Exactly a year after suffering a heart attack while competing at the Donington Historic Festival, Frank Sytner made a successful return to the same event finishing third in the 1000km race for pre-1972 sports racing cars.
Sytner shared a Lola T70 with Simon Hadfield, and the pair chased home Rick Hall's fabulous Matra MS650. Another T70, driven by David Coplowe and a hard-charging Martin Stretton, took the victory.
The race, which ran into dusk on Saturday, was among the highlights of a superb event, held on 5-6 May.
The E-type Challenge saw a great tussle between Alexander Buncombe and Martin O'Connell. The two distanced themselves from the pack and looked set for a grandstand finish before there was contact on the last lap, leaving Buncombe to cruise home an easy winner.
He may have claimed the JD Classics Challenge for 1966-'85 Touring Cars too. Sharing the TWR Jaguar XJS – which rivalled the Matra for best-sounding car of the weekend – with Gary Pearson, Buncombe chased down the Ford Escort RS1800 of Mark Wright and Dave Coyne before spinning two laps from home.
The Historic Formula 2 cars were the only single-seaters on the bill, and Matthew Watts took a comfortable victory in his March 772 after pole-sitter Martin Stretton (below) failed to make the grid.
Much was made of the attendance of the Group C sports cars, and Andy Meyrick drove the rumbling Aston Martin AMR1 to a narrow win over Mike Donovan's Spice SE89, pipping him by just 1.709 seconds after an hour's racing.
Other winners included the Fred Wakeman/Patrick Blakeney-Edwards Frazer Nash Super Sport, the Jackie Oliver/Gary Pearson Ferrari 250 SWB, Bobby Verdon-Roe's wonderful Aston-Martin DBR1 and the Lotus Cortina of Leo Voyazides/Simon Hadfield.
