Butterwick veteran Steve Bannister rolls back the years to sparkle at Trackrod Rally Yorkshire

Veteran local rally star Steve Bannister rolled back the years to show he could still keep pace with the best at last weekend’s Trackrod Rally Yorkshire.

Multiple event winner Bannister, who has been contesting the rally since his dominant days of the late 1970s, swept to sixth place overall with no fewer than four top-ten fastest times on Saturday’s final five stages, writes Keith McGhie.

Multiple event winner Steve Bannister, who has been contesting the rally since his dominant days of the late 70s, swept to sixth place overall with no fewer than four top-ten fastest times on Saturday’s final five stages. Photo by Paul Lawrence

placeholder image — Multiple event winner Steve Bannister, who has been contesting the rally since his dominant days of the late 70s, swept to sixth place overall with no fewer than four top-ten fastest times on Saturday’s final five stages. Photo by Paul Lawrence

The Filey-based North York Moors rallying festival began steadily for Bannister, his Scottish co-driver Callum Atkinson and their trademark Ford Escort but the well known Butterwick potato farmer upped the pace as the afternoon wore on.

He posted a jaw-dropping second quickest time on Staindale’s 5.87-mile stage, less than three seconds behind the fastest car and two and a half seconds ahead of eventual Historic Cup winner Ben Friend from East Anglia's Escort.

Steve Bannister swept to sixth place overall with no fewer than four top-ten fastest times on Saturday’s final five stages at the Trackrod Rally Yorkshire. Photo by Paul Lawrence.

“I didn’t fully realise until after the rally but when I looked at the times I wondered why I was so quick through two completely different stages?” mused the man they simply call ‘Banner’, who admits knowing the forest tracks like the back of his hand.

“Staindale is all bends, whereas Langdale (the second longest stage at just over 10 miles, where he ranked fourth) is flat out! I’m really very pleased to still be mixing it with the younger, quicker lads.”

Bannister’s son John, in a more modern Subaru Impreza, also had a fine weekend in the Trackrod Forest Stages event, which includes more modern cars and runs concurrently with the Historic Cup but without Friday night’s stage in the dark. John came home 12th overall, third in a hotly contested class which included BTRDA Championship’s front-running Mitsubishi Evo 9, driven by Russ Thompson.

While Friend led home the ’historics’, Doncaster’s Matthew Hirst won the Forest Stages event where Elliot Payne, from Pateley Bridge, did enough to clinch the BTRDA Gold Star Championship and become the first driver in the competition’s 71-year history to take the title three times in succession.

Multiple event winner Steve Bannister, who has been contesting the rally since his dominant days of the late seventies, swept to sixth place overall with no fewer than four top-ten fastest times on Saturday’s final five stages of the Trackrod Rally Yorkshire. PHOTO BY PAUL LAWRENCE

Malton’s Dan Mennell won his Escorts class and led the Historic Cup section entering the last stage, but was overhauled and had to settle for third overall, just nine seconds behind Friend.

Pickering garage owner Steve Magson won his class in a Vauxhall Astra, while Scarborough driver Carl Stuttard’s Escort stopped on Stage 3.