Bill Pardoe: From Rallying to the Midland Hill Climb Championship
Bill Pardoe has been involved in British motorsport for more than six decades, as a competitor, navigator, organiser and Clerk of the Course, and today as Coordinator of the Midland Hill Climb Championship.
His motorsport life has taken him from rallies at home and abroad to Loton Park and the three-venue Midland Championship, with plenty of adventures along the way. We caught up with Bill to discover where it all began, how he became involved with the Midland and why he believes its future, and particularly that of Loton Park, matters to the wider sport.
Where it all began
Bill Pardoe was a car enthusiast long before he became involved in organising some of British motorsport’s best-known events.
“I was always a car fan, even as a small boy I was a car spotter,” he remembers.
His first taste of motor racing came remarkably early. In 1958 and 1959 he was taken to Mallory Park, where he saw none other than Jim Clark race.
By 1964, having left boarding school, Bill had joined his first motor club and it wasn’t long before he was competing himself, although his choice of machinery was initially determined by what happened to be available. He “borrowed” his mum’s Triumph Herald Convertible for a driving test event and an economy run to Derbyshire before tackling his first rally in 1965 in a £15 Ford Thames 100E van.
That same year he joined Hagley & District Light Car Club, beginning an association which would eventually lead him to the Midland Hill Climb Championship.
There was another attraction too: the club was organising a coach trip to the Le Mans 24 Hours and this was Le Mans, 1965-style. The trip meant sleeping on the coach and coping with the rather primitive conditions of a 1960s French race meeting, a very different world from Le Mans today.
Bill remembers it, with characteristic understatement, as involving “mainly a liquid diet, rather than solid food.” It clearly didn’t put him off. He went eight times during the following ten years and has returned many times since.
Rallying, Loton Park and life behind the wheel
During the late 1960s, rallying became Bill’s main motorsport interest, whether competing, marshalling or spectating. He and his friends first went to watch the RAC Rally in 1965 and returned year after year.
Then, in 1970, something happened which would eventually bring another branch of motorsport firmly into Bill's life.
Hagley & District Light Car Club took over the lease at Loton Park.
Bill was on the club committee and subsequently competed at the hill during the early 1970s. He also arranged course cars through the Telford garage where he worked.
However, rallying remained his principal passion, He competed on night road rallies and daylight forest stages in a Simca Rallye 1, before moving to Worcester in 1976 and concentrating increasingly on co-driving and navigating.
That took him onto international events including the Manx, Welsh and Scottish rallies and Ypres in Belgium. By the end of the decade Bill was Competition Secretary of the Sixty & Worcestershire Motor Club and becoming increasingly involved on the organisational side of the sport, eventually serving as Clerk of the Course on both road and stage rallies.
His involvement continued throughout the 1990s, including work for Ford Motorsport and organising events for the Historic Rally Car Register. Among them was the Safety Devices Historic Rally Challenge, which became the British Historic Rally Championship in 2000.
The Midland story
In the early 2000s Bill returned to Hagley & District Light Car Club, joined its committee and became Competition Secretary.
That meant becoming closely involved in organising the hillclimbs at Loton Park and brought him into the Midland Hill Climb Championship.
The Championship itself dates back to 1980 and From the outset, three clubs were involved: the Bugatti Owners’ Club, Midland Automobile Club and Hagley & District Light Car Club, under the leadership of Tony Fletcher. Its home has always been the three great Midland hills, Prescott, Shelsley Walsh and Loton Park, although Gurston Down also formed part of the Championship for a couple of years.
Tony Fletcher went on to run the British Hill Climb Championship for many years as well as the Midland series. Following Tony’s death in 2017, Bill was selected to continue his work as Midland Hill Climb Championship Coordinator.
Sixty years on and back in a Mini
Perhaps the best indication that Bill’s enthusiasm for motorsport hasn’t diminished came in December 2025, when he decided to continue his “rally career” by taking on LeJog, the Land’s End to John O’Groats endurance rally.
Nearly four days. A planned 1,500 miles. And a 1964 Mini Cooper S.
There was another rather lovely connection with Bill’s past: the last time he had driven a Mini on a rally was 1971. More than half a century later, he was back behind the wheel. Unfortunately, this particular adventure came to an end after around 450 miles at Telford.
Bill has his own explanation:
“I say that the car cried enough due to the way that I drove it!”
But there was a more important result from the adventure. Bill and the team raised £2,800 for charity. As he puts it, it was simply “another adventure, another challenge.” And somehow, after more than 60 years in motorsport, that seems to sum Bill up rather well.
The future and why Loton Park matters
For Bill, one issue currently sits above all others when considering the future of the Midland Championship: Loton Park.
The current lease runs to March 2029 and Hagley & District Light Car Club will need to negotiate a new lease for the venue beyond that date.Bill believes the implications of losing Loton could extend far beyond the Championship itself.
“In my opinion the Midland Championship wouldn’t work with only two venues, Prescott and Shelsley Walsh,” he says. “If that situation were to occur, I feel it would have a significant impact on hillclimbing at a national level.”
Part of the Midland's strength, Bill believes, lies in its accessibility. With a competitor demographic weighted towards middle and older age groups, the Championship comprises just nine weekends and allows many competitors to compete without repeatedly travelling huge distances around the country.
That doesn't mean its appeal is purely local. Entries come from across the UK, the Channel Islands and even Malta. But Bill worries that without the Midland, many of its regular competitors wouldn't necessarily transfer to a full British Championship campaign.
“I feel that many of our competitors may not want to travel all over the UK competing in the British Championship and may retire or only compete on selected events.”
It is an interesting question for hillclimbing as a whole.
The story of the Midland may have begun more than four decades ago with three clubs and three hills, but its future and particularly the future of Loton Park, could have consequences considerably further afield. And few people are better placed to understand that than someone whose own journey through British motorsport has already lasted more than sixty years and who, evidently, has no intention of giving up on the occasional adventure just yet.
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