{"id":10654,"date":"2022-07-24T00:07:23","date_gmt":"2022-07-23T14:37:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.spriteclub.com.au\/?p=10654"},"modified":"2022-07-24T00:07:23","modified_gmt":"2022-07-23T14:37:23","slug":"vale-paddy-hopkirk-1933-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/?p=10654","title":{"rendered":"Vale – Paddy Hopkirk – 1933 – 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Sadly this week we note the passing of the Irish race and rally driver Paddy Hopkirk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Paddy was famously recorded a winner of the 1964 Monte Carlo Rally in a Mini Cooper S, he started rallying for the Standard Motor Company.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Joining BMC as a work driver in 1963, Paddy was to compete in a range of BMC products including Austin Healey 3000’s, Prototype Sprites and MG Midgets, as well as the famous Mini Cooper S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paddy completed in various rally events including Targa Florio, and numerous English and European Rally’s.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
1964 Austin Healey Sprite that Paddy drove in the Targa Florio<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
\n
\"\"<\/a>
Paddy in the pretty Dick Jacob’s MG Midget Coupe in the 1965 Targa Florio<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Paddy has also an Australian connection competing in Mini Cooper S’s at the Bathurst 500 during 1965 -to 1967 – finishing 6th outright in 1965.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He also competed in the 1968 London to Sydney Marathon in an Austin 1800, where he finished 2nd to Andrew Cowan’s Hillman Hunter.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Paddy was also recognised in many competition events, even having a motorkhana course named after him – “Hopkirk”.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

And every 1960’s -70’s sporting driver had to have a Paddy Hopkirk Throttle Pedal on their Mini. Morris Minor or MGB!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>
\"\"<\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Our thoughts are with the Motor Sport Family at this sad time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sadly this week we note the passing of the Irish race and rally driver Paddy Hopkirk. While Paddy was famously recorded a winner of the 1964 Monte Carlo Rally in … Continue reading Vale – Paddy Hopkirk – 1933 – 2022<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","hentry","category-spritely-chat","post_format-post-format-image"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgyCDM-2LQ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10654"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10654\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10665,"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10654\/revisions\/10665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spriteclub.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}