Tony Fowkes: the garage owner with a sideline in world rallying adventures
Privateer pioneer Tony Fowkes finished third in the RAC Rally with a Ford Escort prepared in his North London garage, then went on to challenge for victory in epic marathon rallies including London-Sydney. Paul Fearnley salutes the remarkable adventurer
Fowkes outside the garage where he prepared his Ford Escort RAC Rally entry
Tony Fowkes Automobiles
From Park Royal in West London to the Paris-Dakar – including two attempts on motorbikes when he was old enough to have known better! – Tony Fowkes has found himself in several remarkable motorsporting situations.
In 1975 he finished third on the RAC Rally in a Ford Escort Mk1 built and prepared in his small but efficient and thriving garage/bodyshop business, and powered by an engine tuned by his brother, David.
Thereafter he played a key role in the return of Mercedes-Benz to competition after a self-imposed exile; was in on the ground floor of friend Andrew Cowan’s creation of what was to become multiple WRC-winning Mitsubishi Ralliart Europe; and competed in Subarus long before Prodrive and Colin McRae made them fast and sexy.
“The Escort Mk1 was the best I ever drove in the forests”
From treasure hunts and 12-car scatters in the Home Counties to the deserts and jungles of West and East Africa, South America and Australia, via the forests of the UK (particularly the Welsh), Fowkes blended speed and endurance with a pioneering spirit.
He was leading the 1977 London-Sydney for Mercedes-Benz until tiredness caused a doubled penalty for booking in early at Alice Springs after (surprisingly) cleaning the section from Perth.
And he was leading the even more daunting 1978 Rally of South America at Bogotá when the team held him back so that its preferred 450SLCs might move ahead of his trusty but less sexy 280E.
He finished second and third respectively – with Cowan winning each time.
Fowkes was more about go than show.
Ford hadn’t wanted him beating its new Escort Mk2 in outdated machinery and so chucked more assistance his way for 1976: “My first gift from Ford Motor Company: a Mk2 bodyshell and all the parts. But we had to build it.
“The sad part is that I never got on with that car,” continues Fowkes. “I don’t know why.
“But that Mk1 was the best I ever drove in the forests.”
Escorts – stronger, lighter, nimbler – replaced from 1970 the Lotus Cortina that he had driven to 24th place on his first attempt at the RAC Rally in 1969.
The following year, again co-driven by Peter O’Gorman, Fowkes finished 15th.
“It was during one of those RACs that I got my wake-up call,” he says. “[Eventual winner Lancia’s Harry] Källström had lost time in service and was really flying. I thought I was going quite well when these lights appeared from nowhere.
“The next thing we were side-by-side through a corner. He was so much quicker than me – head and shoulders faster – I thought, ‘Tony, you have got to get your act together.’”
Cosworth BDA engine proved transformative to Fowkes’s performances
Tony Fowkes Automobiles
In 1971 Fowkes finished fourth on the Welsh Rally, navigated by Martin Holmes, and sixth in Portugal – an early sign of that adventurousness – co-driven by David Kirkham.
His Escort was still powered by a Lotus Twin Cam rather than the newer, more powerful and flexible Cosworth BDA when he finished third on the 1972 Welsh – now regularly co-driven by Bryan Harris – and 16th and thus second-best Brit behind outright winner Roger Clark in that year’s RAC.
“Happy days,” says Fowkes. “We were on the up and up.
“We had just got our Cables & Components Ltd. sponsorship, courtesy of Bryan; his father knew the owners. We all went out to lunch one day and I came away with a deal: £10,000 a year.
“A miracle. My life changed around.
“Rallying took over our business as we started preparing cars for other competitors. Ford had always been good in terms of technical help and they sent me to spend a few days with Mo Gomm, who welded-up the works shells. ‘Jesus Christ! What a lot of work goes into this.’ But I learned.”
A top 10 finish for Fowkes on the 1973 RAC in his preferred Mk1 Escort
Tony Fowkes Automobiles
In 1973 a BDA brought Fowkes another third in Wales and helped him break into the top 10 on the RAC: ninth.
