European DTV history unearthed – the Spa 24 hour Magnum

This car is a Vauxhall Magnum that took part in the legendary Spa-Franchorchamps 24 hour race in both 1976 and 1977.

It has survived largely untouched since the late seventies and gives a unique insight into the DTV operation in Europe and the extraordinary skill and bravery of the drivers who raced in period.

In the late ’70s the spectacle of the Group 1 and 2 Touring Car racing was hugely popular drawing massive crowds in the UK, but the same was true in Europe. In fact the ETCC programmes often included endurance races that tested the cars and drivers to the limit. Races were fast and often eventful, and featured a variety of machinery in different classes competing on challenging circuits and the Spa 24 race was the highlight of the programme.

The story of this car starts in Belgium, with 3 cars shipped from the UK being built into team cars for the European wing of DTV – Dealer Team Vauxhall Gulf. Whilst teams like BMW had huge budgets for racing, General Motors had withdrawn from financially supporting racing in Europe, leaving subsidiaries like Vauxhall to fund their own teams.

So these DTV cars really were built from available parts, but with engineering and development being provided by Blydenstein Engineering in the UK  and by TransEurop Engineering who built the 3 DTV Gulf liveried cars. Funding came from the Vauxhall dealers contributing a tiny percentage from each sale to the racing programme.

 

Of 3 cars built by TransEurop, 2 were intended to take the competition to the opposition in the hands of a colourful group of Belgian drivers led by Michel De Deyne, with the third car being based in the Netherlands with Rein Frankenhout.

In the 1976 Spa 24 race in this very car DTV star driver Gerry Marshall and fellow UK top driver Tony Lanfranchi took this car to high up in the field before a slipping clutch led to retirement after 22 hours.

 

In 1977 DTV were back, and with the race seen as ‘unfinished business’. Gerry Marshall and Peter Brock arrived with a Blydenstein car, a silver DTV liveried Magnum specially prepared at the Shepreth works bearing the race number 56.

 

However this TransEurop run car, Marshall’s former 1976 steed, was now in the hands of Belgian endurance specialists Willy Braillard and Rene Tricot and numbered 57. The sister car, 58, was crewed by DTV Gulf stalwart Michel De Deyne with Dirk Desoet and Jean-Charles Goris.

 

The old Spa circuit was essentially a speed course with drivers managing much higher average speeds than on other race tracks, a factor that made Spa very popular with spectators from its inception. The circuit was nine miles long with extensive public road sections that were fast and blind, and with the unpredictable Ardennes weather this meant that there were times when it was raining on one part of the track, whilst on the other side of the track the sun was shining and the track was completely dry.

In 1977 at one stage in the silver UK car Brock came out with a set of slicks on the rear straight into a 130mph corner awash from a cloudburst, holding the resultant 1km slide until finally regaining control 100mph slower than he had been going in.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The DTV Gulf team drove hard for 24 hours on a difficult track in challenging weather with a rain storm during the night bringing the risk of high speed aquaplaning. Average speeds were in excess of 100mph  . .  170kph.  As Braillard handed over to Tricot after his night time spell in a thunderstorm, he yelled ‘now or never’.  The rain got even heavier and Tricot was lucky that a spin into the armco resulted in just superficial front end damage. Quick repairs meant that little time was lost and this ar ploughed on.

At one point Braillard, on Michelin tyres, got ahead of Marshall at the Masta kink leading to the famous situation where Dunlop sponsored Marshall next left the pits with his sponsor’s tyres on the front, and Michelins on the rear! In the final minutes of the race Marshall came past the Grandstand in 2nd overall, alarm aloft in triumph.

Braillard and Tricot brought this car in 8th overall, and it’s sister car and De Deyne’s crew finishing 9th. The team had won DTV the coveted constructor’s trophy, the Coupe de Roi.

This was an extraordinary success against a grid where the big banging Camaros, BMW 530i, CSi and 3 litre Capris were well represented, and the horde of factory supported Alfas were expecting their 6th Coupe de Roi. For the record other UK drivers present included Gordon Spice, Jeff Allam, Vince Woodman, David Palmer, Barrie Williams, Chris Craft, Alain De Cadenet and Tom Walkinshaw!

In fact this victory came just a few races before at the end of DTV’s circuit racing era, with the rally Chevettes now becoming the focus. But images from the days at Nivelles, Zolder, Zandvoort and the rest show their glory days in E

In the hands of the Belgian and Dutch teams the Magnums had proved an extremely capable racing machine.

 

Most of the UK DTV cars that had raced now ended up as rally cars, and very few ever came back out of the woods.

In Europe Magnums raced in the Championships for another couple of years as the drivers migrated to more modern machinery – but they were still had to beat. In 1978 American driver Ken Battle won the Belgium National Championship and scored 2^nd in the Diner’s Club Trans European Championship in a Blydenstein car he brought over from the UK. The first UK Firenza had raced at the Spa 24 in 1973 . . .

So this car is a survivor, and is virtually unique in having reappeared recently in exactly the same condition as it stopped racing in the late 70s. The front section of the roll cage is still aluminium. The holes drilled in the body to mount the racing number illumination lights for 24 hour racing are still visible. Even the seat and steering wheel are original . . . . .

 

 

 

Thanks to Gerry Johnstone, Adrian Barnard, Klaas Van Vuure, Valere Jaemers & Ken Battle – who were there!

Main photo credits – Valere Jaemers.

• Posted by:

  CCS STAFF on 10th November 2022

• Category: News & Events