With Love to Africa – the story of how SB1619 ended up in Rhodesia:
AN INTRODUCTION TO RACING
By Tony Jefferies
(Published in The Dunlop Rhodesian Gazette, Volume Two, Number 1, February 1963)
Having obtained a small amount of experience and had it great deal of fun in a "hotted up" Morris Minor I decided to stop motor racing until such time as I had accumulated sufficient money to import a car more suitable for racing.
I had hoped to miss out the Sports Car "step-up the ladder" and it was my intention at that time to import a Formula Junior car, which John Love had kindly offered to purchase while in England. Towards the end of last season it became apparent that there was going to be very little future for Formula Junior racing here in Rhodesia or in South Africa. Formula I was out of the question – financially – in addition to which I was not sure that I had the ability to drive a single-seater car; I was most grateful to Eric Glasby at this stage for allowing me to spend some time on the deserted Kumalo track in his Cooper, but I still wasn't quite sure ... I, therefore, decided to compromise and import the new Lotus Super Seven "1500" which had recently been announced.
After frantic telephone calls to John Love in London, and through his influence and co-operation, I managed to have one of the first "1500" models shipped to Durban.
The car is a diminutive, somewhat awkward looking open sports car weighing only 900 lbs., which coupled with a 100 bhp. Cosworth-tuned Ford 116E engine makes it a very exciting car to drive, with performance figures comparable to the E-type Jaguar.
Many delays resulted in the car being landed in Durban four days before the Rhodesian Grand Prix meeting, and after a memorable trip to Dur-ban with John Love, where we collected the "Seven" and his ex-works Cooper, we arrived back in Bulawayo with very little time to spare. My heart was in my mouth as I watched four years hard saving come swinging off the Pendennis Castle, suspended by a single rope. I was perhaps a little disappointed with the car at first sight as the factory had not had time to paint it, and I was very indignant when one of the dock hands asked if it was made out of paraffin tins!!
At practice and on race day we were met with initial teething troubles which necessitated a lot of work and many sleepless nights before our next race which was at the Rand Grand Prix meeting at Kyalami near Johannesburg. Having sold everything in order to purchase the Lotus, I now found myself in the rather unusual predica-ment of having a racing car but no means of transporting it to race meetings; fortunately a good friend came to my assistance and offered to accompany me on the S.A. circuits, so, using his car and a borrowed trailer, we arrived at Kyalami on the eve of the race with very little time for practice.
This was the first time I had driven on a track other than Kumalo, where it is really just a matter of "accelerate hard – brake hard" with no blind corners and little chance of doing any real damage should you spin off. The track at Kyalami is glass smooth by comparison and has been built on the side of a hill with sweeping corners, flanked by banks of earth and steep gradients. I have never been quite so scared in all my life as I was after a few laps, finding that the other cars were still accelerating where I was braking; cars with far inferior road-holding to the Lotus were whizzing past me like hornets on some of the corners. I shall never forget that first feeling of complete lack of ability and experience.
From times obtained at practice. I was in the first six fastest cars and started the race in the second row of the grid, with some 25 cars behind. I was very nervous before the start and at the drop of the flag pulled off without having posi-tioned my goggles; however, all nervousness is forgotten once the race has started and by the half way mark I was used to the track and the feeling of the car drifting on the smooth surface. I was really enjoying myself when, on one of the faster corners, the car left the track, careered over the first ditch and landed on the sump, suspended over a second ditch. I vaguely remember, as I frantically tried to free the front of the car, a solitary woman's voice in the crowd saying. "Shame – why doesn't somebody help him?" The car was not seriously damaged and I managed to finish the race two laps behind the leaders.
It was at this meeting that I saw for the first time the fabulous Coventry Climax and B.R.M. V8-engined cars and the men who drive them, and I must say, in addition to a great deal of experi-ence gained in the Lotus on this trip, she also provided me with a grandstand seat at the three Springbok Grand Prix meetings, I also got the opportunity of seeing the overseas drivers in action and of mixing with racing celebrities in the pits and at the prize-giving parties; men whose faces were so familiar to me from racing books and newspapers. By far the most impres-sive of the overseas cars were the "Team Lotus" entries driven by Jim Clark and Trevor Taylor. These cars were immaculately maintained by a team of mechanics throughout the tour and really gave the appearance of being "works" entries, whereas the appearance, not so much the perfor-mance, of some of the other cars was disappointing.
Following the Kyalami meeting we moved on to the Natal Grand Prix at Westmead, outside Durban; the track here was, at first, even more terrifying than Kyalami and was particularly tricky in the wet weather. Until this ill-fated meeting, motor racing to me had meant only hard works and lots of fun, but now I WAS faced with the reality of the danger involved and the possible consequences. Gary Hocking's tragic death, fol-lowed by Ivan Glasby's spectacular crash brought this home to me rather forcibly.
Towards the end of the practice session an ominous knock appeared in the engine and this was found to be a con-rod suffering from claustro-phobia which entailed working until the early hours of the morning in order to have the car ready for the race. Everyone was most helpful. Grosvenor Motors, the Ford agents in Durban, allowed me the use of their workshop and even supplied me with spares free of charge at 11.30 p.m.!
On race day, the previous night's hard work was well rewarded and the car finished second in Class T and third overall – my greatest thrill be-ing when Colin Chapman (Mr. Lotus himself) congratulated me after the prize-giving; a request for the job of tea boy at the Lotus factory was, unfortunately, turned down – apparently there is a queue for that job as well!!
After the meeting my travelling companion returned to Johannesburg with the Lotus while I spent Christmas Day in Durban with the family before travelling on to East London for the South African Grand Prix, this time as pit mechanic to another Bulawayo driver. Sufficient has been writ-ten about this Grand Prix and its result, and all I can say is that it was a tremendously exciting event to watch, which I wouldn't have missed for all the tyres in Fuchsware. This was the first time I had seen Stirling Moss, who looked sur-prisingly fit, and I spent a very interesting 15 minutes listening to him and Bruce Johnstone dis-cussing the Dunlop racing tyre in the B.R.M. pit – this was while signing autographs, which appears to be second nature to him.
As a driver becomes more competent, so his tyres assume a role of greater importance and increasingly more attention is paid to them until one reaches the Grand Prix driver's stage where they are regarded in their true light: the number one factor in safety and road-holding. In this sport, where tenths of a second gained on corners might well mean the difference between winning or losing, tremendous tyre development has taken place and the name Dunlop reigns supreme and seems to be the magic word – the important place held by Dunlop in international racing circles impressed me as much as anything. However, the final proof came towards the end of the meeting:
Built on top of the pits at East London was an exclusively reserved area to which neither my "competitors" nor "official" ticket could gain me admittance. I badly wanted to enter this enclosure and tried, as a last resort, my Dunlop Rhodesia Factory Entry Permit. At the sight of this impressive looking document bearing the magic word, heels were clicked and I was allowed to pass in and out as I pleased! I'm quite sure Mr. Duncan never intended his permits to be used for this sort of thing!
An altogether memorable trip which I hope to repeat this year armed with a lot more experience and perhaps a Formula car.
