PMO 200

Also, below: | Competition Results 1960 to 62 | John Sprinzel's Comments | PMO today

Tom Coulthard says in "Spritely Years" that there were 6 Sprinzel Sebring Coupés with alloy bodywork fashioned by Williams & Pritchard. The first of these was a black car, which was displayed wearing the registration PMO 200 at the 1961 Racing Car Show. It featured a double-curvature windscreen rather like that of the Speedwell GT, and the roof line differed slightly to that on the subsequent 5 examples built. It is not known what happened to this particular car but it did not appear in competition during the '61 season.

Soon after the show the familiar PMO registration was applied to what is now regarded as the first of the alloy-bodied Sprinzel Coupés. The basis for the car was one which had already been re-built the previous year using a new black bodyshell fitted with parts salvaged from Sprinzel's wrecked Sprite X221. This second re-build involved replacement of the steel rear wings and shroud in aluminium, the fitting of the new Costin-designed alloy bonnet together with, at this stage, a black 'works' (high sidescreen) hardtop. In this form Sprinzel took the car on the 1960 RAC Rally (right). It was later raced by Pat Moss in the Brands Hatch Boxing Day meeting, this time with a white 'works' hardtop.

Over the winter of 1960/1 this black car was converted by Williams & Pritchard Ltd., to full alloy coupé specification in readiness for the Sebring 4 hour event in Florida, USA, when Stirling Moss drove the car. At this point PMO was repainted silver grey.

Following Sebring, PMO was prepared mainly for international rallying, but also raced with great success, made all the more impressive because it was 60kg heavier than most of its rivals which typically weighed less than 600kg. Halfway through the '61 season John had the car repainted Alfa red. PMO also doubled as John's road car and customer demonstrator.
(Picture right shows Sprinzel leading Andy Hedges in his own Sprinzel Coupé, 410 EAO at Brands Hatch.)

The 1962 Monte Carlo Rally was PMO's last international appearance, after which it was sold into private hands, - by now it had a glass-fibre Sebring bonnet and a 'bootlid' let into the alloy rear. The PMO registration was retained by John Sprinzel & was subsequently seen on many different competition cars. The Williams & Pritchard coupé was then re-registered 248 DXN and continued to be raced until the late 60's or early 70's passing through several owners including John Aley of Aleybars and Ted Walker of 'Ferret Fotographics'. At some point the bodywork was modified, to give it a fast-back style and chopped, Kamm tail style.

The car then disappeared from view until the 1980's, when it ended up in the collection of Tony Elshof who stripped it in preparation for a full restoration. At some time during the following years the roof of the barn where it was stored collapsed, completely flattening the car down to level with the door tops. Due to Tony's ill health the restoration never happened and following his death the car was consigned to auction in September 1999 along with most of his car collection.

The current owners, Paul and Sharon Woolmer, acquired the car at the auction, still bearing the 248 DXN registration and they reunited the car with its original PMO200 registration a short time later. The restoration took 6 years. Theirmain aim was to re-use every original component which could safely be salvaged, regardless of cost or time.

The re-built car, in rally trim, was reunited with John Sprinzel at his old base in Lancaster Mews in the West End of London, in November 2005, the first time he had seen the car since 1962. "Octane" magazine produced a feature article about John's reunion with PMO in their issue of February 2007.

Sir Stirling Moss was also re-united with the car he had driven 45 years earlier, at Sebring, and drove it in the Fordwater Trophy race at the Goodwood Revival race meeting in September, 2006. Despite his advancing years he did some respectable times around the Sussex track, bringing the car home 11th out of 19 finishers.

(The above text was put together from Paul Woolmer's own handout produced for the Goodwood Revival 2006, adapted slightly using Tom Coulthard's "Spritely Years" and with the advice of Sebring guru Jonathan Whitehouse-Bird)

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Competition Results 1960 to 62:

Date	Event	Driver/Co-Driver	Result
21 to 26 Nov, 1960	RAC Rally	J.Sprinzel/R. Bensted-Smith	1st class, 2nd overall
26 December 1960	Brands Hatch	Pat Moss	9th overall
The car was fitted with Williams & Pritchard aluminium coupé bodywork over the winter of 1960/61.
24 March, 1961	Sebring 4 Hours	Stirling Moss	5th overall
2 to 6 May, 1961	Tulip Rally	J.Sprinzel/Mike Wood	2nd class, 17th o/a
24 to 28 Jun, 1961	Coupe des Alpes	J.Sprinzel/Willie Cave	2nd class, 17th o/a
7 Aug, 1961	Peco Tr,Silverstone	Paul Hawkins	3rd in class
12th Aug, 1961	6 Hour Relay S'stone	J.Sprinzel/Team Sprinzel	1st overall
6 to 10 Sept, 1961	Liege-Sofia-Liege	J.Sprinzel/Sam Actman	retired
16 to 17 Sept 1961	Godiva Trophy Rally	J.Sprinzel/John Brown	1st overall
22 to 23 sept, 1961	London Rally	J. Sprinzel/Mike Wood	5th overall
4 to 5 Nov, 1961	Regent Rally	J. Sprinzel/John Brown	12th overall
13 to 18 Nov, 1961	RAC Rally	Paul Hawkins/Vic Elford	retired
6 to 7 Jan, 1962	Welsh Rally	J.Sprinzel/Graham Robson	retired
20 to 27 Jan, 1962	Rally Monte Carlo	J.Sprinzel/C.Carlisle	4th class/94th o/a
9 to 10 feb, 1962	Yorkshire Rally	J.Sprinzel/Graham Robson	7th overall
3 to 4 March, 1962	Targa Rusticana	J.Sprinzel/Graham robson	1st class, 1st overall

