Simon Ayris finally achieves his long-held ambition of winning the HERO Challenge Championship

After coming close to winning the HERO Challenge Championship for the last two years, including the heartache of the car failing at the final hurdle when leading last year, Simon Ayris is finally the HERO Challenge Driver’s Champion 2024.

An elated Simon said; “After all the heartache, we have done it! It was cruel this time last year, as you know, the car broke. It was bitterly disappointing, but I think Matt has just been brilliant in the left-hand seat, and we've worked really tightly today. We started off a bit scratchy, and then after the first regularity, we both realised we needed to buckle down and get on with it, and the focus has been quite tight all day.

“We haven't talked about winning it properly yet. To be honest, we didn't even look at the results all day, on purpose. Even when they came through halfway through the day, we chose not to look at them and just cracked on. And we were surprised when we pulled up at the finish line, when Andy Pullan said we were second at lunch, and we both looked at each other, completely gobsmacked. So to finish second, we're delighted and so happy to take both titles. Also credit to the Clerk of the Course James Phillips and his team for a great event over fabulous roads.”

His victorious navigator, Matt Outhwaite has now won the HERO Challenge Navigator’s Championship for a record third time. After he shook the champagne with Simon for finishing second overall by just one second, in their MGB Roadster, Matt commented; “I didn't know that I’d broken the record with the third title. I've just been trying to work it all out with the results. But no, it's fantastic.

“We just focused on each regularity as it came, and just kept it simple. The roads were a real surprise. Andy Pullan said they had managed to find some really good roads around Lincolnshire, but it has been a fantastic route, particularly those last two regularities. They were just brilliant, quite some challenge, some on private land, you know, ducking off the road onto farm tracks and a bit of gravel. A fantastic event we really, really enjoyed it today.”

The bumper entry of over 90 cars competed in five regularities and nine tests over a 150-mile route in the sunshine of North Lincolnshire. The outright winners of the HERO Challenge Three, by just one second from the new champions, were James Holt and Alistair Leckie, himself a former double HERO Challenge Driver’s Champion.

The relatively new pairing were fast and accurate in their BMW 325i. James was gushing in his praise of Alistair and the location for HC3; “The result is beyond all my expectations. With Alistair, it's only the second time we've been together in a car, and he's just very, very calm, clear with instructions, but overall, as a team, we've worked well, and this is a great result.

“The roads, the location, the event itself, couldn't have been better. I think HERO have done a great job and have found a fantastic location here in North Lincolnshire, just very quiet, interesting roads, I thought it would be flat and boring, but the countryside was really quite interesting with amazing views.”

Alistair Leckie; “I thoroughly enjoyed today, a cracking route. A really good mix of roads and private land made it a challenging rally. James put up with me today, I even wrong slotted between the hotel and the start of regularity reg one this morning! I thought it was going to be one of those days, but he's been really, really calm with me today and let me crack on and do my thing.

“But big credit to Matt Outhwaite and Simon for their championship wins today. Everything I know I've learned off Matt and off Mike Cochrane, so credit to them for that.”

In third place overall after a great run in their TR6 and a competitive HERO Challenge Championship were Ken and Sarah Binstead. Sarah ended the Navigator’s Championship second equal with Ken fourth in the Driver’s Championship.

Sarah Binstead; “Certainly, after the trials and tribulations we had on our last event, it was a fantastic result in the car and good in the Championship for navigators as well, but I will take your word for it that I was second equal, I don’t know the Championship results but that’s great, it was a fantastic day.”

Ken Binstead; It was a close-run thing today but we didn't come out to compete at the top end of the HERO Championship. We had to look at getting the Healey out on the first one, then had to get it ready for London to Lisbon, and the other HERO Challenges were basically just trialling the TR6. So it's great that we've had some really good results. The North Lincolnshire roads have been fabulous, and the route was wonderful. We had no baulking all day, the other drivers on the road were really nice, you know, they went off the road a lot for us as well. No really, it was excellent”

Ali and Lynsey Procter were quick in their Peugeot 205 GTi, but the engine failed on the third test. However, family honour was upheld by Ali’s father and brother, Mike and Rob, who claimed the top awards for newcomer driver and navigator.

Daisy Walker and her father won class five in their Alfa Romeo GT 1600 Junior, Daisy was a superb fourth overall in the HERO Challenge Championship for Navigators whilst Dad Patrick was a brilliant second overall to Simon Ayris in the Driver’s Championship. Neither had enjoyed a good morning, Patrick reported afterwards: “It wasn’t a great morning, we had a few issues. Some bad driving, some not ideal time keeping, and some quite bad luck with the traffic, but we've had some good luck too, and then a good afternoon.”

In fact, it was a good day for the young talent coming through. Whilst Daisy was a finalist in the Bob Rutherford Scholarship for Young Navigators, Danielle Pool won it and enjoyed the final part of her Scholarship prize navigating twice winner of the RAC Rally of the Tests, Dan Willan.

Dan had this to say of Danielle’s performance after the pair won the ‘Test Pilot’ award for the fastest crew over all the tests by a clear 30 seconds! Dan; “Danielle is keen, enthusiastic and happy to take on new ideas. She did a great job and has a bright future. I spoke to her father and uncle who both said that the Bob Rutherford Scholarship has brought out the best in her as she was quite shy before.

“We encountered some traffic which lost us time but she handled it really well, very calmly and said we should just put it behind us! I think without that loss of time we could have been third. I hope she gets out on more events and more drivers are going to give her more rally experience, she really deserves it.”

Winner of the Rally for the Ages in 2023, 16 year old Jack Harvey was also out on the event navigating his father in their VW Golf GTi finishing third in class.

Beatrice Valmarana was another teenage navigator out on HC3, she was navigating her father Francesco in their Lancia Fulvia Monte Carlo, she has this to say afterwards;

Beatrice; “The tests. I loved the tests. I mean, there's so much fun, or weirdly, I really like the ones where you have the distance and the time next to each other. You kind of have to be very precise, I quite enjoy them. How did dad do? Well, don't tell him, he drove well but he missed one turn he shouldn't have missed, and the rest, I think, he just followed what I told him to do.”

Francesco di Valmarana; “Yes, the tests were great fun. I had been taught by one of the HERO-ERA guys about left foot breaking, and that really helped with the winding bends coming back and forth. I got some speed there, the left foot breaking really worked!”

Credit must go to some of the seasoned competitors too as Henry Carr navigated Andy Harrison to second in class in the famous ‘Orange Box’ Mini. Henry also won the ‘Clockwatchers’ navigator’s award for best performance in HC3 by four seconds.

It was also good to see Amy Henchoz make a welcome return to the navigator’s seat after her hectic season of mountain biking. It was equally good to see the return of competitive Scottish driver Callum Guy who teamed up with Amy to finish fifth overall and second fastest driver in the ‘Test Pilot’ Award in their fearsome Sunbeam Tiger.

Whilst it was a successful conclusion to the HERO Challenge Championship for 2024, there is still the RAC Rally of the Tests to come in early November. For now though, the Clerk of the Course for HERO Challenge Three, James Phillips, running his first HERO-ERA event in charge, gives his summary of the rally.

“I have to be honest, I'm delighted with the way it went. It was a really close finish, the crews seemed to enjoy it, the weather held out. You can't ask for more than that.

“The feedback on the route has been good so we'll be coming back. The reception we've had from landowners and venue providers have been absolutely fantastic, yeah, and there's not been a lot of traffic.

“Finally, the large entry underlines how popular the HERO Challenge Championship is. It is good value for money, it's a great day of sport. Fantastic, roads and everybody started to go home at eight o'clock, that’s great.”

Ends