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Donington Historic Festival unveils 2014 timetable

With such a packed and entertaining timetable featuring a superb line-up of races each day, the 2014 Donington Historic Festival is definitely the event to be at over the first Bank Holiday weekend in May (3rd, 4th, 5th). Hugely enjoyable and highly competitive world-class historic motorsport is guaranteed and, with the wide diversity of grids and attractions, one day simply isn't enough to enjoy all that's on offer.

The Saturday includes not one but two Touring Car races, covering four decades of this ever-popular genre, with Motor Racing Legends' Historic Touring Car Challenge for 1966-85 Touring Cars kicking off the weekend's race action, and the HRDC ‘Celebration of the BTCC' for Touring Cars 1958-1965 providing the finale for that day. In between, the Pre-63 GT will showcase one of the most beautiful and valuable grids of the whole Festival, while the HSCC Historic Formula 3 promises fast and furious single-seater action, with evocative ‘screamers' from 1964 to 1970 and the HSCC Martini Trophy with Supersports featuring two-litre sports cars of the type that competed for the late '60s and '70s FIA European Sports Car Championship.

Historic Formula 3 and the Historic Touring Car Challenge open the race action on the Sunday morning, with each series having its second race of the weekend. They are followed by a superb variety of grids, including the D-types and C-types, Aston Martins and Austin-Healeys of the Royal Automobile Club Woodcote Trophy pre-56 sportscars and the pre-66 under two-litre Touring Cars of U2TC. Sunday also sees the first parts of the Festival's two feature races - the Motor Sport 90th Anniversary Trophy for pre-War Sports Cars, likely to feature such legendary marques as Bentley, Bugatti, Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, Frazer Nash, BMW, Vauxhall, Riley, MG and Talbot, and the Maserati Centenary Trophy, showcasing cars from the 1930s to the 1960s powered by engines built by Maserati or OSCA. And the day endswith 60 glorious minutes of the FIA Masters Historic Sports Car Championship for Le Mans-style sports cars and ‘Group 4' cars from 1962 to 1974.

The Bank Holiday Monday features yet another magnificent array of historic racing cars of all ages, shapes and sizes. The competitors in the Motor Sport 90th Anniversary and Maserati Centenary Trophies will be out in the second parts of their respective races, while the Mustangs, Lotus Cortinas and Ford Falcons of the Masters Pre-66 Touring Cars will also be put through their paces. The Stirling Moss Trophy for pre-1961 sportscars is always hugely competitive and entertaining, while the Festival ends in high style, with a 90-minute Masters Gentlemen Drivers pre-66 GT race.

The provisional timetable is as follows:

Saturday May 3rd 2014

09:10 - 12:45 Qualifying
12:45 - 13: 45 Lunch Break / Parades and Demonstrations
13:45 - 14:15 Qualifying
14:30 - 15:00 Historic Touring Car Challenge for 1966-85 Touring Cars - Race 1
15:15 - 15:40 HSCC Historic Formula 3 - Race 1
15:55 - 16:55 Pre-'63 GT
17:10 - 17:35 HSCC Martini Trophy with SuperSports - Race 1
17:50 - 18:35 HRDC ‘Celebration of the BTCC' for Touring Cars 1958 - 1965

Sunday May 4th 2014

09:10 - 10:55 Qualifying
11:05 - 11:30 HSCC Historic Formula 3 - Race 2
11:45 - 12:15 Historic Touring Car Challenge for 1966-85 Touring Cars - Race 2
12:15 - 13:15 Lunch Break / Parades and Demonstrations
13:15 - 14:15 Royal Automobile Club Woodcote Trophy for pre-56 sportscars
14:30 - 14:55 HSCC Martini Trophy with SuperSports - Race 2
15:10 - 15:40 Motor Sport 90th Anniversary Trophy for pre-War Sports Cars Race 1
15:55 - 16:55 U2TC pre-66 under two-litre Touring Cars
17:10 - 17:35 Maserati Centenary Trophy - Race 1
17:50 - 18:50 FIA Masters Historic Sports Car Championship for Le Mans-style sports cars and ‘Group 4' cars 1962 - 1974

Monday May 5th 2014

09:10 - 11:00 Qualifying
11:10 - 11:20 Demonstration Laps
11:30 - 12:00 Motor Sport 90th Anniversary Trophy for pre-War Sports Cars Race 2
12:15 - 13:15 Masters Pre-66 Touring Cars
13:15 - 14:15 Lunch Break / Parades and Demonstrations
14:15 - 14:40 Maserati Centenary Trophy - Race 2
14:55 - 15:55 Stirling Moss Trophy for pre-61 sportscars
16:10 - 16:20 Demonstration Laps
16:35 - 18:05 Masters Gentlemen Drivers Pre-66 GT