1982

Saloon Stocks  73 cars

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F2 Stock Cars  137 cars

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Hot Rods  24 cars

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Ministox  42 cars

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It had been mooted in some quarters, that driver support for the new Stock Car venture at Newtongrange would fizzle out as time went on. English drivers would tire of the long trip north every week. Hot Rod drivers would re-sign with "Spedeworth Scotland" in pursuit of the NHRPA benefits.
The Saloon Stocks would miss being the “star” attraction which had been attributed to them at Spedeworth. What was the reality?
"GMP’s" 2nd year of operation witnessed increases in all formulae. The Saloon Stock average increased by 30% to 22 cars and peaked at 29 cars on the 11th July.
The F2 Stock Cars average increased by 20% to 24 cars and peaked at a very spectacular 53 cars on Scottish Championship day.

Even the Hot Rod average went up to 9 cars - despite the best efforts of the NHRPA. Note this average was composed entirely of Scottish drivers & not boosted by NHRPA events. 75% of the meetings had 8 or more cars in attendance.  The peak was 14 cars at the Scottish Championship (the one event which did include two English visitors).
The Ministox had enjoyed spectacular growth in their first full year of competition averaging 14 cars and peaking at 23 cars on the 2nd May & 24th October.

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1982 commenced with the sad news of the death of Roy Cecil at the age of 74. Roy had suffered a few health issues in latter years but it still came as a shock. Stock car drivers, officials and fans from all over Scotland travelled to pay their respects. Les & Mavis Eaton, Dave Pierce & Barry Lee were among those who made the trip up from England.
 
Roy became involved in Stock Car Racing in Scotland in 1964 when "Spedeworth International" awarded White City Stadium in Glasgow affiliation following a dispute between the Scottish F2 Stock Car Drivers & the BSCDA.
Johnny Hoskins son Ian continued as the Promoter at this stage. Eventually "Spedeworth International" took over & then "Spedeworth Scotland" was formed. White City was abandoned and efforts at a new track at Coatbridge failed. Johnny Hoskins however had laid a shale track for Speedway at Cowdenbeath which had also failed after just a few meetings. Roy decided to gamble even more cash and give Cowdenbeath a go in August 1965.
The meetings were initially every 2 weeks, but success came quite quickly and this became every week after a short period of time.

Scottish Stock Car Racing owes much to the determination of Roy Cecil, wife Gwen & son Nigel.
The Cowdenbeath commentator John Kelly compiled a succinct & moving tribute to Roy in the first Cowdenbeath programme of 1982 which I will reproduce in full in the "Spedeworth Scotland" summary for 1982.

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"GMP" had managed to secure promoting rights at the Armadale Track, the first meeting was scheduled to take place on May 1st and would incorporate the West of Scotland Championships for F2, Saloon Stocks & Hot Rods.

First Issue of "Scots Stock"

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One of the major promoting costs in Stock Car Racing is the production of the weekly race programme. It is nearly always a loss making part of the enterprise.
"Spedeworth International" had for some time been producing a "Spede Week" multiple programme where several meetings were incorporated into the one publication.
Gordon decided that he would adopt a similar format with the exception that this would be a genuine A4 sized Magazine and incorporate the race cards for completion by fans.
The Magazine / Programme would be a monthly issue and would thus be a cost saving for fans over purchasing programmes for every meeting, and a cost saving for the Promoter in that sufficient numbers could be printed to cater for a whole month’s racing, and provided they were all sold, they would not make a loss. Thus "Scots Stock" was born, and an excellent publication it was, well worth the  75p purchase price.
In addition to superbly informative articles it included succinct reports of all the meetings as well as the results. Unfortunately the drivers’ lists were still quite poor, I guess we had just been spoilt by the excellent lists produced by Gwen Cecil in the Cowdenbeath programmes of the 70's. It should be noted that as the 80's progressed the "Spedeworth Scotland" programmes also became very poor in this respect.

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Gordon McDougall announced in the May edition of the Magazine / Programme the rather adventurous proposal to raffle a brand new Escort XR3 at the World Semi-Final / Scottish Championship weekend.
The trick was to guess the distance the XR3 would travel around the track on a gallon of petrol when driven by Billy Batten.
Tickets were only 50p each, so a lot of tickets were going to have to be sold to make any dough out of this plan. There is also the possibility that all those who did buy tickets would be persuaded to turn up on the race day to see if they had won, thus increasing the gate. Notwithstanding this I don't believe a similar venture was tried again.
The XR3 competition took place on Scottish Championship day. Gordon McDougall had placed an added incentive for ticket sellers to sell more tickets in that if they sold the winning ticket they would receive a £100 prize. Flag Marshal Eddie Spence was the lucky individual to collect the 100 pounds, but what was even better was that he had sold the ticket to himself! Having himself bought 50 quids worth.

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Newtongrange Track Points Championship

F2 Stock Cars

Note Font in black denotes white roofs.         Red*** denotes Superstars

Armadale Track Points Championship

F2 Stock Cars

Note Font in black denotes white roofs.         Red*** denotes Superstars

 Scottish Championship  8th August                    Radio Forth Grand National  7th November

World Championship Semi-Final  7th August           West of Scotland Championship  1st May

 British Championship  25th August - Bristol             World Championship  12th September - Taunton

There was a European Championship in 1982. What I can say is that it took place at Ringwood and was won by Chalky White. This must have been the most "under" promoted major event in the history of Stock Car Racing. I do not have any further details on the event, not even the date! If anyone can help please let me know.

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 Most wins in 1982:-

Most Highest Points Scores:-

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Gordon McDougall’s season got off to a great start from a driving point of view when he won the first F2 race of the year on the 14th March & then followed it up with a heat 2nd, a win in the Final and 3rd in the Grand National from the lap handicap. Little did he know then, but that would be it as far as winning was concerned for 1982.

