GOW!
SPEED HILL CLIMB
GOW! Speed Hill Climb was the very first event the Vintage Hot Rod Association hosted. We started back in May 2013, and save for not running in 2014 as the hill was oversubscribed, it ran every year until 2023, when we celebrated our tenth anniversary of the event.
The seed for GOW! was sown when the VHRA were invited to be part of a paddock display at the Bugatti Owners Club Autumn Classic race meeting. After being enthralled by the racing, we established that we could hire the hill for our own event, so a date was settled upon and GOW! Speed Hill Climb was born. As soon as it was announced to members it became clear we were onto a winner, and the bookings kept rolling in to make the event a roaring success, giving us a paddock chock full of hot rods and customs, all with owners keen to take to the hill throughout the day. This was echoed at every GOW! that followed and the event was cited by many as the best thing they have ever done with their hot rod.
Prescott Hill for its part is set in the heart of the beautiful Cotswolds, and this historic racetrack has been a home to motorsport since 1937 and is still as exciting today as it was 80 years ago. Along its 1,128 yards, the track has twists, turns, hairpins and blind bends that seem to drop to infinity. GOW! certainly wasn't for the faint-hearted!
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Sadly, a change of policy at the Bugatti Owners Club late in 2023 meant GOW! could not continue at Prescott Hill. We know we'll miss it, but with fantastic memories of good times in the best of company.
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Vintage
Nationals
The Vintage Nationals was the Vintage Hot Rod Association's foray into full on drag racing from 2017 to 2019. After many an hour waiting in line for the Flathead Meltdown, a decision was made to see if we could pull off our own meeting exclusively for the cars of the VHRA, with the opportunity to get more runs in on race day.
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With the Hot Rod Races on Pendine Sands and GOW! Speed Hill Climb at Prescott Hill already a roaring success at such prestige, we decided to follow a similar theme and host the event at the premier drag strip in the UK, Santa Pod Raceway, which has been operating since 1966.
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The first event was run in 2017 and was a great success. Not only was the drag strip visited by more than ninety racers, we had two fun packed nights in the clubhouse, with Big Boy Bloater & the Limits and James Hunter taking to the stage on consecutive nights.
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Sadly numbers dwindled for 2018, with a further drop in 2019, when only forty odd cars took part in the racing. It was always going to be a tough gig squeezing our niche event into such a large venue, but we gave it our best shot. One of our biggest hurdles was how brutal a drag strip can be on cars, so many kept away as they were saving their cars for Pendine. ​We're proud of what was achieved, and whilst not a commercial success, we gave our members the chance to have unlimited runs on one of the finest drag strips in the world.
ATOMIC
DRAGS
For six years, from 2014 to 2019, ATOMIC Vintage Festival was held at Sywell Aerodrome. It was an all-encompassing experience, featuring all kinds of entertainment and attractions from the middle of the 20th Century. Poodle Parades, a vintage funfair, drive-in movies, rock 'n'roll parties in the hanger and so much more, it was a weekend of pure escapism for anyone with a hankering for days gone by.
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The Vintage Hot Rod Associations part in all of this was to host the ATOMIC Drags. With a run-what-you-brung for all-comers in their old cars and motorcycles, with half a dozen or so classes defined to give everyone a chance to go home with an original 1950s motorsport trophy.
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Alongside the members of the public racing, we hosted the Gasser Circus on a number of occasions, which was an incredible spectacle each and every time, with some outstanding burnout action to wow the crowds. We also had the racers from BriSCA Heritage Stock Cars join us with their fabulous pre-war Americana, giving some outstanding displays of old-time bumper to bumper, door to door action, up, down and around the drag strip.
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We can't mention the ATOMIC Drags without a nod to Johnny Radix, who was six times undefeated champion, taking home the silverware each and every time. A legend was born...
SOUP
Magazine
Soup was a sometimes annual publication highlighting the best of the Vintage Hot Rod Association. Released as a limited edition, Soup was a high quality publication, with 92 perfect bound A5 pages, printed on heavy stock recycled paper. It contained photography and features exclusive to the VHRA.
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Print is a tough game these days and whilst Soup was a moderate success, it was hard to justify the time and outlay to continue beyond Issue 4. That's not to say it won't happen again, just not right now.
Issue four from 2023 had reports on Pendine and GOW!, plus features on a couple of flathead powered vehicles from the west of England in the shape of Kirsty Taylor's 1936 pickup and Dean Walker's Model A roadster. All of this was captured by this issue's guest photographer, Ella Mae Walker. There was also some never been published before pictures of Babs on Pendine in 1926 for you to enjoy. For the cover car, we couldn't resist David Sollis' record breaking Model A Sedan.
Issue two came out late 2021 and featured the photography of Paul Martin and Jacqueline Davies, with full reports on the Hot Rod Races, GOW! and the VHRA Swap Meet. The driving force behind this issue was Paul, who really wanted to put something together with the VHRA, and when he suggested we do it in aid of Cancer Research, we were straight on board. Thanks to everyone's generous spirit, more than £1,000 was raised for charity and the magazine sold out in just a couple of weeks.
Issue one of Soup was included with our 2014 Pendine Sands DVD release. It ran to just 16 pages and was a dip of the toe into producing a magazine. It would seem it must have been cold as it took so long to get round to issue two!
Showcasing the fantastic photography of Neal Reed and John Isaac from the 2014 Hot Rod Races, it also included current records and those brave souls in the 100 MPH Club. Mark Gee's 32 then flathead powered coupe adorned the cover, whilst the centre spread went to Christophe Mehault and his hand built streamliner
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A limited reprint of 100 copies of the first issue was released in December 2023, which were all snapped up by the turn of the New Year.
Issue three captured our 2022 season with our regular reports on both Pendine and GOW!, with photography by the wonderful John Isaacs. There were features on an ever evolving Model T roadster in the hands of Marco Warren, as well as a pair of survivor deuces tucked away in Essex, owned by Cheryl Loeber and photographed by Ella Mae Walker.
