On the night before this event, I stayed close to Wenlock Edge, made famous by A.E. Housman in his cycle of poems published in 1865, “A Shropshire Lad” and referred to, in his most resonant of lines, as part of “the blue remembered hills.” Although as I approached the deer park in which lies Loton Park Hillclimb at a keen 7.15am on Saturday morning, the hills were, to be honest, a bit brown. No matter: at least the skies were blue, and with fluffy clouds (no Spitfires though – too far north for them) and the weather promised to be dry and warm – ideal for the competition ahead. My scruffy old DB2/4 Mk ll was on song, its 2,922 cc W.O. Bentley-designed twin-cam straight six howling along up hill and down dale as we approached the circuit.
But enough of the poetry: let's see who had rocked up to test themselves, and their machines, and to grit their teeth and pop the brave pills. For Loton Park, although probably my favourite hillclimb, is not forgiving if you fall off. Ask Tim Stamper.
Victoria Watts! How fabulous! There she was, complete with her 2022 Audi RS3 PDK including child-seat (I know, not an Aston, but her we can forgive...) with partner Jordan in tow, the latter tasked with looking after Edward (Teddie to his mates), now all of five months old – a very cheerful and active young gentleman in a bouncy chair thingy, looking every inch a champion in the making.
And of course the lovely Peter Watts, a proud (if honorary) Yorkshireman, father and grandfather all rolled into one, together with The Pampered One, his sweet and lovely Sea-green DB2/4 Mkll – yes, that one – the trailered, wolf-in-sheep's clothing one, that looks like butter wouldn't melt in its mouth, but in reality the one that has three enormous twin-choke Webers with air intakes as big as most peoples' exhaust pipes, and especially useful for blasting up hills like Loton Park. And so many, many Watts. (Wattai? Wattses?) We would need to keep an eye on this lot.
View Peter in action on this video:
P Watts DB2/4
My own DB2/4 is the opposite of Peter's – a sheep-in-wolf's clothing if you like, with puny little SUs, only two of them to boot, and hardly any tread left on its tyres, poor thing. See Nigel's rather exuberant arrival at one of the corners on the hill:
N Grice DB2/4
And Mr Chutzpah himself, Tom Whittaker, turning up AGAIN in his Aston-in-Drag, the piercingly yellow Porsche Cayman GT4 RS PDK...(we did not forgive him...he's got heaps of Astons, and yet he brings this..) View Tom in action:
T Whittaker - Porsche Cayman.
Guy Staudt was of course present and correct in his immaculate, piercingly white V8 Vantage: we caught him polishing it just before going out for first practice – that is how serious he is – whilst his wife Huguette, who really ought to know better by now, seemed actively to encourage him. Naturally, the rest of us scoffed discretely behind his back. View Guy's 'interesting' line around this corner and how he gets back on track:
G Staudt - V8 Vantage
And Tim Price: black Vantage V12 – the ultimate Brute in a Suit, car and man. And, since reports of his exploits are clearly not being believed at home, he had dragged along his son James as a witness. Watch, and more importantly, listen to the wonderful sound of this car:
T Price - V12 Vantage
And last, but certainly not least, the inscrutable Peter House, in his shy and retiring Aston Martin Vantage GT4, the one with the intimidating steering wheel which he disconcertingly, casually, removes in the paddock. Another amazing soundtrack, while also showing quite how narrow the hillclimb track is:
P House - GT4
(Harrison Smith was unable to join us due to some clown smashing into the back of his road car – we wish him well, and hope to see him later in the season)
The Hagley and District Car Club, whose guests we were, run a tight ship, and are seriously well organised. As things turned out, we got in two practice runs and three official timed runs – in our championship, the second practice run also counts. Great stuff from the officials and the marshals, in spite of a hold-up due to deer on the track! Only at Loton Park...
The AMOC cars lined up ready to go up the hill:
Anne Reed from HQ had set our target times, based on previous outings to Loton, but had no data for Victoria or for Tom, or for Tim for that matter, so their first practice times became their target times.
With so many AMOC competitors (which in itself is deeply wonderful) I will not go through the blow-by-blow jockeying for position during the day. But suffice it to say that at luncheon, I knew something was up. Two years ago, Peter H, having watched everyone else tuck in to bacon, egg and sausage sandwiches, with chips on the side, had just had...wait for it...an Eccles cake. That was it. And at that time, having been literally level with Guy, he eased ahead in the afternoon, and won the day. Would he use the same ruse all over again? Everyone headed off for the lunch wagon. So did Peter, but although he was given a burger by Tom, he was seen slyly to discard its bun – who is to say the rest of it did not find its way into the bin? Or a random deer?
Late in the day, and just before our last run, Peter and Victoria Watts presented Peter H with a birthday card for a Significant Birthday (50? Surely not? Ed.) And (crafty devils) produced boxes of M&S doughnuts, and forced us all to eat them – even the aesthetic Peter H had to give in, since they were in his honour.
But, alas, Wattses, (Wattai?) it was too late! Your cunning scheme came to nought, for as it turned out, Peter H, in the Aston GT4, had already set the fastest time of the day for our class of 60.64 (target: 61.25). Hot on his heels was Guy who on his second practice (counts for us, remember) hit 61.70 (target: 62.43). Next was Tom in the Porker with 62.98, and then Tim in the V12 Vantage – a bit of a barge up Loton, and it was his first time at the circuit – on 63.63. Very quick times: these boys were not hanging about.
Victoria in the Audi RS3 improved massively on her first practice and target of 79.34 with an impressive 69.57. Peter Watts in his DB2/4 absolutely smashed his target of 80.50 by recording a 78.30, whilst, yet again (I am going to have to have words with that Anne Reed) I could not quite get to my target time of 73.38, and in spite of flat-spotting the front offside tyre at the top of the so-called straight (literally wore off a third of the tread), could only manage 73.89....0.52 of a second short. Rats.
Peter and Guy with their end of day awards:
So we all had a lovely day, enjoyed the lunch from the wonderful food wagon run by lovely locals, stuffed ourselves with doughnuts, admired young Master Teddie, and saluted Peter House's sly gamesmanship. For what did he have for lunch? That's right, you've guessed it: an Eccles cake.
Report by Nigel Grice
Photographs by Peter Watts and Nigel Grice. You can see more pictures here:
2026 Loton Park Hillclimb.
Video's by James Price