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There was some disquiet in the Stock Car press over the numbering which had been adopted for the Formula 2's for 1982. F1's & F2's had been split in numbering for the previous 15 years.  F1's 1 - 500 "approx" & F2 500 and above.
In 1981 the Scottish F2 drivers had been allowed to keep their previous Superstox numbers, all of which were below 500. This seems to have been tolerated, however for 1982 the lower numbers had become open slather and this was thought by some to be confusing, ie the same numbers could be utilised in F1 as F2.
Personally I have never had a problem with this as long as there are not cars in the same formula or even race with the same number, as is often the occurrence in say the USA or Australia.

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A bit of number confusion, however I believe this is No 6 Bob Creamer in the ex European Championship winning Bill Pullar Superstox (photo D Seaton)

There were many developments over the close season as far as new recruits into the F2 ranks and the manufacturing of new cars. Regular supplier of music to Scottish Stock Car tracks Bob Creamer of "One Step Beyond" discos had purchased an ex Bill Pullar Superstox converted to an F2 to make his Stock Car Racing debut in 1982. Eric Moore & Alex Craig had new cars. Two top Ministox drivers purchased F2's Phil Hiles & Willie Ewart.      

Saloon Stocker Hamish Buchanan was helping George MacMillan with the construction of his new F2. Warren Taylor had built a new car & then sold it to Ernie Reay, whilst Frank Horner had built "5" new cars over the close season.
One of Frank’s cars was destined for Dunfermiline youngster Alan Harwood. Frank had been building cars for many years, in fact Frank’s first race was at Brough Park, Newcastle in the early 60’s. When that closed he took up Superstox in car No. 407, and even raced on a number of occasions at Cowdenbeath as well as "Spedeworth International" tracks in the East & South of England.
However whether he raced in Scotland or England Frank had a long trip from his home in West Aukland.
              
Frank won his first ever race at Newtongrange at 1982's opening meeting, amazing when you consider that he made 22 appearances at Nitten in 1981, was highest points scorer at two meetings and finished 8th in the track points table for that year.

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Ex Hot Rodder, No 141 Adam Manson (photo D Seaton)

Adam Manson sold his Hot Rod & purchased a new Phill Hayhurst F2, to which he had executed some vey tidy coachwork & paint job.
Billy Johnston who had raced an ex Ian King F2 in 1981 acquired a new car. Ex Saloon Stock man Brian Middlemass purchased George MacMillan's old F2.
Scottish F2 debutants Phil Hiles, Bob Creamer & Allan Pryde all scored points at their first meeting.

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No 13 George McGivern (photo D Seaton)

George McGivern made the long journey from the Isle of Man for Nitten's opening meeting, however he had the wrong gearing for the track, coupled with a mysterious misfire from his engine so did not figure in the results. Lucky I still managed to take a photo of George's visit!

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It only took until the 2nd meeting of the season for the first F2 driver to grab two heats & Final, Russell Taylor accomplishing the feat, unfortunately we didn’t see how he would fair in the Grand National as Russell & brother Warren were "offski" back to County Durum. A pattern they often followed after the Final.

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 An amazing occurrence on the 4th April when the Stock Car meeting scheduled was cancelled, apparently due to insufficient cars being booked in to race. I do not believe this has ever happened again for this reason. So that left 3 meetings in April to run and produced Final wins for Stu Wilkinson, Paul Broatch & George MacMillan. Russell Taylor also managed to win a Grand National on the 11th April, so he didn’t leave after EVERY Final then!
Unfortunately Russell’s early season form came to a halt when he broke his leg at an end of April meeting at Hartlepool.

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No 33 Keith Stanford, not a yellow roof for to much longer (photo D Seaton)

24th April marked a special date in Keith Stanford’s Stock Car Racing career when he collected his first race win the Radio Forth Grand National. He then went one better by collecting his first Final win on the 2nd May. What was of particular note though was that Keith came through for 2nd position in the Grand National from his lap handicap.

I’m sure Keith had taken inspiration from that visionary Stock Car journalist Dave Seaton! who had predicted in "Short Circuit" magazine that Keith and contemporary Jimmy Moddie (then both yellow tops) were destined for greater things. (Jimmy took a few more weeks to demonstrate his true prowess).

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517 Mel Million winning the "Aussie Trophy" (photo D Seaton)

Another 3 meetings took us up to the F2 World Qualifying Rounds at Armadale & Newtongrange at the end of the month. Two Final wins being collected by “Paul” and one to novice Mel Million. Mel (a white top) had started to really impress. Utilising a Frank Horner car. He had won his first points at the opening Armadale meeting with a Final 7th. However on the 8th May he won a heat at Nitten and netted a Final 3rd. On the 15th May he came through to win the “Highly Prestigious” “Aussie Trophy”! (the first heat of the day, to allow as many drivers as possible a chance of winning). He also won the other heat of the day and finished 2nd in the Grand National. Another heat win came the following day at Hartlepool.

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600 Rod Avon WQR top points scorer, seen here at Armadale (photo D Seaton)

The F2 World Qualifying rounds came round at the end of May. 35 cars were in competition at Armadale on the 29th & 31 cars the following day at Newtongrange. 
Top Scottish points scorers were Keith Stanford with 33 points & Jimmy Moodie with 16 points. Whilst the best performance overall came from long distance traveller from Jersey, Rod Avon who collected heat and Final at Armadale & heat 4th and Final at Newtongrange for a total of 45 points. Pete Hobson was the other big point’s gatherer with heat win and Final 2nd at Armadale & heat 2nd & Final 2nd at Newtongrange for 43 points.

The top ten The World Qualifying Points gained at both tracks were as follows:- 

Armadale                                                                  Newtongrange