprised by the number of signs to help you find the
way to this Course de Cote. The paddock
provides another chance for photos and is great throw-back to the paddocks of
the fifties and sixties. The entry fee
for spectators was very low cost at just five euros for the Sunday or seven
euros for both days. We stayed with
friends in Le Havre but there are plenty of hotels and campsites in the area.
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| Impeccable classic Triumph sports car in the paddock at Bénouville. |
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| Lotus in the paddock at Bénouville |
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| Detail on the Gemini including the 4 litre V8 and my shadow! |
Saturday
afternoon sees just the fifty or so historic vehicles take to the hill and they
also return on Sunday when the seventy plus regional French hillclimb cars join
them. It should be mentioned that there
is a Brit competing in many of the Normandy regional hillclimbs. He is John Page, a very nice guy that we met
earlier in the year at St Pierre de Varengville. I was very pleased to see him again at Etretat. He competes in an ex-Gary Brabham 1988
Formula Three Ralt. Thus although he
competes against the more modern cars, his is a car worthy of competing in
historic races itself! John, who has a
French competition license, was competing in his sixth French hillclimb of the
year. Next month at the beginning of
October you can see John competing at Pourville near Dieppe which John rates as
his favourite local hillclimb.
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| With John Page in the paddock at Bénouville in front of his F3 Ralt RT32 |
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| John had a good first run but had trouble with the gear changes on his second run and ran wide. |
Saturday
had the better weather of the two days but it was already beginning to cloud
over when the first runs started at 3pm.
Then there were a number of long delays but you learn to expect these
when you attend French hillclimbs. It allowed me some time to go back to the
paddock and take some photos. Sunday was a little misty but still very
pleasant. The expected rain and storms
stayed away.
The VHC
(Vehicules Historique Competion) cars were split into a number of classes. Brits made up most of the entries in almost
all of the classes.
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| I think this fast 1929 Morgan Super Aero driven by Sue Darbyshire has a 1.3 litre Harley-Davidson engine. |
The pre 1947 VSCC class had a good variety of vehicles including many Frazer Nashes.
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| Annabel Jones in a 1926/29 Frazer Nash Boulogne Vitesse 1.5 lire. |
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| John Earle Marsh in a 1935 3.5 litre Alvis Silver Eagle |
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| Julian Grimwade in the 1934 3.5 litre Frazer Nash Norris Special |
There was also a class for cars from 1947 to 1961 including Cooper-Bristol's and Lotus 6s.
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| The 1956 one litre DKW Monza of Alain Mairie |
The class of cars from 1962 to 1976 was perhaps my favourite.
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| The 1973 Alpine Renault A110 of Bob Gibson |
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| Drivers chatting about their Alpine Renaults. This is the 1974 A110 of Johnny Hulme. |
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| This much modified 1955/74 Renault 4CV was running in the prototype class |
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| It was good to see some younger drivers. This is Christopher Williams in the Renault 4CV Ptoto concentrating before the restart |
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| Tony Gomiz in the 1976 Marcadier "CanAm". Don't worry the driver was wearing proper overalls during his climbs but this is the car coming back slowly up the run during one of the delays. |
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| Andy Owler in the 1971 Dinalpin A110 which is a Mexican built version of the French sports car. It looks rather resplendent in the Yellow Renault colours |
Finally there were the post historique cars.
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| The 1996 Ginetta G27R of Anthony Williams |
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| This 1984 Renault R5 Turbo of Sheridan Bell caught my eye. |
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| Rob Hume in the 1989 Van Diemen RF89 Multi one litre sports car. |
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| The 1979 1.5 litre Fenouil JF79 of Francois Prieur |
The fastest of the VHCs was a much more recent single seater.
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| James Wilkinson took FTD in the VHCs in this 1993 Formula Vauxhall Reynard. |
The classes
in French regional hillclimbs take a bit of understanding with them having
categories, classes and divisions! I
won’t attempt to explain them here except that cars compete against similar
types of car in terms of type, cubic capacity and to a certain extent age. The very fastest cars that compete to be the
overall winner are quite impressive in terms of speed.
The
Production touring cars.
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| Laurent Devienne's F2000 Renault Super 5 Max |
The
modified touring cars cars.
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| An équipe of Simca Rallye 2 |
GT / GTTS The
GT cars.
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| This Porsche is a regular in the Normandy hillclimbs |
CM –
Production based Sports cars
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| Patrick Noe's BRC CM-02 |
CN -Sports Racing
cars. Only cars of 2 litres or under are
allowed. Some of the fastest French hillclimb cars are
the specialist Norma sports cars.
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| Norma M20 |
The single
seaters. Formula Three, Formula Renault
and Formula Ford cars are allowed and compete in different classes. The pre-2009 F3 cars compete with the FF
cars. The F3000 cars that you sometimes
see at the bigger events are not allowed at the Regional events. The modern F3 cars tend to compete with the
Norma sports cars for the outright win on many climbs.
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| One of the very fastest cars was Bertrand Lassalle's Dallara F300 |
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| Alain Facon's F3 Dallara F302-04 |
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| Thomas Beaufils in the much older Lola T620 |
The fact
that there was just one place to spectate gave me a particular challenge as a
photographer and blogger in that I needed to make more of an effort to get
variety into the shots. Hopefully I
succeeded.
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| Roger Buxton's 1930 Alfa Romeo 6C 1750 supercharged Gran Sport. |
As usual I was using the
excellent Panasonic Lumix DMC TZ70 Compact camera with its very good Leica lens
and 30 times zoom. For motor sport it is
good as it is very easy to control the shutter speed.
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| The Jema of Anthony Mancel |
I have
managed to attend at least one French motoring event a month so far this
year. Not yet sure where I’ll go in
September and October, and certainly November and December will be a
challenge! However, you can be sure that
my reports and photos will appear on this blog, so come back soon.
Cars seen in the spectator car park:
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| Ford Escort Mexico |
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| Vintage Bentley |
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| Lotus 6 |
End piece:
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| Changing the gear ratios on the Lola T620 of Thomas Beaufils |
John Etherton asserts his copyright to all of the photos on this blogpost. However, you may post the photos elsewhere on the web as long as you credit the photographer, John Etherton, and this blog post, Rouenlesafx@blogspot.com and provide a link to this page.
John Etherton affirme son droit d'auteur à l'ensemble des photos sur ce billet de blog. Cependant, vous pouvez poster des photos ailleurs sur le web aussi longtemps que vous créditez le photographe, John Etherton, et ce blog, Rouenlesafx@blogspot.com et fournissez un lien vers cette page.
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