Two superb new events for Historic, Vintage & Classic Cars

Between 19 and 24 April 2004, the HERO Irish Trial and Tour will take about 100 privileged owners of vintage and classic cars on a six day, 1,500 mile journey around the scenic rim of Ireland, from Dublin to Belfast. The event will follow closely the format of HERO's other historic reliability trials, and particularly the highly successful Scottish Malts.

The event will start just over a week after Easter. Most hotels and attractions will the have opened for the season, but the Easter rush will have subsided and they will be glad to see us. The roads will be relatively free of tourist traffic. The weather should be reasonably good (in 2003, it was warm and sunny), and spring will be bringing the countryside into bloom.

The HERO Irish Trial

The competitive Trial will cover about 200 to 250 miles a day of superb driving on quiet and scenic roads, interspersed with challenging regularity sections and an enjoyable variety of special tests, as well as visits (with time to pause) to some of Ireland's finest attractions.

The time schedule will be fairly easy, and there are no lateness penalties on the link sections. Navigation will be simple, by means of a detailed road book using easy-to-follow Tulip diagrams. All distances are given in kilometres as well as miles.

During each day, there will be a number of special tests on private asphalt. Mostly, these are enjoyably open handling and manoeuvrability tests against the clock, with a few novelties of our own devising thrown in. On these, you are pitted only against the other cars in your class - we don't expect a vintage Bentley to match times with a Mini Cooper S.

Each day, too, there will be two or three regularity sections on interesting driving roads, again always asphalt. On these, you have to maintain a moderate set speed. Navigation and timekeeping are by means of HERO's simple Jogularity system, which makes things very simple for the beginner.

On the Trial, there is no outright winner. Gold, Silver and Bronze medals are awarded to crews who do well against the standard set for cars in their own class. The most coveted award is the Marque Team Trophy, going to the best team of three cars of the same make and model.

The HERO Irish Tour

If you decide to join the Tour, you will cover a shorter route - on most days, around 190 to 220 miles. You will receive a detailed road book (in both kilometres and miles), together with simple directions and touring notes on places of interest close to the line of route, but you will not be tied religiously to this suggested itinerary.

You are free make your own selection from the many sightseeing opportunities that are available to you each day. There are too many for you to see them all - you'll have to plan your day carefully if you don't want to run out of time by mid-afternoon! Why not team up with friends and travel round together?

On both events, there will be an interesting lunch halt each day, and in the evenings all will come together for dinner or a social event of some kind.

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A rich motoring Heritage

North and south, Ireland is God's own rally country. It offers the unique combination of a superb network of quiet country lanes and traffic-free main roads, beautiful and often spectacular scenery, unforgettable places to visit, unspoiled towns and villages, and a great welcome from warm and generous people. When you arrive in Ireland, you step back in time, and into history.

For Ireland's roads have hosted motor sport for more than a century. In July 1903, almost exactly 100 years ago as these words are written, the Gordon Bennett Cup, the first motor race in Great Britain (of which Ireland was then still part) took place over 327.5 miles on a 92-mile double circuit of closed public roads around Athy. The British Government in Westminster passed an Act of Parliament, the Light Locomotives (Ireland) Act, which allowed Irish (but not mainland British) roads to be closed for the purpose. This Act is still on the Irish statute book, and is the legislation under which modern day special stage rallies take place.

The great Irish road circuits - Ards, Phoenix Park, Dundrod - are legendary, and attracted the top drivers and teams of their day. Rallies and trials, too, have a long history here. The Ulster Automobile Club organised the first 1,000 mile Circuit of Ireland in 1936. Until 1964, it was based on navigation - very tricky here, with the poor maps that existed then - and on driving tests, at which Irish drivers excelled. These Irish rallies nurtured some of the finest drivers of their day, including Ronnie Adams and Paddy Hopkirk, Monte Carlo winners both. From early days, the Sunday Run around Killarney was the event's highlight.

The 1960s and 70s saw the development of a new and exciting form of rallying. The Circuit of Ireland dropped driving tests in favour of closed road special stages in 1964, and over the next 15 years a series of new events sprang up which were to become legends: Donegal, Galway, the Cork 20, the West Cork, the Ulster, the Texaco, the Rally of the Lakes at Killarney. The Circuit itself reached its pinnacle in the late 70s and early 80s, with over 650 miles of special stage and two all-night drives - sadly unthinkable today.

The HERO Irish Trial and Tour is in part a homage to these events, and the great drivers who took part in them. I was lucky enough to be there for that heyday, and have drawn on my many happy memories (and on my old marked maps) to draw up a route which retraces the steps of this glorious past, albeit at a more leisurely pace. Many of our regularities are famous special stages.

But the Irish Trial and Tour is above all designed with today's classic car owner in mind. The route and the pace are not too demanding, and we visit dozens of attractions, many of them hidden away off the beaten track, that will surprise and delight you. Do join us.

John Brown