The same combination brought a slew of strong results in the 1975 British Rally Championship: fourth on the Mintex and Welsh, second on the Jim Clark Rally, sixth on the Burmah, plus that incredible performance on the RAC.
Fowkes also scored a second successive national-level win on the undulating asphalt of the Epynt military ranges in Wales, on this occasion co-driven by journalist Sue Baker.
“The BDA transformed the car,” says Fowkes. “Quicker all the way up the range, it would rev to 10,000rpm. Way back in the 1970s. Amazing.
“Herr Fowkes, I am sorry but Stuttgart does not want a 280E leading this rally…”
“By 1975 we had built up a good team of people, too, including two enthusiastic spectators who lived in York: Floss and Jerry Slack. This man-and-wife would appear out of the dead of night in the middle of nowhere to offer you a cup of coffee. Fantastic.
“I had three other service crew, all red-hot mechanics, who would try to meet me before and after every stage. I was well covered in that regard.
“Tony Pond and David Richards were fourth in an Opel Kadett the year I finished third.”
The non-Ford aspect of his rallying career came about through good customer Jonathan Ashman, a future FIA mover-and-shaker but then assistant to the MD of Mercedes-Benz UK.
Fowkes finished fifth on the snowy Tour of Epynt of 1976 in a 450SLC and, with Ashman co-driving, 10th on the Avon Tour of Britain in the same car – arguably the most standard entry in an event purportedly for showroom models.
“Jonathan came to the garage to ask if we had heard about the London-to-Sydney,” says Fowkes. “I replied that I hadn’t given it much thought.
“The next day I was on a ’plane with him to Stuttgart.
“We visited the Special Developments Department and Jonathan put it to them that they should come back into motor sport and build some cars.
“That’s exactly what they did: five 280Es; one each for me and Andrew Cowan, plus three support vehicles.
“It was a very good team and the car was ideally suited: almost unbreakable, so perfect for going almost flat out on long stretches of rough road.
“By 1978 [and the Rally of South America] they had employed some star drivers. But Timo Mäkinen made a rare mistake, rolling his 450SLC, and I inherited the lead as we went over the top [of the South American continent] and started back down [to the Buenos Aires finish].
“But Erich Waxenberger, the team manager, was waiting for me: ‘Herr Fowkes, I am sorry but Stuttgart does not want a 280E leading this rally…’
“It’s a big company. You have to obey instructions.”
Fowkes speeds through Southern Europe in the 1977 London-Sydney Rally
Mercedes-Benz
By 1979 these increasingly plum seats were taken by the likes of Hannu Mikkola and Björn Waldegård, as well as Cowan, leaving no room for an unassuming London garagiste.
Cowan did not forget his friend, however, and Fowkes – a handy team-mate in all respects – was invited to drive a support Pajero to that of Cowan and Colin Malkin which won the Marathon category of the 1983 Paris-Dakar.
Switching to Subarus – “Farmers’ cars – but at least they had four-wheel drive” – Fowkes continued his Paris-Dakar association, and also made three attempts at the Safari Rally, finishing 12th in 1984.
“I loved the endurance aspect and adapted well,” he says. “I had always kept myself fit.
“I had started out competing in the late 1950s/early 1960s doing scrambling on a 250cc Greeves and found it very demanding. I was an amateur – a Junior to begin with but eventually an Expert after winning a race – but took it seriously: jogging round the block every night, weight-training in my bedroom.
“So I felt an affinity for the bikers on the Dakar. I got told off for stopping to help them: ‘Do your job!’
“When Honda France made [about 50-odd] Africa Twins available – they prepped the bikes and looked after you throughout the event – I jumped at it: bought one, rode it to the start – and off I went.”
Fowkes was the only Brit to do so in 1990 – and was one of just two in 1991.
“It was absolutely fantastic. But I should have done it 10 years sooner, to be honest.
“Plus I was always stopping to help others.”
Tony Fowkes: adventurer, enthusiast, privateer; capable and competitive; but first and foremost a Corinthian.
