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Kay Petre - Nick Salmon - 04-02-2019
Many will be familiar with the name of Kay Petre who, among many other wonderful motoring and racing exploits, drove the Jamieson twin-cam for the Austin works racing team in the mid 1930s.
I have just been reading S.C.H. (Sammy) Davis' 'Rallies and Trials', published in 1951 by Iliffe & Sons Ltd. He is describing his entry to the 1935 Monte Carlo Rally in an open four-seat Railton, and he gives an interesting description of Kay Petre that goes some way towards explaining her character. Thought I would share it with you, just for interest.
"The crew consisted, besides myself, of Charles Brackenbury, who was tough, and Mrs Kay Petre who had been of the crew the previous year. Kay, whom I had met earlier on and had helped when she began racing, was one of those puzzles that seriously upset elderly, ultra-conservative people to the point where they break blood vessels.
Small, amusing and decorative, she looks the last person who could stand hours and hours of driving, lap Brooklands at 130 and tackle any difficulty with the tenacity of a small cinnamon bear, especially when wearing the 'butter-won't-melt-in-my-mouth' expression. As a co-driver she is as tough as you can make them; nobody takes the job more seriously, nobody can last longer when really tired.
Henry Petre, her husband, I had met right away back in 1912-13 when we were all interested in the apparently insane idea that a thing that looked like a box kite made of odd wood, canvas and a weird rotary engine, could be made to fly. At this Henry was the cat's whiskers, his method of coming in to low over the roof of the Blue Bird Cafe at Brooklands with a Deperdussin monoplane in a high wind making strong men dive for cover below the stoutest tables saying altogether unprintable things. Anyhow, in the many years I have raced, or become involved in this or that competition, there is nobody I know better than Kay for the job and with whom one can have such frightful disagreements which arise like lightning from a clear sky and assume the proportions of an atomic explosion, only to die down in seconds leaving peace and friendship still unbroken. It is all most odd."
IMG_0001.jpg (Size: 195.91 KB / Downloads: 1,227)
RE: Kay Petre - Chris KC - 04-02-2019
That's an interesting insight Nick!
RE: Kay Petre - Timothy P - 04-02-2019
Brilliant, thanks for sharing Nick.
RE: Kay Petre - Julian Hunt - 05-02-2019
Towards the end of her life Kay Petre lived in the same block of flats in London as Charles Goodacre. They met frequently and remained good friends.
RE: Kay Petre - Mike Costigan - 05-02-2019
Kay Petre in the side-valve single-seater (I don't think she ever drove the twin-cam, but I may be wrong):
1936 Kay Petre.jpg (Size: 16.9 KB / Downloads: 984)
As late as the1960s Kay was still driving a 3-litre Lagonda saloon, which had been the family car since 1934; the car was seen at the last Wentworth Woodhouse Rally looking just as it did fifty years ago.
RE: Kay Petre - Mick Hanna - 05-02-2019
As if by magic.
RE: Kay Petre - Nick Salmon - 05-02-2019
(05-02-2019, 09:54 AM)Mike Costigan Wrote: Kay Petre in the side-valve single-seater (I don't think she ever drove the twin-cam, but I may be wrong):
As late as the1960s Kay was still driving a 3-litre Lagonda saloon, which had been the family car since 1934; the car was seen at the last Wentworth Woodhouse Rally looking just as it did fifty years ago.
My apologies, my mistake. This from Motor Sport of October 1994.
'By this time Lord Austin had given Kay Petre a place in his works Austin racing team, appointing her to drive the blown side-valve car while the men raced the Jamieson twin-cam Austins which Stirling Moss once described, after sampling one, as a miniature Grand Prix kind of car.'
RE: Kay Petre - Timothy P - 05-02-2019
I've posted this before, but this seems like a good excuse to repeat it.
Key Petre, driving the Remaining Sidevalve in the 'Parade of Pre War Drivers' VSCC Oulton Park, 1961.
Many other big names as well including Sammy Davis.
There are quite a few instances showing Kay the parade bit starts around 2.53, but the whole thing is worth watching.
RE: Kay Petre - dickie65 - 05-02-2019
Great Viewing,
Jenks did a walk past.
Chap just down the road from me used to race the ERA Delage.
David Roscoe films are brilliant.
He only passed away last October.
RE: Kay Petre - Greig Smith - 05-02-2019
Fantastic stuff...
We patterned our new single seater on the Kaye Petre car, with a few liberties here and there, Dad and I both liked the look of the Works supercharged sidevalve racer, it's definitely one of the prettiest little A7 racing cars about
Aye
Greig