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John Sprinzel's Comments:

J.S. tells the story of PMO the Second in his own words:

"I sold 'PMO the First' to Speedwell, as it had become their first GT prototype (all in alloy for the moulds*). It was on the champions’ display at the Horticultural Hall BRSCC Racing Car show, alongside the F1 and other winners – being the '59 RAC Rally Championship winning car. With the money, I bought a beige Sprite from Albon’s garage in East London.  Peter Albon was a good pal and the source of our Austins before we got a franchise. This was one of the three steel Sebrings we built to race while at Healeys. H221 for David Harris, S221 for Cyril (Simpson) and PMO 200 – which was raced as X221 ( as we entered under team 221) X221 was actually the number on my Lambretta which served as our parts vehicle in Grosvenor Street. (You would love the stories from our Oz mechanics back in the day!) The team had been started using Borgwards, where Cyril was sales manager. We used those Borg’s as tow cars for their racers! Cyril and I had been pals since we were about 16 or so.

I actually raced the car at Goodwood in the Fordwater Trophy, in 1960. Bob Domey crashed this car while my co-driver on the Acropolis Rally, and Car Mart of Hendon ( to become our  Austin Distributors at the Mews) rebuilt her with a new black body shell (yes, you could get them from BMC in black) and fitted all the original bits except radiator, carbs and manifolds which had been damaged by the tree which Bob placed neatly alongside the motor, It was Bob’s Left Hand drive Sprite that we used as a pretend PM0 200, on the Alpine rally as PMO was still en route back from Greece by Russian tramp steamer. On completion, the black car had the prototype alloy bonnet (again, used as the mould*) and came 2nd on the RAC Rally. Pat Moss raced this car at Boxing Day Brands, and the next day it went to W & P to get the full alloy top as the first Sebring, sprayed metallic silver to match S221, and shortly the same colour as the cars of Ian Walker and David Seigle Morris. I think Andy Hedges car was also this grey. This PMO, Stirling drove in the '61 four hour race at Sebring.

After Sebring, Paul drove it a couple of times, as did I, including winning the six hours at Silverstone with the car now sprayed red. After its last win on the 62 Targa in March – I sold the car to Mike “Spike” Ducker, who raced it a bit before selling it on, but obviously without the reg. number. I did rally a couple of other cars during that period with the PMO reg – at times when the original was being prepared for another event, which is why the tales of “many” Sebring PMO’S comes from. One was Eric Davis’s yellow and black car - others I don’t really remember. We were not really wealthy enough to have more than one car at a time – so I fear that the stories which have grown up were not really very accurate.

I then bought a TR3A to rally, as I had joined Triumphs, and couldn’t really rally a Sprite any more, could I?"

* I presume JS's first reference above to 'moulds' was for the Speedwell Monza bonnet, and the second, a year later, for the Sebring bonnet used on the Sprinzel Coupes. Both styles were included in Speedwell catalogues of the period, and both came from Williams & Pritchard who had added a fibreglass department to their business. (MEI)

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PMO today: A class win at Silverstone in 2007

In June 2007 Paul Woolmer was invited to enter PMO in the MG Car Club's International race meeting at Silverstone, which included two 30 minute races for FIA Historic Sports Cars. PMO was in the 1300cc class, up against 2 WSM’s, the James Willis (ex-John Milne) Midget coupe, an alloy bodied works Midget, several Spitfires & a Lotus Elite. It was a full 44 car grid for both races, with a wide variety of cars including MGA’s, MGB’s, TVR’s, Elva Courier’s, Triumph TR’s & a few other assorted machines.

The first race took place on the Saturday when it was dry. Paul qualified 18th and, in the race, finished a creditable 17th overall & second in class - behind the very rapid works Midget, which had an all- steel engine which could allegedly reach amazing revs…..! Paul was pleased that his best lap was only 1.2 seconds off that of the lightweight Midget. He had some great dices with the MGBs and  a TVR, climbing all over them under braking and through the corners but with no chance on the straights.

On Sunday it was wet….very very wet. By the time the second race started the rain had stopped and it was just a case of coping with some standing water, and as the race progressed the track began to dry making every lap an adventure. Whilst the track was still wet Paul climbed from 17th overall up to 9th, but once the bigger cars got traction they breezed past him down the straights. However he still finished 14th overall & again second in class after a spin, this time behind James Willis in the Milne Midget.  "James drove an excellent race & deserved the class win". Interestingly both James & Paul lapped the rapid works Midget this time.

When the results of both races were amalgamated Paul and PMO found themselves with the overall class win - "not bad for a car which only 2 weeks before had covered over 200 miles in 2 days, too and from car club meetings and all Paul had done since was to swap the engine & front springs, and remove the carpets and passenger seat….  Over the following week or so he put the road bits back and continued to use the car when the weather was a little more pleasant".                  

PMO at Cholmondeley Pageant of Power (July 2009)
	Sharon Woolmer recently drove PMO at this second running of the event, in changeable weather conditions. She was quicker than much of the more exotic machinery ~ but it took Paul a whole afternoon to clean off all the mud!

 

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