While attending the Mitsubishi Motors 25th anniversary event celebrating their sponsorship of the Badminton Horse Trials, during a visit to the media centre I came across a number of my former Press colleagues.
One such person was Charles Breton, now called Chas. He and I worked together for Bailey Group Newspapers – now Newsquest. Chas reminded me of the time I had hair and had pictures to prove it.
They were taken at the 1977 Total Economy Run when I was the driver and Chas my navigator. This came about because I was providing the motoring coverage for the Bailey Group newspapers and was invited to enter the media class of the event which was the replacement for the Mobile economy run.
Our car was the best selling ‘supermini’ of its day – a new Vauxhall Chevette provided by Cirencester Garage.
We eventually came third with a figure of 52.7mpg – not bad for a 1.3-litre petrol engined hatchback of that era.
We think the event started near Coventry and then made its way North, across to Wales, into Herefordshire, back into Mid Wales, then the Forest of Dean before returning to Coventry where we duly received our prize, bottles of champagne.
After joining Mitsubishi in 1985 I’ve met Chas on a number of occasions at the Badminton Horse Trials. He moved on to the Bristol Evening Post/Western Daily Press and now works as a freelance photographer based in Longtown Herefordshire. After our Total event participation Chas caught the motorsport bug and took up rallying and a Ford Escort Mexico was one of his cars.
