Race Report: Mallory Park, 10 October 1971

With Castle Combe the day before the original entry of 28 cars was whittled down to just 12 for this Lombank round although the quality was nevertheless good.

Pole position went to Roger Williamson in his usual March 713M ahead of Ian Ashley having another outing in the EMC 606 and Jody Scheckter in the Merlyn Mk21.

Row two saw Rikki von Opel (Lotus 69) ahead of John Bisignano (March 713M), with row three comprising David Purley in his Ensign, completely rebuilt after the Snetterton debacle, Peter Hull in his Brabham BT28 and Colin Vandervell in his newer BT35 version.

Ian Ashley got away fast at the start, too fast, he had anticipated the start, unfortunately his premature getaway confused Scheckter who was slow away so at the end of lap 1 it was Williamson ahead of Scheckter, Purley and Vandervell. Williamson and Scheckter were fighting it out at the front with the March driver doing most of the leading with Scheckter content to sit in second place except for a couple of laps when the Merlyn put its nose in front. So fast were the leaders going that on lap 17 Scheckter set a new lap record and took the lead once again. A backmarker got in Scheckter’s way allowing Williamson to close right up, on Stebbe for the last time the March pulled level with the Merlyn, Scheckter took the inside line so that so that both cars went through the Esses and up to the haipin abreast. The Merlyn was just in the lead coming out of the corner and held the inside line for Devil’s Elbow, in an effort to give Williamson some space Scheckter hit the barrier, the tail of the Merlyn swung out and hit Williamson putting the March off.
So it was that Scheckter took the win from von Opel who moved up after a slow start, Vandervell was third suffering from a tyre vibration from a replacement tyre. Ashley took fifth behind Hull but the 60 second penalty from the jumped start dropped him down to seventh.

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