Brandsatch

[forddeliveryboy]

Mebbe I'll manage to get to one or two race meetings a year, but the last time I was involved I remember pondering what a great European motoring holiday could be had using the petrol, time and effort involved in going round and round a tarmac circuit faster than others. Admittedly, it was a 24hr race and it was half four in the morning.

 

Despite my preference for overland tours, one British racing venue stands out as my favourite - Brands Hatch. It's a shame it's on the wrong side of the M25 for me, since I love almost everything about it. Alan Henry does a good job of describing the subtleties of driving it here, https://www.mclaren.com/formula1/blog/alan-henry/Spare-a-thought-for-Brands/, I like it for its egalitarian history also. I thought some of you could be interested, so read on if want to improve your pub quiz abilities. And have ten or so minutes of time to kill.

 

Imagine back to twenty years after the first race at Brooklands when race tracks were still the preserve of the richer classes, when motorbike and sidecar was the choice for those who worked hard. The bicycle wasn't long fully evolved into a reliable vehicle which could carry you across countries, anxious parents worried about their teenage daughters being able to be ten or miles away in under an hour and getting off with boys from a different parish.

 

Cycling clubs were popular and sometimes included motorcyclists too - there was a much tighter bond back then between all those who rode on two wheels - and it was a group of cyclists who spied the natural amphitheatre of Brands Hatch when picking mushrooms out in the Kent countryside in the mid 1920s.They may have resembled something like these guys,

 

 

 

Plenty of bike clubbers had fought in The War, one club called themselves the San Fairy Anns, as in the 'ca ne fait rien' heard in France - they still exist. Anyhoos, back to the story. The land had been used by the Army as part of a training area but cyclists from all over the area heard about the circuit and it quickly grew in popularity. An old army hut was turned over to refreshments and cyclists even raced against runners, who were known to beat the wheeled comperitors.

 

Soon enough motorbikes were using the track for racing, which continued on grass after the war.

 

 

 

You'll perhaps recognise what are now the Brabham and Cooper straights, Paddock and Pilgrims Rise and if so, see they're racing anticlockwise.

 

Talk of another war led the Army to use the land as a car park, which was then bombed by the Luftwaffe. The Germans were back after the war on four wheels.

 

Anyone else have any pre 1950s pictures?

 

https://www.britishpathe.com/video/farnborough-kent-aka-your-world-in-nine-minutes/query/grass+track+brands

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moVu0OUCkYs

[Vantman]

I have some black and white photographs of Brands Hatch before it became what it is now,i will dig them out soon.

[forddeliveryboy]

That's great Vantman. There's not so much I can find online, perhaps I'm missing some key searchwords.

 

After much repair work after the war, the 500 club organises the first race immediately after a track was tarmaced in April 1950, it wasn't long before Stirling Moss was winning.

 

 

[Vantman]

This is all  can find at the moment--

 

 

 

 

Jock West

 

This is John Surtees father,also seen in one of the above pictures posted by FDV.

[timolloyd]

These are brilliant - really interesting. Brands is my local track and the first I ever drove around. It'll always hold a special place for me.

[DSdriver]

John Surtees had a motorcycle shop in West Wickham, not far away.