What A Triumph

Posted on 04.11.2015

I received a very interesting letter recently which tells an interesting story about this photograph from the Manx Press Pictures archive. The car to the foreground is Tony Pond’s famous Manx Trophy Rally winning Triumph TR7 V8 from 1978. In May 1979, Mylchreest Motors held a Motor Fair at Summerland, the late Doug Baird is pictured here with the prize exhibit. Sitting next to it is a pageant blue demonstrator, albeit the production model unmolested by British Leyland Competition Department at Abingdon.

I am now informed that the demonstrator was brought over especially from England for the event, and that the would-be purchaser had to wait until afterwards to take possession of his new pride and joy. However, despite getting a discount on the price in the photo, the car had issues that needed sorting under warranty and the owner was less amused to be given a Morris Marina as a courtesy car. However, Mylchreests did go the extra mile to get the car back on the road, having sourced one part listed as ‘unavailable’ directly from the factory.

Steve Jackson (Manx National Heritage Library & Archives Services Assistant)