After the opening three events, this year’s British Hillclimb Championship is shaping up to be a three-way contest between defending champion Matthew Ryder, former champion Wallace Menzies and aspiring champion Will Hall.
It is Hall that has a slender points lead following the first six of 26 run-offs. All three drivers are running state-of-the-art Gould GR59s and their pace has been such that they are already starting to edge clear of the chasing pack. Hall has 57 points with Ryder and Menzies level on 51. The competition has been so close that four of the six run-offs have been decided by less than a tenth of a second.
When the season opened at Prescott at the end of April, it was Ryder and Hall who each took narrow triumphs at the scenic Gloucestershire venue, with Ryder scooping the opening victory by 0.03s. At the end of the afternoon, Hall turned the tables by 0.13s as Menzies chased them both.
Next up at Craigantlet, the closed-road course in Northern Ireland, it was Ryder who won both run-offs at a record-breaking pace as Hall again chased and finished 0.04s behind the 2025 champion each time. Menzies was right with them and took a brace of thirds.
However, when the action moved to Harewood in Yorkshire for rounds five and six last weekend, Ryder hit trouble in the opening run-off when a sensor problem put the engine into limp mode as he tried to get off the line and his run was wrecked. Instead, Menzies swept to his first victory of the season with an attacking 47.11s climb to edge Hall by 0.07s.
Ryder bounced back from sensor problem in style at Harewood
Photo by: Paul Lawrence
With the issue resolved, Ryder went to the line for the last run of the day at the end of the second run-off and, despite a fairly modest launch by his own standards, was able to claw back lost time and push Hall back to second with Menzies third. It was the first time since Ryder set the new hill record three years ago that anyone had dipped under the 47s bracket.
Ryder was quick to pay tribute to his two key rivals and said: “Will and Wallace are really on it this year and the competition and pace is really top notch.”
Hall is equally pleased with progress as he establishes his place as a major title contender. “I’m over the moon with how it’s going so far this year,” he said, while Menzies described the level of competition promising a “super season”.
Behind the big three, championship stalwarts Trevor Willis (OMS 28) and David Uren (Gould GR55) are next up, while a fine sixth in the points is young Alex Coles in his 1.3-litre supercharged Force TA, who has been in the points in every run-off so far. Coles is battling with the 1.3-litre turbocharged GR59 of Paul Haimes, who had a tremendous day at Harewood to bag joint fourth in the final run-off.
Coles has continued to impress in his smaller-engined car and currently sits sixth in the standings
Photo by: Paul Lawrence
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– The Autosport.com Team
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