Rallycross

Rallycross was born on 4 February 1967 at Lydden Circuit

The sport started as a TV show (with especially invited rally drivers), produced by Robert Reed of ABC Weekend TV for ITV's World of Sport programme, at Lydden Circuit (between Dover and Canterbury) in Great Britain on Saturday, 4 February 1967. The first true rallycross was organised by Bud Smith (d. 1994) and the Tunbridge Wells Centre of the 750 MC, with the aid of Lydden Circuit owner Bill Chesson (d. 1999), and was won by later Formula One driver as well as 1968 Rally Monte Carlo winner Vic Elford in a showroom Porsche 911 of the British importer AFN, ahead of Brian Melia in his Ford Lotus Cortina and Tony Fall in a BMC Mini Cooper S.

After that inaugural event there were another two test rallycrosses at Lydden, on 11 March and 29 July, before the new World of Sport Rallycross Championship for the ABC TV viewers started with round one on 23 September, to be followed by round two on 7 October. The series was run over a total of six rounds (three at Lydden and three at Croft) and was eventually won by Englishman Tony Chappell (Ford Escort Twin Cam), who became the first British Rallycross champion after winning the final round of the new series on 6 April 1968 at Lydden.

However, the true birth of rallycross is often wrongly connected with the cancellation of the 1967 RAC Rally, due to foot-and-mouth disease, in November 1967, about ten months after the maiden event. Some foreign entrants for the RAC had also planned to take part in the 1st international rallycross at Lydden Circuit, on Saturday, 25 November 1967, but went home immediately after the rally had been cancelled on the evening of 17 November, and was replaced by a single special stage (won by Swede Erik Carlsson in a Saab 96 V4) for the sake of the disappointed television companies. RAC Rally stage number one by then, Camberley, was on Ministry of Defence land and not affected by movement restrictions caused by the disease in rural areas. Subsequently, only British drivers competed in the maiden international rallycross event one week later, which was eventually won by Andrew Cowan and his Hillman Imp. Thames Estuary Automobile Club's (TEAC) premier event, the original Clubman's rallycross, was held the day after. It opened up the new rally drivers' fun-sport to many amateur competitors, proved very successful and thereby paved the way for the first generation of real rallycross specialists, many of them coming from the ranges of autocross and autograss racing.

After one and a half years and several rallycross events at Lydden as well as Croft Circuit (near Darlington) the BBC adopted the young sport for its Grandstand programme while ITV dropped it after the British Rallycross Winter Series 1968/69. In 1969 Lydden Circuit and Croft Circuit were joined by another RX venue, Cadwell Park in Lincolnshire. However, while both Lydden and Croft nowadays are still in use for rallycross Cadwell Park later dropped this type of car racing from its schedule.

Rob Herzet (AVRO), a Dutch counterpart to Robert Reed, discovered rallycross during a visit to Great Britain in 1968 and immediately understood its potential for the television viewers. By that time there were nearly ten million Britons watching some of the events on television. Back home in the Netherlands, Herzet contacted the race and rally driver as well as motoring journalist Gerard van Lennep (a cousin to Formula One driver Gijs van Lennep) to discuss his find. Both agreed that this form of sprint racing could be also appropriate for the Netherlands. Van Lennep soon started his investigations and found a military testing ground near the town of Venlo, close to the Dutch-German border. Actually there had been two venues available, the one at Venlo in Limburg and one at Elst in Gelderland, but the aid offered by the army turned the decision into the favour of Venlo.

Dutch rallycross ace Jan de Rooy (1979)

On Saturday 17 May 1969 a group of invited rally and racing drivers went to the spot for a test day. Everybody was really satisfied and enthusiastic and only three weeks later, on Saturday 7 June the first rallycross event on the European continent was held. The track consisted of a section of concrete runway, loose sections through heathland and a hollow, about 40 metres long and 10 metres deep, usually used for tank testing. Although the soft heath soil and the muddy hollow hampered most of the two dozen or so competitors, or at least their mostly rather aged cars, the event produced much fun for all concerned as well as the TV audience. Overall victory went eventually to Hans Kok and his valuable NSU 1200 TT. Davy Van Den Branden 9 Times Belgian Champion. And 5 times Netherlands Champion.

The Dutch television company AVRO gave green light to Rob Herzet as well as another three rounds counting towards the so-called AVRO-Trophy and on 16 August of the same year NSU campaigner Hans Kok claimed the first national Dutch rallycross title. On Oktober 4 1969 Holland saw its last Rallycross event of the first season, a stand-alone one-off race organised on a temporary track that was quickly set up on pastureland near the ‘Europahal’ at the town of Elst, halfway between Arnhem and Nijmegen. Here it was young Briton ‘Jumping’ Jeff Wiliamson who drove his Riley 1300 to overall victory. On 1 November the Dutch Rallycross Association was founded and, during 1970, organised another five events at Venlo. For 1971 the Nederlandse Rallycross Vereniging (NRV) moved the sport to its new continental home at Valkenswaard near Eindhoven. The Eurocircuit opened on Saturday 17 April with a race that was won by Jan de Rooy and his famous DAF 555 Coupé 4WD and became the first track in the World that was especially designed and built purely for rallycross purposes.

Rallycross came to Australia in 1969 with a one off meeting at Leppington in New South Wales.[1] Events were held at Calder Park Raceway in Melbourne until the mid 1970s and at the Catalina Park circuit in Katoomba in New South Wales from 1972 until the early 1980s. Circuits at Towac near Orange in New South Wales as well as Tailem Bend and Whyalla in South Australia were also used, but after a dozen or so years the sport faded in Australia. Peter Brock was especially successful driving for the Holden Dealer Team in a supercharged Holden Torana GTR.[2]

The inaugural Australian Rallycross Championship was held at the Tailem Bend circuit on 24 June 1979 and was won by Larry Perkins, driving a 2.0-litre Volkswagen Beetle for Kruger Motors.[3] This was the only Australian Rallycross Championship to be contested.[4]

A national rallycross championship was set to return to Australia in 2015 in the form of the Extreme Rallycross Championship, originally scheduled to consist of seven events held across 2015 and 2016.[5] However, the series was cancelled after just one event had been held due to a lack of entries.[6] A proposed Victorian championship, titled Rallycross Australia, was also cancelled before a single event had been run.[7]

In Soviet Union history of rallycross (under name of autocross) goes back to 1949 when first competitions were held for light trucks, as well as passenger cars.[8] First competitions resembled more light offroad race over 20-40km course, but over time races shortened and purpose built tracks were established. In 1970s and 1980s autocross was among most popular autosport disciplines in Soviet Union with hundreds of racing tracks and various classes of trucks, light cars and purpose built buggies competing. Most classes were effectively one-make classes, with few performance upgrades available, which together with wide state support made autocross popular and easily accessible to enthusiasts. Since late 1970s local regulations for autocross were harmonized with FIA regulations for rallycross. Until that time most tracks were unpaved, since then more partially paved rallycross tracks were built. [9]