The 2006 Season
This weekend sees two one-day meetings at Shelsley Walsh:
Saturday is the annual invited clubs and championships meeting with entries from MAC Members and many others from the invited clubs.
Sunday sees the annual meeting co-promoted with the VSCC (Vinatge Sports Car Club). There will be lots of tyre smoke, drive chains and Castrol 'R' to delight spectators.
The Riley Nine and Shelsley Walsh
2006 marks the 80th anniversary of the 1926 launch of the Riley Nine- largely developed by Percy Riley
There will be celebration of the 80th anniversary of the introduction of the Riley Nine motor car at Shelsley Walsh.
There is folk lore that a Riley Nine Monaco did a demonstration run at Shelsley in 1926 to launch the new breed.
But did this ever take place? Both Bill Boddy , and by Tony Bird doubted it. Most recently, Mark Joseland , MAC archivist, has worked on the records and he can find no reference to such an event in 1926. In fact it was 1927 before Nines began to appear in any number. In 1927 a Monaco saloon did ascend the hill in 123.6 seconds. In 1930 the Burcher ascended the Hill in 60 secs
Victor Riley ( Jnr ), aware of the Shelsley rumour, described an actual event from 1926, recounted by his father, which might explain that the run occurred elsewhere. A nice story! Percy Riley had completed the Nine, in tourer form, in 1924, but old William Riley disliked it and would have nothing to do with it. It was doomed to stand, ignored, in one of the sheds. In 1926 Stanley Riley was due at a Riley Motor Club event at Cheddar and he was persuaded by Victor ( Snr ), with a wry smile, to take the Nine, despite William's stated policy. The car went to Cheddar , caused a stir, made a good climb, and the Company was besieged with calls and cables as to when the new model would be released. A hurried Board meeting was called and the Nine went into production, slower than it should have been, tooling and the like, all lacking!
But 1926 was the year when the car was released, a twin cam design that was to take motor dev elopment forward and make its presence felt in the breed of Nines, Sixes, 12/4s, and ERAs which followed. Sporting appearances were notable, Shelsley among them
So on Sunday the hill will be opened in a demonstration run by Robin Dodd's Nine 1929 Monaco and also an assembly of two dozen fairly original examples of Riley Nine production models spread over the ten years of the Nine's dev elopment. These are in the lower field for all to see, near the paddock: Monacos , Biarritz , Merlin, Kestrel, Lincocks , March Special, Hoyal Special , Brooklands , Tourers including the Burcher Special, Imps and Ulster Imp.