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A memorable Lombard drive
A look back at 1968, the year of the under-dogs. Was this the most amazing Lombard RAC drive ever?
The first thing that will shock you is that there are no less than 87 Special Stages in a route that runs all round the UK, seemingly forever, and nobody has yet thought up the idea of nine-to-five rallying, or, no night-time driving, or cutting it down to 17 stages as an "improvement" - and nobody has yet thought up the idea of running up and down the same bit of track more than once. This then was "real rallying" of epic proportions.
 It was billed as a "quiet" year by the pundits in the motoring press because the first ever London to Sydney was only a month away which was reckoned to cause several top drivers and teams to give the Lombard a miss. But the event reports don't much read that way. Two Porsches from the factory, for Vic Elford who had won the Monte earlier that year, and a second for Tony Fall and Mike Wood, then there were three very special Lancia Fulvia HFs with new 1600cc engines expected to shine, plus Timo Makinen and Paul Easter were in a Ford Escort twin-cam, Rauno Aultonen who was soon to join Ford full-time after the London-Sydney was in another Escort, Harry Karlstrom was expected to do well in a 1.3 Lancia Fulvia - and also the works Saab squad.
Cars set out from the London Airport hotel, with the usual flock of hopeful privateers, with Escorts, Cortina twin-cams and Mini Coopers galore. One privateer not getting any attention in the press reports was a chap called John Barnes and Tony Pettie (who has competed more recently as a co-driver on Historic events). The car was a new Peugeot model, the 204, and was straight from the dealer's showroom, Marshals of Croydon. It kept the same original seats and lap-belts, and the same original suspension.
The Peugeot 204 was an ugly-duckling of a thing, looking like the designer ran out of inspiration and just doodled off the drawing-board a scaled down 504 with heavy rear quarters and bluff upright front grille. It boasted a front drive engine of 1130cc, giving 53 bhp, and weighed in exactly the same as a BMC 1100 at 16.5 hundredweight. The skinny wheels carried 135-section Michelins. And it is in this spec that it set out on the '68 Lombard.
Up and coming photographer Peter Robinson was the regular co-driver of John Barnes, rallying a Cooper S and an Escort Twin Cam together. But for the '68 Lombard, John was accompanied by Tony Pettie, who had rallied with John before Peter took over. The entry was a last-minute affair, after an offer from the Croydon Peugeot distributor brought about a deal to loan a standard car. The engine and mechanicals would be repaired by Marshals, but any body damage would have to be accounted for by John Barnes. With that he shook hands and took over the car.
John was no stranger to rallying, having rallied 404s and was in the winning team of 404s on the Scottish Rally, and scored some notable successes on the Caravan Rally.
"John was an abrasive and forthright sort of person and a little impatient with his views," recalls Tony Pettie. "This did cause resentment to some which no doubt was why his undoubted ability as a very, very good all round club driver was not given the prominence it deserved."
With the last minute deal hatched with the dealership - ten days before the start, the RAC used the entry to fill a cancellation, which is how the car gained a fairly good start number of 33 instead of being added to the back of the field. This would help on the early forest tracks that were being churned up by the rain from the first car through. The only preparation that could be gained was the fitting of two spotlights and a makeshift sumpshield, and a maplight.
"On the last morning was a ten-lap time trial around Mallory," recalls Tony, "they lost count of our laps, we did the ten but credited us with less, so we didn't argue and so chalked up the fastest time of the rally. The time given would have equalled a respectable time by a Formula Three car in the wet, but somehow was allowed to stand. This didn't change the results, by now, the little Peugeot was flying. Press reports (mainly by Graham Robson) give due prominence to all the names, but it's interesting that Pat Moss, who rolled out of the event, and "up and coming" Chris Sclater and other names who fell by the wayside, including the works Lancias, the battling Escorts of Timo Makinen, who led for most of the way, and challenger Rauno Aultonen, all get plenty of column inches. The gung-ho drive in the standard 1100cc Peugeot gets barely a sentence in the reports. It harries the top names night after day into night...all round the UK. After Mallory, it's sixth overall. What more have you got to do to get famous, eh?
This drive had been spotted by the works team in Paris, who called Marshals to ask what support they were giving the entry. At first, involvement was denied. Then the French ordered the Croydon base to get going in two estate cars and follow the 204. They turned up, unannounced, at Mallory Park to ask if they could provide any assistance. As the car was not missing a beat and all it needed was a wipe over the rear lights, and an oil check, a quarter-pint of Castrol was added to the engine and the support crew were told to return to Croydon.
The car ran on down to the London finish to score 6th overall. It was going better at the end than at the start. All sorts of stars would have been thankful of a result like that - in fact all sorts of stars failed to finish this gruelling marathon of an event.
John Barnes had pulled off a wonderful giant-killing under-dog drive. The event was also to see some other great drives by privateers - Phil Cooper in a Mini Cooper, finishing 4th, gave BMC a result they would have been hard-pressed to equal had they entered themselves with factory-built cars, and a Rover 3500 automatic whispered through the forests to finish an incredible 11th overall. Top privateer was Jimmy Bullough and Don Barrow who finished third in an Escort twin-cam. The first-ever international outing in the tiny Peugeot shopping-trolley though really was the surprise of the event. Saab won with Simo Lampinen and John Davenport, ahead of a second works Saab...clearly front wheel drive, good traction and utter reliability mattered.
Who was John Barnes? He was the son of Mike Barnes who designed and raced the Zenith motorbike in the 1920s. He competed in hillclimbs and sprints in the 1950s in a Cooper Jap 500, followed by a Lotus Seven, which was sold to help Derek Bell get going in motorsport. John started rallying in the 1960s, in things like Hillman Huskys, Turners, Peugeot 403s and 404s, Morris 1100, and Mini Coopers. He moved to Jersey and died in the 1970s. Today, Peter Robinson lives in France and has a super collection of historic motorsport photos, incuding rallies, HERE and Tony Pettie is very much still out and about, a member of the HRCR, and competes regularly.
And what happened to the baby Pug? Naturally there was no body damage, as John Barnes would have had to pay for it, so it was given a wash and polish and put back in the showroom at Croydon. It was spotted parked in London's Harley Street a year later, with rolled up black umbrella and a copy of the Financial Times on the back seat. The owner no doubt had no idea his "ex-Demonstrator" had an illustrious international rally history. It could be still out there...
PY
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