7 replies to this topic

[Llandowhistoricmotorsport]

Hi all,
My name is Jamie Rees; I have created Llandow Historic Motorsport as a point of communication and exhibition of all things Llandow and it’s Motorsport history.
I am forming a collection with the hope to create a small local museum here near Llandow to preserve and educate and exhibit important items from posters, programmes, passes, race overalls, helmets etc essentials anything that shows a point in time of Llandows hayday.

I can see a few feeds here that relate to Llandow, however they’re all around 7+ years old and any links or images are now times out or corrupted.
There is lots of talk of boxes and boxes of programmes and photographs I’d love to hear from anyone who thinks they may have something of interest toward this preservation project.

I’m looking forward to reading some replies,
And Thankyou in advance.
Jamie

Llandow Historic Motorsport.
Facebook - Llandow Historic Motorsport
Instagram - Llandow_historic_motor_sport
Email - llandowhistoricmotorsport@gmail.com

[djr900]

Hello, perhaps you could set up a basic cheap website.
This would appeal to a broader group of people

Facebook/instagram is not universally loved by everyone,for many good reasons.

[Llandowhistoricmotorsport]

Hello, perhaps you could set up a basic cheap website.
This would appeal to a broader group of people

Facebook/instagram is not universally loved by everyone,for many good reasons.

To be fair, they’ve both been fantastic for networking. 
I’ve set up an email account for anyone who doesn’t use social media.

If I had a website I’d still need to promote it the same as I am my other pages anyway.

The outreach has been amazing, however there are lots of people on old feeds here I’d love to communicate with.

Fingers crossed.

[Myhinpaa]

Roger Clark, 1975 Welsh Rally.

 

 

https://www.mckleini...lark 01 ctp.jpg

[Gregor Marshall]

Hi there
My late father competed there several times in 1971 (including the first ever win in his famous race car 'Old Nail') and once in 1973 - I have a couple of photos.
If you PM me your email address I can send on or let me know if you're interested.

[Llandowhistoricmotorsport]

Hi there
My late father competed there several times in 1971 (including the first ever win in his famous race car 'Old Nail') and once in 1973 - I have a couple of photos.
If you PM me your email address I can send on or let me know if you're interested.

Hey Gregor, I’d love to see them.
My email is Llandowhistoricmotorsport@gmail.com

[garyfrogeye]

I had a lot of fun breaking a gearbox in my frogeye on a trackday at Llandow a few years ago. Very enjoyable track for me.

[moffspeed]

Jamie - great to know that someone is planning to perpetuate the memory of this unremarkable but remarkable circuit.

 

As a kid in the 60's I witnessed many of the early Llandow races perched on the roof of my dad's Austin A55. As I grew older (and heavier) my father swapped to a slightly less substantial Ford Corsair V4 and I was demoted to watching from the earth banks surrounding the circuit.

 

Sometime in about 1970 - and I cannot remember the circumstances that enabled it - I started to write some of the Llandow race reports for Motoring News. This was in conjunction with schoolfriend Jon Price. We were both about 15/16 at the time. My dad would drive us from Cardiff to Cowbridge for the meetings after which we would cobble together a report and then phone it through to London in a lengthy dictation/transcription process. I'm not sure whether we were reimbursed for the phone calls. This continued intermittently until 1974 after which I disappeared off to Uni.

 

Gregor, I remember your father at the circuit. From memory he was worried about the challenge from local hot-shot Joe Gregory (or was it Dave McCloy that day) in his rapid Escort BDA - but your dad & "Old Nail" prevailed. Sadly Joe was killed at the circuit in '74. There was a makeshift bar in the paddock, the walls and ceiling of which were adorned by fragments of shattered race cars. I think your dad might have popped in for a cheeky pint after the race...

 

I have great memories but little if any memorabilia of Llandow. However Jon Price's younger brother Mike took what seemed like hundreds of photos at each of those meetings. I lost touch with the Price brothers when I went off to Uni. but they would be a brilliant resource if you could track them down (and if the photos were archived). The Price brothers lived in the Whitchurch area of Cardiff when I left for London.

 

Perhaps the richest seam of memories would come from Richard "Dickie" Davies (not the ITV version) who commentated on the majority of the races at Llandow as well as over the bridge at Castle Combe. He ran a tyre business in Haverfordwest and always turned up at the circuit in something exotic  - culminating in a DB6. Happily I believe he is still with us, although location unknown to me. 

 

Obviously many of the Llandow cars race on. Back in the late 60's that old Mk1 Jag run by Risca Garages and Sgonina's scruffy ex-Reivers Aston Martin DBR1 were just venerable old racing cars gasping the last of their competitive lives on an anonymous Welsh oval. How things change over half a century - these days "BUY 1" and "FSH 360" are two very relevant & valuable Historic racing cars.

 

I do hope your plans come to fruition. I don't think you could document or display the history of the circuit without mentioning the genesis from airfield and RAF base. Llandow was mainly an RAF storage facility during WW2 (Lancasters etc) but at times housed active Spitfire squadrons both during the war and immediately post war. Vampires were flying from Llandow as late as 1957. Similarly, warranting a mention, the Avro Tudor V Llandow air disaster of March 1950 which, at the time, was the world's worst air disaster (80 dead - mainly rugby fans returning from the Ireland v Wales International in Dublin). Somehow it is a disaster that hasn't lived on in the consciousness of many Welsh folk unlike Aberfan 16 years later.

 

A very worthy project - go for it.

Edited by moffspeed, 25 August 2022 - 13:37.